Recasting Intractable Policy Issues: The Wider Implications of The Netherlands Civil Aviation Controversy

The explosive growth of civil aviation is among the most difficult issues in transportation policy, and nowhere are the fundamental economic and environmental challenges it poses more apparent than in airport expansion. Conventional policy analyses have ineffectively handled these problems, characterized by uncertainty, complexity, and polarization. Increasingly, policy analysts and public managers depend on stakeholder involvement to recast intractable issues into a more tractable format. This article describes a method that supports this recasting process through analysis of stakeholders' policy arguments; and in so doing contributes to the increasing literature on recasting intractable policy issues and to the recent discussion of Q‐methodology in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. The method is applied in a policy analysis of the controversy over the expansion of Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. The analysis, which was under‐taken on behalf of the Dutch government and which has wider implications, leads to a new agenda for transportation policy by uncovering and addressing a fuller range of alternatives that move beyond the current polarization and allow the problem to be redefined more tractably. © 2001 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

“Guide to developing a culture of lawfulness,”

This paper has argued that regulatory and law enforcement measures cannot, on their own, deal with the scope of global crime and corruption. Rather, they need to be complemented and supported by a society that embraces a culture of lawfulness. This is difficult to establish. Yet, there are examples, in diverse circumstances, of major changes in values and attitudes towards the rule of law within a relatively short time frame. While there is no “one size fits all” approach, certain key principles can provide a useful guide for societies seeking to foster a culture of lawfulness. These have been found in the most successful and enduring programs.     

Exploring Microfinance Clients with Disabilities: A Case Study of an Ecuadorian Microbank

Using a unique sample from an Ecuadorian microfinance institution that has focused on increasing its outreach to disabled clients, we present a comparative analysis of the characteristics of disabled versus non-disabled clients. The study shows that disabled clients are more often male, are less likely to be living with a partner, have fewer children, and are older compared to their non-disabled counterparts. Moreover, we observe differences in repayment statistics between clients with and without disabilities, as well as differences within the disability sample. Our findings illustrate the importance of adapting microloans to the special needs of persons with disabilities.     

Households’ Willingness to Pay for Health Microinsurance and its Impact on Actual Take-up: Results from a Field Experiment in Senegal

Abstract

Community-based health insurance schemes (CBHIS) have been present in the region of Theis, Senegal, for many years. Yet, despite the benefits they offer, take-up rates remain low. This article measures the willingness to pay (WTP) for CBHIS premiums in such a context; our results highlight the role of income, wealth and risk preferences as determinants of WTP. We also provide an analysis of the predictive power of WTP on the actual take-up of insurance following our offering of membership to a sample of 360 households. Results show that WTP has a positive and significant impact on actual CBHIS take-up.     

The Potency of the State: Logics of Informality and Subalternity

Abstract

This article serves as an epilogue to the special issue curated by Claire Bénit-Gbaffou and Sarah Charlton with a focus on state power and the concept of informality. In my reflection, I examine the specificity of statecraft in the context of postcolonial government. In particular, I analyse political potency as a relationship between the state and subaltern subjects. Also at stake in this paper is the question of comparative and transnational analysis. In what ways can concepts generated through the study of processes of urban informality in India speak to the production of illegality and the reproduction of rule in South Africa?     

Economic Crises,Crisis of Labour Law? Lessons from Weimar

Labour law has been thrown into turmoil in many large industrialized countries with democratic tradition and market economies. In fact, rapid economic globalization resulted in an irremediable decline in collective bargaining in most of the states that entered into the sphere of Anglo-Saxon capitalism. On a first reading, the financial crisis of 2008 exacerbated this retreat of labour law back to its initial individualist and contractual forms. In analysing the contemporary crisis of labour law, the historical-comparative method can be highly fruitful, especially if one considers the precedent of the economic crisis of 1929. On this basis, I first consider an influential text by Hugo Sinzheimer on the ‘crisis of labour law’ in Weimar Germany and a study by Otto Kahn-Freund on the changing function of labour law in the same context. These works can be connected to the concept of the ‘labour constitution’, which Max Weber notably developed in an empirical sense, and which finds its extension in the later works of Thilo Ramm, a labour scholar of international reputation.     

Reconstruction of the state: Lobbying against political corruption in the Czech Republic

High level of distrust in political elites accompanied with a strong perception of corruption in Czech Republic has led to an increase of several anti‐corruption nongovernmental organisations' activities. About 18 organisations have created in 2013 an open coalition and established a project called “Reconstruction of the State” (Rekonstrukce státu). This project is oriented towards political parties and political elites to lead them to adopt nine anti‐corruption legislative proposals. This paper analyses how the project operates in its formal and informal aspects, which communication means are preferred and how the lobbyists interact with the politicians and political parties. Apart from the analysis of publicly available pieces of information from the project's website and official printed materials, semistructured interviews with activists and field research were performed. It can be seen that Reconstruction of the state has been most successful regarding agenda‐setting, but in the context of the legislative process, it has to face many obstacles either from legislators themselves or competitors with different goals.     

Corporate values of the 25 largest European banks: Exploring the ambiguous link with corporate scandals

Corporate value statements communicate what a firm aspires for and what drives their value creation. In addition, corporate values often also define which behaviors are acceptable and which are not. Ideally, corporate values are representations of a firm's informal corporate values and organizational culture. However, in practice, there is an inherent tension between the aspirations and actual values and ensuing behaviors of and within a firm—let alone the potentially different interpretations of abstract corporate value statements. In this paper, we set out to provide more clarity on what corporate values are, how they are inherently ambiguous, and how in practice they compare to firm involvement in scandals. For this purpose, we study the corporate values of the 25 largest European banks after the financial crisis. “Integrity” appeared to be the most common value among the 25 banks, followed by “customer focus.” Nonetheless, over the past 6 years, 15 out of the 25 studied banks were involved in one or more scandals. Scandals can be systematic or caused by rogue employees, and benefitting the firm or their customers—in the latter case, providing an interesting interpretation of the customer focus value. Additionally, we found that courage or its synonyms were barely mentioned among banks' corporate values, potentially providing an additional explanation for the fast size of the financial crisis. Finally, we found that banks that had inclusive social principles such as respect, solidarity, and equality did not face large-scale scandals.