Combining Citizen Participation and Expert Analysis: A Wild,Wild Horses Problem in British Columbia

Local governments face increasingly complex decisions and must inevitably rely on professional staff with specialised knowledge. However, ordinary citizens and stakeholders are demanding the right to directly participate in governmental decisions. What is the appropriate division of labour? The article proposes a practical approach to participatory decision making that tries to combine administrative efficiency and democratic legitimacy. The approach decomposes the decision problem into a number of discrete stages. An action research methodology is used to illustrate the application of the method. Specifically, we decompose a ‘roaming horse’ problem in the interior of British Columbia to identify the information requirements for each stage of the model. We use a series of web-based Delphi surveys to elicit specific information from citizens regarding objectives and potential alternatives. The survey results suggest that a relatively simple and cost-effective deliberative tool like Delphi can facilitate an effective division of labour between citizens and government experts.     

Ethnic Group Identity and the Roma Social Movement: Transnational Organizing Structures of Representation

This paper examines the relationship between European integration and ethnonational demands with the example of selected regions in the European Union (EU). It follows the theoretical premises of new regionalism and explores the ways in which ethnonational groups use the opportunities and resources of European governance to express their identities, material interests, and political demands. Methodologically, it conducts a plausibility probe of the potential effects of European integration on ethnonationalism by testing for regional differences in identities, interests, and political attitudes. The case studies are drawn from the UK (Wales and Scotland), Belgium (Flanders), Austria (Carinthia and Burgenland), Romania (Northwest and Center regions), and Bulgaria (South-Central and South-Eastern regions) as a representative selection of regional interests in the EU. The paper finds that European integration affects ethnonational groups by reinforcing identity construction in the direction of inclusiveness and diversity. Although regional actors are more supportive of the EU than the European publics in general, they also seek access to representation in the authority structures of the state. Based on these findings, the paper concludes that European integration facilitates a growing public acceptance of its resources, in parallel with persisting allegiances to the nation-state, the community, and ethnoregional distinctiveness.     

Housing prices and wealth inequality in Western Europe

Abstract

Comparative political economy (CPE) has robustly examined the political and institutional determinants of income inequality. However, the study of wealth, which is more unequally distributed than income, has been largely understudied within CPE. Using new data from the World Income Database (WID), this article examines how economic, political and institutional dynamics shape wealth-to-income ratios within Western European and OECD countries. It is found that the political and institutional determinants that affect income inequality have no short- or long-run effects on the wealth-to-income ratio. Rather, the rise in wealth-to-income ratios is driven by rising housing prices, as well as price changes in other financial assets, not home ownership or national saving rates. The article concludes by examining how the changing dynamics of housing prices and wealth inequality will increasingly shape intergenerational – and associated class-based – political conflict in Western Europe.     

“Just give me a number!” Practical values for the social discount rate

A major reason the quality of cost‐benefit analysis (CBA) varies widely is inconsistent use of the social discount rate (SDR). This article offers guidance about the choice of the SDR. Namely, we recommend the following procedures: If the project is intragenerational (does not have effects beyond 50 years) and there is no crowding out of private investment, then discount all flows at 3.5 percent; if the project is intragenerational and there is some crowding out of investment, then weight investment flows by the shadow price of capital of 1.1 and then discount at 3.5 percent; if the project is intergenerational and there is no crowding out of investment, then use a time‐declining scale of discount rates; if the project is intergenerational and investment is crowded out, then convert investment flows during the first 50 years to consumption equivalents using a shadow price of 1.1, and then discount all of these flows at 3.5 percent, and discount all flows after the 50th year using time‐declining rates. We then compare current discounting practices of U.S. federal agencies with our estimates. Consistent use of the recommended rates would eliminate arbitrary choices of discount rates and would lead to better public sector decision‐making. © 2004 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

Building the firm's political (lobbying) strategy

• In this paper, we present a framework for building a firm's issue‐specific lobbying strategy. We argue that there are five critical elements of a lobbying strategy and that the major choices concerning political lobbying strategy relate to these elements. The five elements, and the primary strategic choices concerning these elements are: (1) the choice of the level and type of inclusiveness of the strategy; (2) the choice of the form, or forms, of argument to be used in persuading relevant target constituencies; (3) the choice of jurisdictional venue to be addressed; (4) the choice of organizational target that will be engaged and (5) the choice of delivery mode—that is, whether political strategies should be implemented directly by firm managers or outsourced to professional suppliers of these services. We explain these elements in detail. However, in order to engage in a lobbying strategy on a specific issue, the firm must first be able to identify relevant government actions and understand their profitability impact. We show how the strategic logic can be generated by an augmented version of Porter's ‘five forces’ (5F) model (Porter, 1980 ) that explicitly recognizes the role of government—‘six forces’ analysis.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.