Discrimination and diversity: Market and non-market settings

This paper analyzes discrimination in light of two possibilities (1) that variety has a positive marginal value and (2) that it is less costly to deal with more homogeneous inputs. In market settings it explains the anomaly that firms practicing discrimination in hiring may survive in a competitive environment. In non-market settings it explains the minority separatism practiced under the name of “multiculturalism” on college campuses. Curriculum reforms in the direction of more ethnic, racial and religious “exclusivity” may be understood as attempts to change the constraints within which individuals of diverse cultural backgrounds, brought together into intimate contact, may maximize their utilities.     

Accuracy of Investigators' Verbatim Notes of Their Forensic Interviews with Alleged Child Abuse Victims

Verbatim contemporaneous accounts of 20 investigative interviews were compared with audiotaped recordings thereof. More than half (57%) of the interviewers' utterances along with 25% of the incident-relevant details provided by the children were not reported in the verbatim notes. The structure of the interviews was also represented inaccurately in these accounts. Fewer than half (44%) of the details provided by the children were attributed to the correct eliciting utterance type. Investigators systematically misattributed details to more open rather than more focused prompts. These results underscore the superiority of electronic recording when the content and structure of investigative interviews must be preserved.     

Democratization, dispersed interest groups, and economic reform in South Korea: Understanding the decline of the “Chaebol Republic”

The 1997 financial crisis exposed serious weaknesses in South Korea's economy, with its heavy reliance on large conglomerates (chaebol). During the late authoritarian period, the chaebol arose through state guidance and subsidies, becoming the central players in South Korea's export-led growth boom. The early democratic period saw limited efforts toward economic liberalization. But these measures reduced state oversight while actually expanding the privileged access to credit enjoyed by the chaebol. The resulting investment distortions and financial weaknesses were the most important root causes of the 1997 crisis. The 1997 presidential election brought the outsider Kim Dae-jung to power. Kim launched an unprecedented assault on the credit privileges and corporate governance structures of the chaebol. However, the reforms have been compromised by measures to prevent a large transitional recession. It is argued that the overall pattern of ambitious but compromised reform is explained by two main considerations. First, Kim did not want to alienate “dispersed interest groups” (the urban service sector and agriculture). These want to conserve the favorable elements of South Korea's economic model while purging the dross. And at the same time, Kim wanted to focus transitional restructuring costs on the most hostile “concentrated interest group” constituencies (the chaebol and government sectors) of the opposition Grand National Party. I thank Uk Heo and Sunwoong Kim for their helpful suggestions and insights.