Problems of Budgeting During “The Great Transformation”

The budget system of Lithuania, one of the nations that recently emerged from the former Soviet Union, is examined. The analysis draws a contrast between the present budget practices and those during the Soviet period, points out the problems that the Soviet budgeting legacy presents to a nation seeking transformation into an independent, market-based political economy, and discusses other budgeting and financial dilemmas brought on by the bedrock reforms taking place in Lithuania and throughout the former USSR.     

Managing the NATO alliance: Congress and burdensharing

The Congress has been an active partner in the transatlantic alliance from the negotiation of the North Atlantic Treaty to the present day. Congressional perpectives have been substantially influenced by the desire to limit the U.S. share of the NATO burden. In recent years, U.S.—European differences over East—West relations, Third World security requirements, and other issues have intensified the burdensharng debate. Now some members of Congress are once again using the threat of unilateral U.S. troop withdrawals from Europe—the main source of congressional influence on the alliance—to pressure the Europeans to increase their defense efforts. Whether the recent focus on burdensharing will recede or grow in the next few years will depend on how the administration and the allies respond to the congressional pressure. In any case, Congress is likely to continue to insist on its due share of management rights in the NATO relationship.     

Regulation and poverty: an empirical examination of the relationship between the incidence of federal regulation and the occurrence of poverty across the US states

Public Choice - We estimate the impact of federal regulations on poverty rates in the 50 US states using the recently created Federal Regulation and State Enterprise (FRASE) index, which is an...     

The 4 Ds of Forensic Mental Health Assessments of Personal Injury

The field of psychiatric/psychological injury and law concerns tort and other legal claims for injuries sustained in events at issue, such as in motor vehicle accidents (MVAs), worker compensation, or the veteran affairs (VA). The 4 Ds refer to the requirement that legal action in these types of cases can proceed when there is a duty, the duty has been discharged with dereliction, the resultant act has caused directly tortious harm, and damages are applicable. In contrast, the related 4 Cs refer to the conditions of effective forensic testimony. The principles of forensic mental health assessment (FMHA; Heilbrun et al., 2009) underscore the scientific requirements in forensic assessments, as do the American Psychological Association’s (APA, 2013) forensic specialty guidelines. For example, Brodsky’s maxims for effective work in court (Brodsky & Gutheil, 2016) cover a broad spectrum of ethical and practice guidelines for the profession. Similarly, Young (2016 a, b, c) has specified the parameters of admissible evidence in court, functioning ethically for the court, and the need to be comprehensive, scientifically informed, and impartial in forensic mental health assessments. All these sources lead to an integrated set of the principles for effective and ethical practice in the forensic arena of mental health work, referred here as the 4 Ds for the field of psychiatric/psychological injury and law. These revised 4 D principles involve Dignity, Distance, Data, and Determinations.     

The Weak Reading of Authority in Hans Kelsen's Pure Theory of Law

Authority qua empowerment is theweak reading of authority in Hans Kelsen's writings.On the one hand, this reading appears to beunresponsive to the problem of authority as we know itfrom the tradition. On the other hand, it squares withlegal positivism. Is Kelsen a legal positivist?Not without qualification. For he defends anormativity thesis along with the separation thesis,and it is at any rate arguable that the normativitythesis mandates a stronger reading of authority thanthat modelled on empowerment. I offer, in the paper,a prima facie case on behalf of a stronger reading ofauthority in Kelsen. I go on to argue, however, thatthe textual evidence weighs heavily in favour of theweak reading. Both nomostatics and nomodynamics arepervasive points of view in the Pure Theory of Law,and both reflect species of empowerment as theendpoint of Kelsen's reconstructions.

     

Segregation,racism and white women reformers: a transnational analysis, 1840–1912

This article tracks continuities between early nineteenth-century female abolitionism and the role of white women reformers in Britain in the campaigns against segregation and lynch law in the USA, and on behalf of black rights in British colonies in the early twentieth century. It argues the value of a transnational perspective to these questions. More particularly, it explores the working out of the ‘maternalist’ legacy of female abolitionism, and the increasing problematising of ‘blackness’ and ‘Africanness’ in the perspectives of a circle of white women reformers in Britain.     

Studying the role of political competition in the evolution of government size over long horizons

Here we argue for the use of cointegration and error correction analysis to combine economic factors that are nonstationary with political factors that are stationary into an empirical model of the evolution of public policy over long periods. The approach is applied to disentangle the contributions of economics and politics to the evolution of public expenditure by the Government of Canada over 130 years. Political competition emerges as the primary political factor affecting government size.     

The Road to Reengagement and Beyond

The Shanghai Communiqué, a pathbreaking accord signed by U.S. President Richard Nixon and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai on February 28, 1972, marks a defining moment in the history of both the United States and the People’s Republic of China;50 years on, its significance endures.     

Friendship and Domestic Service: the letters of Eliza Oldham,general maid (c.1820–1892)

Eliza Oldham (c.1820–92) worked as a general maid in Rochdale and Halifax from the 1840s to the 1870s. A set of her letters to a wealthy relation of two of her employers, Helen Priestman Bright Clark (1840–1927), has been preserved, indicating their close friendship. This article asks what kind of friendship was possible in such a socially and economically unequal relationship, and what it might tell us about class identities and class contest. It locates the basis of this friendship in the emotional labour involved in domestic service, alongside the complex intersection of work, family and community life with larger arenas of radical and gender politics.