Poverty and profit in Central American forest policies

The failure of forestry to contribute to poverty reduction in Central America is due to public policies which inhibit its profitability. Absence of public regulation of harvesting and competing subsidies to agriculture keep forestry stumpage prices artificially low. This encourages destruction of the forest resource, which damages both the environment and the potential to reduce poverty. A comparison of Costa Rica and Honduras reveals two dissimilar approaches toward forest policy. While Costa Rica attempts to raise producer and grower stumpage prices by tax credits, soft loans and differential species fees, Honduras enforces price ceilings and uses centralized authority to control forest production and export. Both countries exhibit weaknesses in the management control cycle of programming, budgeting, implementing and evaluating their forest policies. Yet the Costa Rican approach has increased stumpage prices already, which bodes well for their forest sector. By contrast, the major beneficiary of Honduran forest policy has been COHDEFOR, the state enterprise responsible for forestry management, controlling production, and running its national system of agroforestry cooperatives. Despite greater public authority and resources than the Costa Rican forest service (DGF), the Honduran forest policy is not likely to increase producer profitability or reduce poverty in the near future.     

Local Taxation in the Netherlands

Provincial governments in the Netherlands have only one general tax at their disposal. However, it has become an insufficient source of revenue for this level of government in the Dutch system. To increase the revenue raising capacity of the provincial governments, thirteen broad-based general tax proposals not used at the local level were examined. The objective was to find a fair and equitable tax that could easily be collected and would result in fl. 200 million in additional revenue for the provincial governments.     

Environmental dispute resolution and hazardous waste cleanups: A cautionary tale of policy implementation

New York State experimented with replacing their litigation-oriented system for achieving toxic dump site cleanup with one promising to lower transaction costs through alternative dispute resolution. Our analysis of outcomes is informed by three generations of implementation work focusing on (1) the motivations and incentives shaping individual behavior, (2) the larger organizational and political factors associated with variation across cases, and (3) the generic properties of policy implements. This mosaic approach to explanation produces, we believe, a more lifelike picture of use to policy makers for understanding the dynamic and interrelated nature of their choices.     

Symposium comment: On the new politics of public policy

The process is not the problem, the problem is the problem. Rudolph Penner (1984). …We argue the superiority of the outcome from the process, not of the process from the outcome. The constancy of the economist's objection to this conclusion when applied to governmental rather than market decisions simply often reflects the fact that, while some economists are not disturbed that consumer preferences lead to allocation policies other than best respond to their own tastes, when political preferences lead to governmental policies not consistent with his informed and considered preferences, they are tempted to attribute irrationality to government.     

Psychological obstacles to administrative responsibility: Lessons of the MOVE disaster

Investigative bodies and other observers have attributed much of the blame for the 1985 MOVE catastrophe in Philadelphia to ineffective management by the city's previously successful mayor, W. Wilson Goode. Goode's behavior toward the disruptive extremist group followed two patterns, both paradoxical: protracted delay followed by excessive haste, and arms-length action that contrasted sharply with his usual hands-on management style. Drawing on the theory of decisionmaking developed by Irving Janis and Leon Mann, this paper suggests that both paradoxes resulted from unresolved decisional conflicts that impeded responsible and rational handling of the problem. The case points to the value of devoting more attention to the psychology of decision-making in educating present and future public managers.     

Examining Sexual Violence in the Military Within the Context of Eritrean Asylum Claims Presented in Norway

Discussion of rape by soldiers as a form of persecution haslargely been directed towards the context of war or actual conflict.Nevertheless, there is a need for attention to be directed towardsthe phenomenon of rape within the military in the post-conflictperiod. This article discusses asylum claims presented in Norwayby Eritrean female soldiers claiming risk of persecution inthe form of sexual violence, rape, or torture within the military.First, presentation is made of the history of Eritrean women'sparticipation in the war of independence and the ensuing politicaland legislative gains won at the end of the war against Ethiopia.Review of Eritrea's report and responses to the Committee onthe Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) reveala state of backlash against women in the post-conflict period.Second, examination of how rape within the military and desertionmay fall under the criteria of the definition of a refugee accordingthe 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees is pursued. Comparisonis drawn to instances of rape of women soldiers in the US andIsrael, as well as sexual violence by United Nations Missionin Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) peacekeepers, revealing commonchallenges affecting prevention and protection strategies. Third,a comparative review is conducted of evidentiary standards inorder to highlight the importance of maintaining a flexibleapproach responsive to the special circumstances of sexual violence.The Norwegian practice indicated a tendency to provide protectionfor compassionate grounds or humanitarian protection, ratherthan asylum. This resulted in non-recognition of the legitimacyof claims based on gender related persecution as requiring legalprotection under the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees.