Absence Of Government Research Articles

The Dark Age: How the Biblical Narratives Demonstrate the Necessity for Law and Government

This paper continues the analysis of political theory in the Hebrew Bible. In earlier work I argue that the Garden of Eden story explores why people have an obligation to obey the law. The narratives that follow describe a “Dark Age” characterized by accelerating violence and ending in a catastrophic flood. These texts expand the analysis of the Eden narratives by asking whether human beings can achieve a good and decent life in the absence of government and law. The narratives describe an experiment in which people interact strategically in an environment where cooperation can generate a surplus but defection is always possible. The message of the Dark Age texts is people cannot achieve a good and decent life in the absence of government and law. The story of Noah’s Flood expands the analysis by arguing that human beings can achieve a good and decent life in the presence of government and law. The Tower of Babel story explains why, even with government and law in place, human societies do not achieve their full potential.

Immigration and Left Party Government in Europe

Are governments of the Left more or less immigration-friendly than governments of the Right? Are they more or less likely to restrict immigration during their tenure (or to seek selective immigration policies). And, to what extent do the answers to these questions depend on other factors, such as the characteristics of a country’s political economy? Based on existing work on the determinants of voter preferences for immigration policy and the electoral tensions faced by Left party elites, we hypothesize that , other things being equal, immigration creates particular electoral tensions for parties of the Left, and that parties of the Left may therefore be more, rather than less, likely to restrict immigration when they are in government than parties of the Right. However, we also suspect that the degree of electoral tension faced by parties of the Left (and hence their policies when in government) are likely to depend, at least in part, on other aspects of a country’s political economy. We focus in this paper on particular characteristics of national welfare states. In the first section of the paper, we develop a number of hypotheses regarding the electoral tensions that immigration is likely to create for Left party governments. We draw on the theoretical literatures on the economic impact of that immigration tends to have on different segments of the population, on the effect that immigration may have on the support for redistributive social policies among voters, and on the social and ideological electoral space within which parties of the Left operate in post-Fordist societies. When taken together, the insights of these various literatures lead us to conclude that, all things being equal, Left party governments should be at least equally, if not more, likely to seek to restrict immigration than governments dominated by the Right. We also discuss how specific features of national welfare states (specifically, the extent to which social policies address the needs of middle income families such as child care, elder care, and other household services) may affect the balance of preferences regarding immigration within national electorates. Where social policies do not address these needs, we hypothesize that immigrants often come to play the role of compensating for the absence of government services/benefits in these areas (by providing affordable child and elder care as well as other services that families depend on). Lastly, we also offer some ideas on how immigration might affect the social spending priorities of governments of the Left.

The Territorial Governance of the Shadow Economy

The findings of studies of local economies can be applied to those concerned with ‘shadow’ and illegal activities. These activities need to be seen not as situations with an absence of governance and markets, but as constituting particular kinds of governance—this often being concerned with ensuring the functioning of markets. A scheme for modelling this type of governance is proposed, and is then used to formulate a critique of most of the prevailing policy approaches to trying to counter the shadow economy and to encourage the ‘emersion’ of firms from it. Some instances of policies that are better grounded in an appreciation of the reality of the shadow economy as a social order are also cited.

Desafio para a gestão ambiental integrada em território de fronteira agrícola no oeste do Pará

Este artigo aborda a Terra do Meio (PA), região brasileira localizada em um dos estados mais conflituosos da Amazônia, que tem se convertido em um desafio simbólico para a gestão pública integrada neste país. Ela está em um contexto que traz elementos característicos de um complexo sistema geopolítico: grilagem de terras e exploração irracional dos recursos naturais; baixa presença do Estado; falta de integração das políticas públicas que incidem sobre o território. A existência de um movimento social estruturado e a intervenção de ONGs socioambientalistas na proteção e conservação da biodiversidade e das populações tradicionais (índios, ribeirinhos, seringueiros e agricultores familiares) formam o cenário em questão. Este artigo apresenta a caracterização socioambiental e econômica da região e discute o mosaico de unidades de conservação e o corredor de biodiversidade do Xingu como alternativas para um plano de ordenamento territorial como perspectiva de gestão integrada para a região.

Temas Emergentes em Gestão e Políticas Públicas: tendências gerais

The recent experience of the local level of government in Brazil is characterized by the presence of innovations in the field of management and public policies. The analysis of this experience makes it possible to identify issues relevant for the field of local government studies. Some of these issues have already been integrated in the literature but some of them have not been explored yet. The goal of this article is to identify areas of study that comes from the analysis of policies and programs promoted recently by local government. These areas include: gender, employment and income, environment management, rationality in public expenditure, accountability and new institutional arrangements. But, the lack of policies and the government absence in some areas also points to some relevant issues. Among these areas where the governmental action remains fragile are race and youth. The Brazilian executivist tradition – which identifies government with the executive branch – is responsible for another area very poor on innovations: there is a lack of innovative initiatives led by the legislative level.

Candidate HIV/AIDS vaccines

Candidate HIV/AIDS vaccines

Logo ali, no final da avenida: Os sertões redefinidos pelo movimento sanitarista da Primeira República

O artigo aborda os esforços do movimento sanitarista brasileiro em redefinir, entre 1910 e 1920, as fronteiras entre os sertões e o litoral, entre o interior e as cidades, entre o Brasil rural e o urbano, em função do que consideravam o principal problema nacional: a saúde pública. Este movimento divulgou exaustivamente uma definição essencialmente médico-política desses limites: os sertões dos médicos-higienistas caracterizavam-se pela concomitante ausência de poder público e onipresença de doenças endêmicas. Por meio de uma intensa campanha de opinião pública, os médicos-higienistas convenceram as elites políticas de que esses sertões estavam mais próximos do que elas imaginavam criando, assim, as bases para as primeiras ações nacionais de saúde pública na década de 1920.

On the limits to rent-seeking waste

The general equilibrium framework developed in this paper for analyzing the limits to rent-seeking waste goes beyond the existing literature by incorporating tax-financed, public subsidies and rent-protecting activities into a rent-seeking environment. We show that the limits to rent-seeking waste depend on the extent to which government subsidizes rent seekers and rent defenders through tax-financed grants, contracts and favors. As observed by Tullock (1967), the diversion of resources toward efforts to acquire a monopoly rent causes a social waste in addition to the excess burden of monopoly pricing measured by the Harberger triangle. In the absence of government subsidies to rent-seeking and under competitive conditions, this additional waste cannot exceed the maximum monopoly rent attainable. However, if government subsidizes expenditures on rent-seeking, then the additional waste can exceed the Tullock rectangle of monopoly rent and, in the limit, equal the economy's maximum potential social surplus.

Sparta and Samos: a Special Relationship?

The relationship between the United Kingdom and the United States seems to embody most fully the type of the ‘special relationship’ today. It is a relationship founded ultimately (and now of course remotely) on biological kinship, structured by mutual economic and strategic interests and cemented by a sense of political and ‘spiritual’ affinity. At least the broad contours of such contemporary ‘special relationships’ are sufficiently clear. This is far from being the case with those of the Archaic and Classical Greek world, for two main reasons. First, and more decisively, our sources for the history of that world – literary, epigraphical, archaeological – are normally scrappy, discontinuous and variously slanted. Second, and only in part because of the nature of the evidence, the workings of all ancient Greek interstate relationships, whether ‘special’ or not, are in principle controversial. For in the absence of governments and parties in the modern sense it is frequently impossible to explain confidently a particular foreign policy decision taken by a Greek state.A fortioriit is in principle even more difficult to describe and account for ‘special’ relationships between states that apparently transcended purely immediate, local and narrowly self-interested considerations.

QUALITY CONTROL IN THE CONFECTIONERY INDUSTRY

The following topics were highlighted in this paper: (a) Candy manufacture is basically the physical chemistry of super-saturated solutions. (b) Quality control is necessary to produce a clean, uniform, and legal product. (c) Quality control is necessary to control costs. (d) The high solids content in finished confections requires special packaging. (e) Effects of small quantities of foreign material such as ash and protein may affect quality at the temperature used to manufacture most candy. (f) Methods of producing grain within the confection or by adding seed to produce grain. (g) Candy manufacturers should develop purchasing specifications in the absence of government or industry standards. (h) Specifications should meet Federal Food and Drug Administration requirements. (i) It is important to know the microbiology of certain ingredients, particularily products of animal origin. These sensitive ingredients should be quarantined on receipt and not used until found safe. (j) The candy manufacturer is legally responsible for the products offered for sale.