Faith and Development

A consensus now exists that secularization theory can no longer explain the worldwide persistence and spread of modern religious movements, with the exception of western and central Europe as well as intellectuals in general. This essay examines how these new religious forces have taken root in economic development and how that development has been shaped by those same forces. An assessment is made of Max Weber’s famous thesis in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. The article concludes with five major observations about religion and development in the modern world.

权威平衡渐进:新中国60年政治体制改革经验探析

维护政治权威以增强对政治体制改革的引导力和执行力,即权威思想;平衡改革中各种关系,调动各种力量的积极性,增强改革的统筹力,即平衡思想;把握渐进的政治体制改革进程,保持可持续健康发展,即渐进思想.这是新中国60年来在政治体制改革方面摸索出的三条宝贵的发展经验.系统总结建国60年来我们在政治体制改革领域取得的基本经验,对我国政治体制改革的进一步深化和发展,全面展望中国政治未来的走向,具有重要的理论意义和实践价值.     

Perceptions of Discretion in Street-Level Public Service: Examining Administrative Governance in Romania

ABSTRACT

Street-level bureaucrats have long been seen as key figures in program and policy implementation, often occupying unique positions that encompass executive, legislative, and judicial functions. Osborne’s concept of the New Public Governance addresses concepts of policy implementation and interpretive activities that characterize street-level bureaucracy. Current understanding of street-level bureaucracy is, however, dominated by research focused on the United States and the United Kingdom, both of which demonstrate differences from countries in Eastern Europe. This study uses survey data to examine street-level bureaucracy in Romania, with attention to the determinants of bureaucratic perceptions of discretion. Results indicate that proactive personality, prosocial motivation, autonomy, job satisfaction, and years of experience are related to individual perceptions of discretionary latitude among front-line workers.     

Blunders and Blame: How Armed Non-State Actors React to Their Mistakes

Armed non-state actors make mistakes. Why this phenomenon occurs, and how organizations respond to their blunders, has remained understudied. This article draws on interdisciplinary research to examine sources of errors, and offers a public sensitivity argument to explain why groups claim and even apologize for their blunders. The quantitative analysis finds that all armed groups, regardless of ideology and organizational structure, are willing to apologize when there are unintended high casualty rates. A detailed analysis of three Provisional Irish Republican Army incidents reveals that public opinion is sensitive to the nature of the victims, and shows how public condemnation can impact organizational behavior.     

Dynamics of Policymaking: Stepping Back to Leap Forward,Stepping Forward to Keep Back

We study dynamic policymaking when today's policy agreement becomes tomorrow's status quo, agents account for the consequences of today's policies for future policy outcomes, and there is uncertainty about who will hold future political power to propose and veto future policy changes. Today's agenda setter holds back from fully exploiting present opportunities to move policy toward her ideal point whenever future proposer and veto players are likely to be aligned either in favor of reform or against it. Otherwise, agenda setters advance their short‐run interests. Optimal proposals can vary discontinuously and nonmonotonically with political fundamentals.     

Information,power, and location: World Bank staff decentralization and aid project success

Using data on World Bank staff identity and field placement, this article examines the relationship between staff presence in recipient countries and aid project performance. I find that merely placing World Bank staff in developing countries has little effect on the success of development projects. Greater field decision rights are, however, associated with differential project performance. In the most fragile states, the presence of senior personnel (World Bank Country Directors) is associated with greater project success after the “Strategic Compact” increased Country Directors' power. However—consistent with a bargaining model in which greater World Bank authority is in tension with recipient country direction of projects—as countries become less fragile, the net effect of the presence of Country Directors becomes negative. The impact of World Bank staff decentralization is mixed and appears to be driven primarily by the power of senior personnel in the field, not the ability of field staff to gather local information.     

Receptivity to Violence in Ethnically Divided Societies: A Micro-Level Mechanism of Perceived Horizontal Inequalities

Although past scholarship shows that group inequalities in economic and political power (“Horizontal Inequalities”) correlate with dissent, violence, and civil wars, there is no direct empirical test of the perceptual explanation for this relationship at the individual level. Such explanation is vital to understanding how integration, inclusion in power-sharing agreements, and exclusion from political power filter down to mass publics. Moreover, subjective perceptions of group conditions do not always correspond to objective group realities. We hypothesize subjective perceptions attenuate the effect of objective exclusion on support for violence in ethnically divided societies. Cross-national comparative multilevel analyses of the 2005/6 Afrobarometer dataset (N = 19,278) confirm that subjective perceptions both amplify the effect of exclusion on acceptance of violence and alter the readiness of included groups to dissent. These findings carry implications for research, state-building, and conflict management.     

破产原因的反思与解析——兼对《企业破产法》第2条的解读

破产原因是债务人是否被宣告破产的关键,其破产原因的法律界定影响着破产法维护社会经济秩序功能的发挥。从破产原因的一般理论出发,借鉴国外破产原因的立法规定,反思我国1986年破产法中的破产原因,进一步解析2006年《中华人民共和国破产法》第2条,将破产原因区分为不能清偿到期债务且资不抵债和不能清偿到期债务且停止支付两种,分别适用于债务人自愿提出破产申请和债权人提出破产申请的情况。