Transaction costs and inter‐jurisdictional cooperation: an application to land use collaboration

• The costs and benefits of inter‐jurisdictional cooperation and how these impede strategic alliances among jurisdictions is an issue of growing importance worldwide. The reason is the potential cost savings, efficiency increase and economic development benefits that can be realized through cooperation. The literature has increasingly mentioned transaction costs as obstacles that mitigate cooperation and as a key component of cooperation costs, which must be outweighed by cooperation benefits in order for communities to perceive advantageous strategic alliances. However, a framework is lacking in the literature for evaluating the implications of transaction costs for inter‐jurisdictional cooperation. This paper develops a framework for evaluating the nature and dynamics of transaction costs and their implications for inter‐jurisdictional cooperation, with an application to land use. A simple cost function model is used to explain the costs and challenges associated with managing coordinated, cooperative or consolidated relationships, and the dynamics of such costs. The analysis highlights the importance of such things as degree of complexity, inter‐party diversity and the relative sizes of collaborating partners. An application to land use cooperation in Michigan suggests that policies to eliminate transaction costs could help reduce the barriers to cooperation of various types.

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Near‐fatal Intoxication with the “New” Synthetic Opioid U‐47700: The First Reported Case in the Czech Republic

Recreational use of the potent synthetic opioid 3,4‐ dichloro‐N‐(2‐(dimethylamino)cyclohexyl)‐N‐methylbenzamide (U‐47700) is rising, accompanied by increasingly frequent cases of serious intoxication. This article reports a case of near‐fatal U‐47700 intoxication. A man was found unconscious (with drug powder residues). After 40 h in hospital (including 12 h of supported ventilation), he recovered and was discharged. Liquid chromatography/high‐resolution mass spectrometry (LC/HRMS) or gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) were used to detect and quantify substances in powders, serum and urine. Powders contained U‐47700 and two synthetic cannabinoids. Serum and urine were positive for U‐47700 (351.0 ng/mL), citalopram (<LOQ), tetrahydrocannabinol (THC: 3.3 ng/mL), midazolam (<LOQ) and a novel benzodiazepine, clonazolam (6.8 ng/mL) and their metabolites but negative for synthetic cannabinoids. If potent synthetic opioids become cheaper and more easily obtainable than their classical counterparts (e.g., heroin), they will inevitably replace them and users may be exposed to elevated risks of addiction and overdose.     

Rapid screening for the detection and differentiation of γ-hydroxybutyrate using ion chromatography

The analysis of gamma-hydroxybutyric acid (GHB) is problematic because it is hygroscopic, it lacks a good UV chromophore, and it undergoes heat-induced cyclization. This paper presents a new method utilizing ion-exchange chromatography (IC) with conductivity detection. The simple sample preparation, rapid analysis time, and inorganic anion detection capabilities are all advantages over the current methods. The detection of inorganic salts (formed during GHB synthesis) gives insight into the synthetic route utilized and can aid in drug seizure comparison. The developed method has a detection limit for GHB anions of 0.57 mg/L and chloride of 0.22 mg/L. A comparison of this technique with a current gas chromatography-mass spectrometry technique is presented, and a t-test found that the two methods' results are not statistically different at the 99.9% confidence level demonstrating the merits of this fast, simple, and informative IC method as a routine screening tool.     

Has Legal Realism Damaged the Legitimacy of the U.S. Supreme Court?

Does understanding how U.S. Supreme Court justices actually decide cases undermine the institutional legitimacy of the nation's highest court? To the extent that ordinary people recognize that the justices are deciding legal disputes on the basis of their own ideological biases and preferences (legal realism and the attitudinal model), the belief that the justices merely “apply” the law (mechanical jurisprudence and the myth of legality) is difficult to sustain. Although it is easy to see how the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, the most unaccountable of all American political institutions, is nurtured by the view that judicial decisionmaking is discretionless and mechanical, the sources of institutional legitimacy under legal realism are less obvious. Here, we demonstrate, using a nationally representative sample, that the American people understand judicial decisionmaking in realistic terms, that they extend legitimacy to the Supreme Court, and they do so under the belief that judges exercise their discretion in a principled and sincere fashion. Belief in mechanical jurisprudence is therefore not a necessary underpinning of judicial legitimacy; belief in legal realism is not incompatible with legitimacy.     

Economic freedom, culture, and growth

How do economic freedom and culture impact economic growth? This paper argues that culture, as measured by the World Values Surveys, and economic institutions associated with economic freedom are both independently important for economic prosperity, but the strength of their impact can be better understood only when both are included in the growth regression. Our results indicate that economic freedom is more important than culture for growth outcomes, suggesting substitutability between the two. We posit that culture is important for growth when economic freedom is absent, diminishing in significance once economic freedom is established.     

Gender Differences in the Educational Expectations of Urban,Low-Income African American Youth: The Role of Parents and the School

This study examined how youths’ gender is related to the educational expectations of urban, low-income African American youth, their parents, and their teachers. As predicted, African American boys (ages 9–16) reported lower expectations for future educational attainment than did their female counterparts. Parents and teachers also reported lower expectations for African American boys (ages 6–16) than for girls. These findings held even when controlling for academic achievement. Contrary to predictions, the magnitude of the difference in expectations for males vs. females did not increase as a function of youths’ age. In keeping with our hypotheses, parental expectations fully mediated the relation between youths’ gender and youths’ expectations. Finally, certain school-based factors (i.e., positive teacher expectations and positive youth perceptions of the school environment) appeared to protect youths’ expectations from the deleterious impact of low parental expectations.

Effects of Victimization on the Belief in a Just World in Four Ex-Yugoslavian Countries

Levels of support for just world beliefs among young adults (N = 598) from four ex-Yugoslavian countries—Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Slovenia—were compared, taking into account victimization experiences and the general belief in a just world. Being a victim affected an individual’s belief in a just world in the two less economically favored contexts: Victims of exclusion in Macedonia and victims of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina were less likely to believe in a just world than non-victims. These victimization variables partly explained why the mean scores of these two countries were less than those of the two others. A deleterious effect of cumulative negative events on belief in a just world was identified, in parallel with a lower endorsement of the belief when the first victimization occurred more recently.     

Managing the People: Art Programs in the American Depression

How do “classical” big art institutions (museums, the ballet, the opera, symphony orchestras) react to phenomena of globalization such as migration flows, the “denationalization” of artistic movements, the enormous growth of the number of artists, the trend of a global cultural branding of cities, etc.? And which cultural policies do governments develop to interfere in the relationship between those art institutions and their changing environments? Those were the central questions I asked while doing research about the position of art institutions in society today. The research concentrated on a very diverse sample of big art institutions in Europe. The research begins with the insights of Actor Network Theory and the political philosophy of Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt and leads to an ideal typical two-dimensional model to classify the possible strategies that such institutions and their responsible governments can use on the local, national and international level.