Differences In Political Institutions Research Articles

Cooperation and Struggle Between Vietnam and the United States: Impediments to Improved U.S.-Vietnam Relations

Abstract The relationship between the United States and Vietnam began when Prince Nguyen Phuc Canh worked with Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary American Ambassador Thomas Jefferson in 1787. The United States, however, later invaded Vietnam, causing a bloody conflict unlike any in human history from 1954 to 1975. Then, in 1995, a shared sense of humanity and morality motivated the two countries to attempt to form a comprehensive partnership that they achieved in 2013, and they have been working to refine their approach toward collaborating together ever since. In this partnership, there is a need to uncover and resolve a few mysteries. This article’s objective is to analyze the fundamentals of both cooperation and conflict in this historical partnership – human rights (including for prisoners of war and those missing in action), military security, policy reform in Vietnam, and financial gains for Vietnam and the United States. However, differences in political institutions, interests and values, and aims for the relationship have all become points of contention since normalization of bilateral relations in 1995.

Local lobbying in single‐party authoritarian systems: Do institutions matter?

AbstractLobbying, and its role in the policy process, has been extensively studied in democratic states, but much less is known about similar practices in authoritarian political systems. Although a few studies have identified lobbying in China, most have focused on big businesses and national policy making, and some have argued that it is unaffected by differences in political institutions. Our paper challenges this portrayal of business lobbying in autocracies. Through a study of the lobbying activities of business associations based on documentary research and fieldwork in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin between 2011 and 2013, we show that although business associations have similar lobbying motivations to their counterparts in democracies, their specific practices are often shaped by authoritarian political institutions. While they are similar in seeking to build informal relationships with public officials, provide expertise to shape policies, and raise their profile through public relations activities and media engagement, they differ in focusing their relationship‐building efforts on helping officials with routine work, helping Communist Party organizations establish cells in businesses, and brokering between businesses and government. Rather than donating to political campaigns like their counterparts in democracies, they become legislators themselves, hire retired officials, and seek positions on advisory bodies. Rigged elections, an unreliable legal system, and restrictions on media and freedom of movement are key authoritarian institutions that shape these distinctive lobbying practices.

Mobilization and Strategies: Comparing Trade Lobbying in the US and Canada

Do US lobbying patterns extend to other countries? To date no study has systematically compared US lobbying patterns with those of other countries using observational data. Taking advantage of similar lobbying disclosure rules in the US and Canada, we create a cross-country lobbying dataset. We focus on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) to control for timing, salience, and issue scope. This helps us attribute differences in firm mobilization and trade lobbying strategies across the two countries to differences in political institutions. Strikingly different USMCA lobbying patterns emerge. Within the same industry, trade associations, the executive branch, and in-house lobbyists play a larger role in Canada. Meanwhile, well-established determinants of US lobbying fail to explain patterns of mobilization and the use of external lobbyists in Canada. These findings provide insights into comparative lobbying studies and indicate that some stylized facts about lobbying are unique features of the US political system.

Financial Globalization, Output Gap and Foreign Output Gap on inflation: Evidenced from Developing Economies

This paper covers previous studies' deficiencies and re-examine the theoretical model using a heterogeneous panel GMM technique, which overcomes cross-section dependency. In the current sample of developing nations, developed two models'; model 1 consists of the domestic output gap, and the second model includes the foreign output gap. According to model 1, foreign globalization and imports boost the inflation level in developing countries and disaggregation analysis (low, lower-middle, and upper-middle-income countries). The output gap impedes inflation in overall, lower-middle, and upper-middle-income countries, while it boosts inflation in low-income nations. And unemployment level increases the inflation rate in the overall and middle-income groups, while in low- and high-income countries, it decreases. According to the second model, foreign globalization and the foreign output gap boost overall low-income, middle-income, and upper-middle-income groups. While import reduces the inflation level globally, while in low-income, middle-income, and upper-middle-income groups, it increases inflation. Finally, the unemployment level boosts the global inflation level and as well as in low income, and it impedes inflation rate in upper-middle-income group. Despite this, there is considerable variation in countries' effect, perhaps due to differences in political institutions' quality, central bank independence, exchange rate systems, financial development, and legal traditions.

Exploring the re-emergence of industrial policy: Perceptions regarding low-carbon energy transitions in Germany, the United Kingdom and Denmark

Industrial policy has re-emerged as an area of policy discussion in recent years, but the characteristics and role of industrial policy vary across national contexts. Particularly, the role of industrial policy in the ongoing energy transitions of different countries has received little attention. We introduce an analytical framework to explore the relationship between industrial policy and different energy policy trajectories and apply this framework in an empirical analysis of the perceptions of key stakeholders in the energy sector in Germany, the United Kingdom and Denmark. We identify four key elements of industrial policy – industrial visions, industrial policy instruments, industrial policy governance, and employment concerns – and based on these analyse perceptions of how industrial policy has facilitated changes in the energy system of the three countries. We find significant differences in industrial policy styles for low-carbon transitions, reflecting broader differences in political institutions and cultures. Our analysis shows how sustainability transitions relate to industrial policy, and which elements can act as enablers and barriers to low-carbon transitions.

The role of extractive industries in developing peripheral Arctic regions of Russia and Canada

Russian Federation and Canada are the largest arctic powers that have similar features in evolving their Arctic zones. In the mid-1920s both countries formalized their rights to the northern territories. Russian and Canadian arctic regions are located in harsh climatic zones,geographically distant from national political and business centers, poorly populated, and rich in natural resources. At the same time, there are obvious differences in political institutions,“core-periphery” relationships, business organization, and social activities of aboriginal people and newcomers. The purpose of this study is a comparative evaluation how the rich resource base and industrial production impact on the socio-economic development of the Arctic regions of Russia and Canada. To reach the goal authors use the official statistical sources of the Russian Federation and Canada. Case study method, comparative analysis, and econometric calculations are applied. As a result similar and distinctive features of the industrial development of the Arctic regions of these countries were identified. It can be explained, first of all, by the institutional characteristics of Russia and Canada. Comparing an evidence of the leading extractive companies completed the empirical analysis. Authors concluded that the regions under consideration are characterized by a high or medium share of the extractive industry in the regional economy. Specialization in natural resources extraction and primary processing does not have a negative impact on the economic development of the territories. However, outer companies are engaged in this business that increases the dependence of the regional economy on the conjuncture of world markets. The article investigates in empirical studying common features of the extractive industry in the peripheral Russian and Canadian Arctic territories and its impact on the socio-economic development of these regions.

What to Make of Gentrification in Older Industrial Cities? Comparing St. Louis (USA) and Dortmund (Germany)

Few scholars have studied gentrification in older industrial cities across different national contexts. A review of the literature suggests that gentrification in older industrial cities will look different in systematic ways from gentrification in global, magnet cities that most research has focused on. The literature also suggests that the political and institutional differences in cities located in different national contexts can shape gentrification processes. Our research shows that Dortmund and St. Louis are both undergoing deep processes of economic restructuring with new knowledge workers moving in to neighborhoods adjacent to expanding tech clusters. The speed and magnitude of gentrification, however, is significantly less than reported in strong market cities. Unlike in hot market, global cities, many areas within Dortmund and St. Louis are experiencing little or no gentrification, and the neighborhoods that are experiencing gentrification-like processes vary significantly along important dimensions. Despite important differences in political institutions, the basic pattern of gentrification in St. Louis and Dortmund is similar. In these two older industrial cities, at least, gentrification is a complex and variegated phenomenon that requires more research to be fully understood.

The Fundamental Determinants of Economic Inequality in Average Income Across Countries: The Declining Role of Political Institutions

Within the fundamental determinants of cross‐country income inequality, political institutions represent a hallmark factor that societies can influence. Focusing on the portion of inequality explainable by differences in political institutions, we decompose annual cross‐country Gini coefficients from 1960–2012. Although inequality has marginally decreased since 1988, the portion that cannot be explained by political institutions has increased markedly, with the explanatory power of institutions falling rapidly from the late 1980s to the early 1990s. This result prevails when using alternative variables, weightings, samples, and controls, and appears to be unlikely to be driven by contemporary regional events alone. However, we find that the link between institutions and income levels has become increasingly nonlinear as countries with the most inclusive political institutions enjoy even higher incomes than before. Our results imply that, if we hold societies responsible for their political institutions, cross‐country inequality has become notably less fair since the late 1980s.

Rents and economic development: the perspective of Why Nations Fail

We present the approach to comparative economic development of Why Nations Fail. Economic prosperity requires inclusive economic institutions—those which create broad based incentives and opportunities in society. Extractive economic institutions, which lack these properties, create poverty. Variation in economic institutions is created by differences in political institutions. Inclusive economic institutions are the result of political choices which arise under inclusive political institutions: a strong state and a broad distribution of power in society. When either of these conditions fails one has extractive political institutions that lead to extractive economic institutions. We relate our analysis to Tullock’s notion of ‘rent seeking’.

Inequality in Twentieth-Century Latin America: Path Dependence, Countermovements, and Reactive Sequences

Most recent explanations of social welfare and development outcomes have focused on the role and impact of formal institutional arrangements, particularly the state. The institutional legacies of colonial rule and the role of democratic institutions have been common explanatory variables. This article focuses on the historical origins, persistence, and increases in inequality in Mexico and Chile during the twentieth century. It argues that despite important historical economic and political institutional differences, similar processes account for the unequal distributional outcomes that characterize the two cases. Critical conjunctures involved bitter struggle between social groups. While popularly based countermovements (along the lines predicted by Karl Polyani) arose periodically and struggled to improve social conditions, these movements were unable to alter the underlying sources of inequality. By mid-twentieth century, popular pressure had been able to exact only an unequal form of embeddedness (or social protection from the market) that contributed to inequality. Further, waves of popular mobilization linked to critical conjunctures produced reactive historical sequences involving fierce resistance from propertied elites and their middle-class allies. This resistance inevitably gave rise to new conjunctures ushering in new institutional arrangements that entrenched or increased inequality. The absence of a distributive settlement between propertied classes and popular groups was at the heart of the mobilization and countermobilization cycles in both cases; indeed, it was the depth of this disagreement, particularly the disagreement over private property, that fueled reactive sequences and their unequalizing outcomes.

New Rulers in the City: Local Political Institutional Transition and International Entrepreneurship

This study explores how subnational political institutional differences affect where within an economy multinational enterprises decide to locate new ventures. Previous research has shown that cross-national political institutional differences affect a multinational firm’s new venture location strategy. However, we know little about how subnational institutional differences affect multinational enterprise new venture location strategy within the same economy. This is an important question because vastly different formal and informal rules of the game may prevail in different subnational regions within the same economy, affecting not only new venture strategies, but also the effectiveness of those strategies. We develop a theoretical framework proposing that local political institutional transitions create opportunities, but also uncertainties, for new ventures. Whether opportunities outweigh the uncertainties depend on the content, frequency and political-structural consequences of the transition. The the...

Explaining Inequality between Countries: The Declining Role of Political Institutions

Within the fundamental determinants of cross-country income inequality, ‘humanly devised’ political institutions represent a hallmark factor that societies can influence, as opposed to, for example, geography. Focusing on the portion of inequality explainable by differences in political institutions, we decompose annual cross-country Gini coefficients for 95 countries (representing 85 percent of the world population) from 1960-2012. Since 1988, inequality has marginally decreased (from a Gini of 0.525 to 0.521) but the portion that cannot be explained by political institutions has increased substantially (from 0.411 to 0.459). Specifically, the explanatory power of institutions fell rapidly from the late 1980s to the early 1990s. This result prevails when using alternative variables, expanding the sample, weighting countries by population size, and controlling for the remaining fundamental determinants of income: culture and education. Over the same timeframe, the explanatory power of geographical conditions has been rising. This phenomenon appears to be global and is unlikely to be driven by contemporary regional events alone, such as the fall of the Soviet Union, Asian success stories (e.g., China), or institutional monocropping in Africa. A corollary of our finding implies that, if we hold societies responsible for their political institutions, inequality has become notably less fair since the late 1980s.

South Korea and Japan since World War II: Between Ideological Discord and Pragmatic Cooperation

Since the end of World War II, relations between South Korea and Japan have gone through significant changes – from distant and hostile in the 1950s, to cooperative and increasingly close through about 2005, to the last decade of serious deterioration. Three frameworks are used to understand change and continuity in South Korea–Japan relations: a realist perspective emphasizing either structural military power relations or “revealed” patterns of military threat; an institutional perspective that emphasizes similarities or differences in political institutions; and an ideological regime‐type perspective that includes ideologies as well as institutions as influences on government or leadership preferences. The third framework captures two types of ideological factors that have exerted significant influences on South Korea–Japan relations: the existence of a small range of competitive ideological regime types or government types specifying national ideals and national development roadmaps; and historical legacies of intense conflict, which tend to produce ideological and diversionary frictions that cause conflict to persist or recur. Only the last factor, the history issue, is readily subject to policy control: the best way forward to restore cooperative and stable relations is for South Korean and Japanese leaders to agree informally on truthful and empathetic norms governing historical judgments, and for Japanese political and opinion elites to agree informally to marginalize those that defy such norms.

Policy (Mis) Representation and the Cost of Ruling: U.S. Presidential Elections in Comparative Perspective

The cost of ruling effect on electoral support is well established. That is, governing parties tend to lose vote share the longer they are in power. Although we know this to be true, we do not know why it happens. This research examines whether the cost of ruling results at least in part from the tendency for governing parties to shift policy further away from the average voter. It first considers differences in political institutions and how they might influence cost of ruling owing to policy drift, and then tests the hypothesis focusing on U.S. presidential elections, which is an unfavorable case to find such an effect. Results confirm a clear cost of ruling effect in these elections and demonstrate that policy misrepresentation is an important mechanism. That is, the policy liberalism of presidents from different parties diverges over time as their tenure in the White House increases, and the degree to which it does matters for the presidential vote. Policy is not the only thing that matters, and other factors, in particular the economy, are more powerful. From the point of view of electoral accountability, however, the results do provide good news, as they indicate that substantive representation is important to voters. Elections are not simply games of musical chairs.

The risk of civil conflicts as a determinant of political institutions

This paper proposes a mechanism to explain differences in political institutions based on a particular feature of civil conflicts that has not been previously explored. Under asymmetric and uncertain costs of civil conflicts members of the elite would like to commit in advance to a strong response to insurgencies, but ex-post they have the incentives to block any response if the conflict mainly affects other members of the elite. One way of solving this commitment problem is empowering the executive so he may react forcefully to conflicts, despite the opposition of some fraction of the elite. The main prediction is that, conditional on asymmetric and uncertain costs, the higher is the likelihood of a conflict in the future, the lower are the constraints imposed on the executive. The paper validates this implication using a sample of former colonies and geographic variables to identify the exogenous component of the likelihood of conflicts.

Careers, Connections and Corruption Risks in Europe

Why do officials in some countries favor entrenched contractors while others assign public contracts more impartially? According to the research, such variation responds to differences in political institutions, economic development and historical preconditions. This paper instead emphasizes the interplay between politics and bureaucracy. It suggests that corruption risks are minimized when the two groups involved in decision-making on public contracts — politicians and bureaucrats — have known different interests. This is institutionalized when politicians are accountable to the electorate, while bureaucrats are accountable to their peers, and not to politicians. We test this hypothesis with a novel experience-based measure of career incentives in the public sector — utilizing a survey with over 85,000 individuals in 212 European regions — and a new objective corruption risk measure including over 1.4 million procurement contracts. Both show a remarkable sub-national variation across Europe. The study finds corruption risks significantly lower where bureaucrats' careers do not depend on political connections.

The Timeline of Elections: A Comparative Perspective

How do voter preferences come into focus over the electoral cycle in different countries? Do they evolve in patterned ways? Does the evolution vary across countries? This article addresses these issues. We consider differences in political institutions and how they might impact voter preferences over the course of the election cycle. We then outline an empirical analysis relating support for parties or candidates in pre‐election polls to their final vote. The analysis relies on over 26,000 vote intention polls in 45 countries since 1942, covering 312 discrete electoral cycles. Our results indicate that early polls contain substantial information about the final result but that they become increasingly informative over the election cycle. Although the degree to which this is true varies across countries in important and understandable ways given differences in political institutions, the pattern is strikingly general.

Understanding resource nationalism: economic dynamics and political institutions

Resource nationalism is on the rise around the globe. During the recent global resource boom, many governments have adopted nationalistic policies to maximise the political and economic benefits from their mining and energy sectors. Existing theories of resource nationalism rely upon economistic bargaining models, which fail to interrogate how political processes shape governments’ resource policy strategies. This article extends and develops these bargaining models by theorising the role of political institutions – specifically those found in rentier, developing and liberal market economies – in determining patterns of resource nationalism. A survey of 12 major resource-producing countries reveals that contemporary resource nationalism takes a range of distinct forms, which are connected to differences in political institutions that structure the objectives and policies of governments. It is therefore argued that while economic dynamics function as an enabling factor, political institutions are an equally important conditioning factor shaping the distinctive forms of resource nationalism observed today.

Local emissions trading in developing countries as a transitional strategy toward international greenhouse gas trading: a Beijing example

As is the case in most developing countries, China relies on command-and-control regulation to control air pollution. While it has instituted a modest air pollution levy system in the past 20 years for emissions in excess of standards, the effect on emission levels has been minimal. This paper focuses on how to use emissions trading as a policy instrument to achieve cost-effective reductions in air pollution in Beijing. Emissions or allowance trading has been widely applied to air pollution control in the USA during the past 25 years. Three of the most recent programmes will be examined, which provide applicable experience for possible SO2 and NOx trading in the Beijing region. A trading strategy for Beijing will be proposed by comparing the economic and political institutional differences between the USA and China, which could eventually facilitate acceptance of an international greenhouse gas trading system.

Party size and policy outcomes: An empirical analysis of taxation in democracies

Taxation varies widely among democracies. Yet scholars disagree whether differences in political institutions help produce the variation. This article identifies topdown and bottom-up mechanisms by which political institutions are thought to influence taxation. It then combines political and economic data on more than 50 democracies to evaluate the impact of political institutions on government revenues. Cross-sectional and pooled time series analyses that include controls for economic conditions and partisan ideologies of governments confirm an indirect impact of these institutions: there is a curvilinear relationship between the size of political parties in a democracy and the tax revenues collected. Yet the effect of party size on policy outcomes is limited to a subset of democracies. The article opens new paths for research on the roles of electoral, constitutional, legislative, and party institutions in democratic policy making around the world.