Strategic agricultural trade policy interdependence and the exchange rate: A game theoretic analysis

Strategic Agricultural Trade Policy Interdependence is modeled using a game theoretic framework. The model distinguishes between the European Community, the United States and a politically passive rest-of-the-world. Particular emphasis is placed on the effect of the exchange rate on the equilibrium outcome of this game. Without compensatory payments to those with the highest political influence, the results suggest that only modest reform is possible. With compensation, liberalization occurs but free trade is not obtained. Simulations also indicate that the U.S. gains incentive to reduce protection given a depreciation of the dollar, while incentive to liberalize trade policies decreases as the dollar appreciates. Research was supported by Minnesota Agricultural Experiment Station project 14065 “Economic Integration and Disintegration in Europe: Implications for U.S. Agriculture.”     

A NEW PARLIAMENT HOUSE — A NEW PARLIAMENTARY ORDER*

Abstract: The physical design and location of the existing Parliament House has influenced the evolution of Australia's parliamentary system. The new Parliament House will exert a new set of influences. The Executive will assume an entrenched position within its own enclave and Ministers will be physically more remote from backbenchers. The physical arrangements of the Executive entrance and the Prime Minister's suite will encourage a presidential-style status in the office. But the architecture also emphasises the public's access to Parliament in the spirit of Burley Griffin's original conception. There is likely to be a strong “congressional” impetus arising from the prominence given to committee room space and backbencher facilities. Tensions between the Executive and Parliament will be exacerbated. Changes to procedures and to parliamentary administration are also likely to flow from the new layout and facilities. The new building will provide an impetus for widespread parliamentary reform.     

Is There a Future for Contracting in the Australian Public Sector?

Contracting has moved from the margins to the centre of public management. Significant sections of the public workforce, from benefits delivery to corporate services, now find their functions open to tender. Governments prefer to concentrate on policy analysis and development, leaving service delivery to the market. As purchasers rather than providers, governments are redefining the role and scope of the state. But are Australian governments ready for this shift to contracting? Do they possess the full array of control and reporting mechanisms necessary if contracting is to deliver its promised benefits? There are significant difficulties finding evidence that answers such questions. Yet on the basis of concerns discussed across Australian jurisdictions, it appears contracting has developed so quickly it outstrips the capacity of government to monitor what is happening, and so learn from mistakes. In time governments will become better at maintaining accountability for contracted functions, because experience reduces the risks of moral hazard.     

Reviews

Anders Aslund & Richard Layard, eds, Changing the Economic System. London, Pinter Publishers: 1993, xviii + 237pp., £35.00.

János Mátyás Kova?s & Marton Tardos, eds, Reform and Transformation in Eastern Europe: Soviet‐type Economics on the Threshold of Change. London: Routledge, 1992, xix + 345 pp.

Peter J. Boettke, Why Perestroika Failed: The Politics and Economics of Socialist Transition. London: Routledge, 1993, viii + 199 pp., £35.00

John Flemming & J. M. C. Rollo, eds, Trade, Payments and Adjustment in Central and Eastern Europe. London: Royal Institute of International Affairs and EBRD, 1992, vii + 242 pp., £11.95 p/b.

Zoltan J. Acs & David B. Audretsch, eds, Small Firms and Entrepreneurship. An East‐West Perspective. Cambridge: CUP, 1993, 240 pp., £30.00, $49.95.

Alex Pravda, ed., The End of the Outer Empire: Soviet‐East European Relations in Transition, 1985–90. London: The Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1992, x + 238 pp., £35.00 h/b

Leonid Gozman & Alexander Etkind, The Psychology of Post‐Totalitarianism in Russia Trans. Roger Clarke. London: Centre for Research into Communist Economies, 1992, 121 pp., p/b £6.50.

F. J. M. Feldbrugge, ed., The Emancipation of Soviet Law. Dordrecht, Boston, London: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1992, xvii + 272 pp., £76.00. $146.00

John Massey Stewart, ed. The Soviet Environment: Problems, Policies and Politics. Cambridge: CUP, 1992, xv + 246 pp., £40.00, $64.95.

I. Kon & J. Riordan, eds, Sex and Russian Society. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1993, viii + 168 pp., £35.00 h/b, £12.95 p/b.

Kenneth C. Farmer, The Soviet Administrative Elite. New York: Praeger, 1992, xii + 296 pp., £39.95.

Robert Service, ed. Society and Politics in the Russian Revolution. New York: St Martin's Press, Basingstoke and London: Macmillan, 1992. Published in association with the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University of London, in their series Studies in Russia and East Europe. 199 pp., + index. £40.00 h/b, £14.99 p/b.     

Reassessing the “freshman effect”: The voting bloc alignment of new justices on the United States Supreme Court, 1921–90

Part of the conventional wisdom about the United States Supreme Court is the presumed existence of a freshman effect, a distinct pattern of behavior thought to be associated with newly appointed justices. Among other things, freshman justices are thought to be less likely than their senior colleagues to vote with established ideological blocs on the Court. The empirical evidence for the freshman effect in voting on the Court is somewhat ambiguous, however. In order to test for a freshman effect in the voting behavior of new justices on the Supreme Court, we examined the behavior of all justices on the Court between 1921 and 1990. Voting blocs were determined from the justices' interagreement scores, using the widely employed criterion developed by Sprague (1968). We found no evidence of a freshman effect during the time frame under study. Freshman justices do not differ from their senior colleagues with respect to bloc voting. We conclude that the freshman effect hypothesis is erroneous, at least with respect to the supposed nonalignment behavior of neophyte justices.