公共选择理论与中国公共财政

公共选择理论是一门介于经济学和政治学之间的交叉学科,是对政府决策的经济研究。之所以将公共选择理论引入财政学领域,是因为财政问题本身的某些固有属性决定了大多数财政问题的解决都可以吸收和借鉴公共选择理论。现代市场经济下的公共财政不仅是提供公共产品的财政,更是公共选择的财政。同时,中国建立公共财政体制的过程应当是,也必然是财政管理公共化的过程,这是建立民主的、有监督的财政的必由之路。     

金融全球化与转轨国家金融自由化的效应分析--以俄罗斯为例

自20世纪90年代以来,随着经济全球化的不断深化、贸易自由化和生产国际化的进一步扩大,金融全球化和金融自由化已成为一种更加明显甚至是必然的趋势;与此同时,原计划经济国家相继向市场经济转轨。在此背景下,金融全球化与转轨国家的经济和金融发展之间存在着互动关系,并具有内在的逻辑一致性。这一联动关系对经济转轨国家利弊兼具,经济转轨国家不仅要直面金融全球化所带来的利益和风险,而且要承受金融全球化与其经济和金融互动所产生的双重效应。同样,由于联动关系,如果转轨国家顺利融入金融全球化进程,并能获得较大的收益,这对金融全球化的可持续发展将是极大的贡献,否则他们的缺失或者不稳定将严重影响到金融全球化的可持续发展。     

构建公共财政框架的经济法思考

随着社会主义市场经济体制的建立和完善 ,必将带来财政职能的调整和转换 ,表现在政府财政退出“越位” ,弥补“缺位” ,财政应理性地退出私人商品生产领域 ,而转向为公众提供公共商品和公共服务。公共财政实质上是对政府财政职能的定位 ,直接引起我国政府经济行为的变革 ,必将推进财政的民主化和法治化建设。作为规范国家宏观调控经济关系的经济法当然是建构公共财政的框架的指导理论 ,同时公共财政框架的建立也必将促进我国现行财政法体系的完善。     

财政公共化改革的三个基本任务--支出结构调整、公开透明与责任落实

公共财政是公共管理和社会管理的经济基础,同时公共财政的运行制度和游戏规则是作为政治行政体制一部分的上层建筑。建立公共财政框架,需要对经济体制、政治行政体制进行全方位的改革。关键任务有:一是调整财政支出结构,确保社会公共需要的满足;二是提高公开透明程度,使公众确实能够了解、监督财政运行状况;三是落实财政责任,给权力以充分对应的制约。后两个任务的核心是民主和法治,旨在建立财政公共化的制度基础,关键是要重建政府预算制度。从历年的国家审计报告看,解决这个问题非常紧迫、相当艰巨、极端重要。     

中国商业银行碳金融业务发展战略研究

当前碳金融已经成为全球商业银行竞争的新领域,中国商业银行拓展碳金融业务已是大势所趋。该文对中国发展碳金融的必要性和国内外商业银行在碳金融领域的发展现状进行了分析,指出了中国商业银行发展碳金融业务存在的七个主要障碍,进而提出了促进中国商业银行碳金融业务发展的对策建议。     

Explaining the unpopularity of public funding for congressional elections

This article uses data from the 2008 Cooperative Congressional Election Study to explain weak support for public financing of congressional campaigns. Previous studies lack theory to explain variation in support and use a flawed measure of the dependent variable. We argue that low support reflects a failure resulting from a collective action dilemma. Citizens desire a campaign finance system that weans politicians from private donors, but are unwilling to pay a small amount in taxes to support public financing. In contrast to conventional wisdom, we show that support for public financing is highest among those perceived to benefit the most from the current system. Our results suggest that most Americans would rather not pay for politics, and that reform proposals must avoid incurring transparent costs on individual citizens to pay for reform.     

次贷危机与我国金融安全

随着美国次贷危机的蔓延,资产证券化的风险对金融安全的影响不容忽视。结合对美国次贷危机诱因及目前资产证券化风险的分析,提出防范风险的核心是建立一套与我国金融安全相适应的一系列机制。     

Unilateral CDM—can developing countries finance generation of greenhouse gas emission credits on their own?

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) was originally seen as an instrument with a bi- or multilateral character where an entity or fund from an industrialised country invests in a project in a developing country. The sluggish implementation of incentives for industrialised country companies to embark on CDM projects and low carbon prices led to a preference for just buying Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) instead of investing in projects. Thus a third option has gained prominence—the unilateral option where the project development is planned and financed within the developing country. We propose that a project should be called “pure unilateral” if it involves no foreign direct investment (FDI), only has the approval of the Designated National Authority (DNA) of the host country and sells its CERs after certification directly to an industrialised country. Unilateral projects can become attractive if the host country risk premium for foreign investors is high despite a high human, institutional and infrastructural capacity and domestic capital availability. Moreover, transaction costs can be reduced compared to foreign investments that have to overcome bureaucratic hurdles. On the other hand, technology transfer is likely to be lower, capacity building has to be undertaken by the host country and all risks have to be carried by host country entities. The potential to carry out unilateral CDM projects strongly varies among host countries. Whereas several countries from Asia and Latin America can design and implement projects autonomously, most of the Sub-Saharan countries rely on foreign support. International donors of capacity building grants should increasingly address those countries that are not presently focused on by foreign investors and support them in the design of local projects.

Simulated foreign policy exchanges: A formal theory of foreign policy interaction (part II)

This article presents the underlying rationale for a theory of foreign policy dynamics, and is the second part of a two‐part series which specifies a theoretical perspective for explaining the exchanges between nations. The task of the first paper was to discuss the substantive thrust of the research, and to give a view of the Monte Carlo simulation which lies at its core. The theory deals with the relevance of such concepts as reciprocity, uncertainty, third party effects, bureaucratic politics and domestic events for explaining foreign policy. This article provides the axioms which structure our theory and formal theorems that follow from these axioms.     

The effective design,implementation and enforcement of socio-economic equality duties: lessons from the pupil premium

Abstract

The UK has extremely high levels of socio-economic inequality, which are predicted to rise over the next five years. Traditionally, equality law was seen as inappropriate to address socio-economic inequality but in the last decade, a growing number of equality duties have been introduced to address this persistent form of inequality. There is, however, little research on the principles that underpin these duties. This article seeks to address this gap through the use of data from interviews conducted with primary school personnel implementing the pupil premium. The article explores understandings of socio-economic inequality by individuals in schools; policy conflicts; the wider context of action to address socio-economic inequality; different decision-making processes; and accountability mechanisms. On the basis of the findings of this study, broad principles are outlined to inform the design, implementation and enforcement of socio-economic equality duties in the future.