Book Reviews

Mauricio Font, The State and the Private Sector in Latin America: The Shift to Partnership. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Figure, bibliography, appendixes, index, 318 pp.; hardcover $100, ebook $79.99. Tracy Beck Fenwick, Avoiding Governors: Federalism, Democracy, and Poverty Alleviation in Brazil and Argentina. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2016. Tables, figures, acronyms, bibliography, index, 277 pp.; hardcover $75, paperback $29. Michael Reid, Brazil: The Troubled Rise of a Global Power. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016 [2014]. Illustrations, 352 pp.; paperback $22. Ben Ross Schneider, ed., New Order and Progress: Development and Democracy in Brazil. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Tables, figures, bibliography, index, 328 pp.; hardcover $99, paperback $31.95, ebook. Anthony P. Maingot, Race, Ideology, and the Decline of Caribbean Marxism. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2015. Index, 368 pp.; hardcover $79.95. Sebastián Ureta, Assembling Policy: Transantiago, Human Devices, and the Dream of a World‐Class Society. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2015. Photographs, figures, abbreviations, bibliography, index, 224 pp.; hardcover $39, ebook $27. Carlos de la Torre, De Velasco a Correa: insurreciones, populismos y elecciones en Ecuador, 1944–2013. Quito: Corporación Editora Nacional, 2015. Tables, bibliography, 243 pp.; paperback. Sebastian E. Bitar, US Military Bases, Quasi‐Bases, and Domestic Politics in Latin America. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. Map, figures, tables, notes, bibliography, index, 220 pp.; hardcover $110, ebook $79.99.     

Budget Process Reform: Waiting for Godot

The unraveling of the budget process described by Irene Rubin will have extraordinary consequences for the long-term budget outlook facing the nation. The retirement of the baby boom generation will prompt unprecedented and unsustainable structural fiscal imbalances for decades to come. Early policy action on the spending and revenue sides of the budget is critical to avert fiscal and economic crisis and to phase in changes in order to avoid precipitous and politically perilous actions in the future. Yet such actions constitute what amounts to a politically unnatural act, as one generation of political leaders is asked to make sacrifices in current policies benefiting future generations. Budget process reforms can serve to highlight the salience of these issues and help deal with the significant political hurdles faced by decision makers in making these intertemporal budgeting trade-offs. Ironically, the need for budget rules and processes has intensified as policy makers have become more vulnerable to polarized political parties, ever more watchful media, and mobilized interest groups. Budget rules and processes can help policy makers cope by protecting their ability to make the hard choices that will be necessary. The pressures for budget process reform will accelerate as the current financial crisis increases near-term budgetary pressures, promoting greater alignment between near-term and long-term fiscal problems.     

The Politics of Coercive Federalism in the Bush Era

During the period of the Bush Presidency, the federal governmentproceeded to centralize and nationalize policy in major areasformerly controlled by states and localities. The extensionof federal goals and standards to such areas as education testing,sales tax collection, emergency management, infrastructure,and elections administration were among the areas of significantmandates and preemptions. The continuation of policy centralizationin areas under a conservative and unified political regime showshow strong and deep the roots are for centralizing policy actionsin our intergovernmental system.     

Block Grants: A Perennial, But Unstable, Tool of Government

During 1995 and 1996, the Congress and the president gave considerableattention to block granting over $200 billion in federal intergovernmentalgrant programs, ranging from large entitlement programs to smallerprograms in housing, vocational education, and law enforcement.In the end, the record of successes was modest—highlightedby welfare-reform legislation that, in some respects, resembleda block grant and in others did not. The contrast between processand outcomes in this most recent block-grant cycle reinforcesthe point that block-grant prospects depend on fundamental fiscal,political, and programmatic forces that are separate from federalismconsiderations. The states' maturation as leaders in many domesticpolicy areas strengthens the performance rationale for blockgrants. The federal fiscal crisis will continue to stimulateinterest in block grants among fedeal as well as state policymakers.The proposals offering the greatest fiscal advantage (i.e.,Medicaid and AFDC) may not be those with the strongest performancerationale. Although recent congressional developments suggeststronger support for states, nationalizing forces remain embeddedin domestic policymaking. Thus, substantial questions remain,posing obstacles to a fundamental and sustained role for blockgrants in the federal system.     

An Economic Analysis of State and Individual Responsibility Under International Law

The international law of state responsibility determines whenstates are liable for international law violations. States aregenerally liable when they have control over the actions ofwrongdoers; thus, the actions of state officials can implicatestate responsibility whereas the acts of private citizens usuallydo not. We argue that the rules of state responsibility havean economic logic similar to that of vicarious liability indomestic law: the law in both cases provides third parties withincentives to control the behavior of wrongdoers whom they canmonitor and influence. We also discuss international legal remediesand individual liability under international criminal law.     

The sociology of the sociology of law: A view from economics

The sociology of law appears to be a weak field in the United States, in comparison to other indisciplinary fields of legal study, notably economic analysis of law. Although American legal sociologists have done important empirical work, particularly on the litigation process and on the legal profession, the focus of American sociology of law has been narrow, theoretically limited, and, empirically, limited in both scope and method. These deficiencies may reflect the methodological limitations of Max Weber, the most influential figure in the history of sociology in general and sociology of law in particular. The failure of legal sociologists to borrow theoretical and empirical tools from sociologically minded economists such as Gary Becker is especially regrettable, and may be due to inaccurate perceptions of the political valence of economic analysis of law, sociology's traditional skepticism about the knowledge claims of other disciplines, professional envy, and misunderstanding of the economists' conception of rational choice.     

An economic theory of intentional torts

The topic of intentional torts is, at first glance, an unpromising one for economics. ‘Intent’ is not a normal part of the economist's vocabulary and does not appear to correspond to any concept in economics. Perhaps this is why there is so little economic writing on intentional torts as such.¹ We shall argue, however, that the concept of intentional tort can be given a coherent economic meaning and we shall try to show that the common law treatment of intentional torts can be explained on the hypothesis that the common law attempts to promote efficiency.