No description available.

The partisan election of state judges and costly litigation make the civil justice system in the United States vulnerable because they undermine the values upon which the system was founded. The public’s trust that courts administer justice fairly and impartially is questioned by partisan elections funded by large corporations. Moreover, with the advent of electronically stored information, and the market’s control over the price of legal resources, access to the civil justice system is limited by wealth. This thesis seeks to address these problems and analyze the solutions that are most effective and comprehensive.

In this dissertation, I examine three major aspects of Germany's education system from an empirical public finance perspective. First, I analyse the effects of strong demographic shifts by considering how the East German Länder responded to the rather dramatic decline in the number of students in primary schools (1993-2002). The demographic shock is a consequence of collapsing birth rates after German Reunification. Previous results from the literature, which rely on data from rather stable demographic periods, suggest that public resources are incompletely adjusted to shrinking cohort size such that large reductions in the student population translate into important increases in spending per student and not in significant reductions of public resources allocated to education. Evidence from a panel of 5 East German Länder over the 1993-2006 period suggests, however, that resource adjustments have been considerable, especially in the years when student cohorts were actually decreasing. Adjustments have been less tight in the period when student numbers stagnated such that the 50% decrease in cohort size has translated into a 25% increase in the teacher/student-ratio. Second, I test whether partisan theory can help to explain the practise of ability-tracking in West Germany. The analysis starts from the empirical observation that in the German education system – where tracking is practised very early compared to other OECD countries – the correlation of parent’s education or income with their children’s track choices is very strong. Thus, students whose parents have a high-education background have significantly higher probabilities of attending a high-ability track. Partisan theory states that political parties when in office pursue the interests of their members and electoral constituencies. Political parties representing highly educated households should therefore support the practise of ability-tracking and advocate higher education spending on the tracks for good students. Evidence from a panel of 10 West German Länder over the 1979-2006 period suggests that German political parties support tracking if they represent high-education households and oppose tracking if they represent lower educated households. The results also suggest that political parties tend to allocate public resources towards the track in which party members’ or party electorate’s offspring is overrepresented. Third, research-oriented higher education in Germany is almost exclusively provided by the public sector, which highlights the importance of measuring university cost efficiency, because market exit and entry – which ensure efficient resource use in the private sector – virtually do not exist (see e.g., Hanushek, 2002). Based on a panel of 70 German public universities over the 1998-2003 period I provide evidence about the factors that benefit efficient resource use in the German higher education landscape. I analyse whether relatively liberal university regulation improves the cost efficiency of public universities as suggested in the literature (see Aghion et al., 2008). The results show that liberal university regulation indeed contributes to more efficient use of resources. Moreover, I find that a prosperous private economic environment seems to reduce university costs.

No description available.

Magister Legum - LLM

Les gauches de la gauche à l´épreuve des mutations des classes populaires. À travers l'étude des gauches de la gauche des années 2010-à savoir le PCF, le PG, le NPA et LO-, cette thèse s'emploie à prolonger et discuter les travaux portant sur le divorce de la gauche et des classes populaires. À la croisée de la sociologie des partis politiques et de la sociologie des classes populaires notre thèse se propose d'apporter un éclairage sur la manière dont les transformations ayant affecté les classes populaires depuis les années 1980 et les représentations dominantes qui en ont été véhiculées ont renouvelé les liens entre les gauches de la gauche et leur traditionnel groupe social de référence. Nous entendons repérer le caractère populaire des formations partisanes des gauches de la gauche en dépassant l'analyse des propriétés sociales du personnel politique et en nous arrêtant sur les grilles de lecture partisanes du monde social, le travail partisan de propagande et d´enrôlement et les normes régissant le militantisme. Postulant une déclinaison localisée des « cultures partisanes » selon les configurations sociales et partisanes, les liens qui unissent les gauches de la gauche des années 2010 et les mondes populaires ont été mis en lumière à l'issue d'une enquête de terrain menée dans quatre espaces locaux : Villejuif, Saint-Brieuc, Saint-Étienne et Nantes. L'exploration des « gauches de la gauche » des années 2010 donne à voir comment les mondes populaires persistent à être un enjeu problématique mais central pour une partie de la gauche partisane. Loin de n'être que des porte-parole rationnels autoproclamés des classes populaires, les gauches de la gauche sont porteuses de « cultures partisanes » imprégnées de populaire. Elle ne font pas que parler des dominés, elles s'adressent à eux sur un ton populaire. Elles peinent néanmoins à voir aboutir ou à pérenniser leurs idylles avec les classes populaires notamment avec les franges pluri-dominées de ce groupe social. L'insertion des gauches de la gauche, héritières d'un modèle d'investissement efficace de la classe ouvrière, dans des contextes populaires renouvelés et largement défaits (éclatés, réfractaires à l'unité, indisposés à se mobiliser) permet d'apporter un éclairage sur ce bilan contrasté. Resserrer la focale sur les militants « produits de socialisations multiformes » et donc inégalement sensibles au populaire permettra de compléter l'analyse de rencontres des collectifs partisans et des classes populaires inégalement inabouties. / The « Lefts of the Left » confronting lower classes. This PhD thesis is dedicated to the study of the Lefts of the Left Parties in the 2010s in France, namely PCF, PG, NPA and LO. It aims to extend and discuss the scientific research regarding the divorce between leftist parties and the lower classes. This research work is therefore rooted in political sociology and lower class studies. It sheds light upon how the transformations that affected the lower classes since the 1980s and its related representations have modified the connections between the Lefts of the Left and their traditional reference group. We intend to identify the lower classes-related component of the Lefts of the Left political parties, beyond a focus on social properties of the political staff. We rather pay attention to the political parties' interpretative frameworks of the social world, partisan propaganda and enlistment work, and militancy norms. In this view, the connections between the Lefts of the Left in the 2010s and the lower class, based on a research survey conducted in four local spaces: Villejuif, Saint-Brieuc, Saint-Etienne and Nantes, are to be underlined. Exploring “the Lefts of the Left” of the 2010s allows us to understand how the lower classes remain a problematic and central stake for a part of the left parties. The Lefts of the Left are not only rational self-proclaimed spokespersons for the lower classes, they also convey partisan cultures draining a lower classes-related component. They do not only speak about the dominated, they also try to speak to them with their words. However, they hardly succeed in formalizing and perpetuating this positive relationship, particularly regarding the pluri-dominated parts of the lower class. The Lefts of the Left inherited an effective model of promotion of the working class. The context in which these parties' political action takes place is a renewed context characterized by the division and unwillingness to mobilize of the lower classes, which seem to be now largely defeated and fragmented. Analyzing the Lefts of the Left's insertion in this context contributes to shed light upon this contrasted assessment. We shall then put the emphasis on political activists who are embedded in multiform socialization contexts, and therefore unequally sensitive to lower classes' stakes. In doing so, we shall complete this analysis of unequally unaccomplished meetings between partisan organizations and the lower classes.

O Brasil possui uma característica incomum entre as democracias, seu altíssimo número de partidos políticos. Em sentido clássico, muitos partidos poderiam significar várias clivagens sociais. Na teoria, uma ampla participação partidária na arena política favoreceria uma democracia mais consensual, mais benevolente. Por outro lado, elevado número de atores partidários inibiria a clareza de responsabilidade de quem é governo, dificultando, com isso, a responsabilização eleitoral. Utilizando-se de dados eleitorais, como o índice de volatilidade eleitoral, o índice de coerência partidária e o índice do número efetivo de partidos políticos, o trabalho elabora a seguinte hipótese: no Legislativo, quanto maior a fragmentação partidária, maior a dificuldade do eleitor em identificar o partido governista. Para testá-la, foi criado uma proxy inédita de clareza de responsabilidade e um banco de dados de países presidencialistas do continente americano. Os resultados mostram como países com alta fragmentação partidária e com coalizões de governo dificultam a associação entre o sucesso ou o fracasso do partido governista no Legislativo e no Executivo. Mostra-se, ainda, que o multipartidarismo brasileiro não deriva da fragmentação sócio-cultural e sugere que as instituições políticas brasileiras atuais constrangem os partidos políticos a não sustentarem uma condição de oposição ao Poder Executivo. / The Brazil has an unusual characteristic between the democracies, yours very high number of political parties. In classic sense, many parties can mean multiple social cleavages. In theory, a wide partisan participation in political arena favors a democracy more consensual, more benevolent. By other side, a high number of partisan actors inhibit the clarity of responsibility of who is government, difficulting the electoral accountability. Utilizing electoral data, like the index of electoral volatility, the index of partisan coherence and the index of effective number of parties, the work elaborates the hypothesis: in Legislative, as bigger the party fragmentation, more difficult to the voter identify the government party. To test it, was created an inedited proxy of clarity of responsibility and a database of presidentialist countries of american continent. The results show how countries with high party fragmentation and with government coalitions hamper the association between the success or fail of party government in Legislative and Executive. It also shows that brazilian multiparty system doesn’t derives from social or cultural fragmentation and suggest that the current brazilian political institutions constrains the political parties to not sustain an condition of opposition to Executive Power.

This thesis consists of three essays in the field of information economics. The first essay studies manipulation of information by partisan media. The recent increase in partisan media has generated interest in what drives media outlets to become more partisan. I develop a model to study the role of diffusion of information by word of mouth. In the model, a media outlet designs an information policy, which specifies the level of partisan slant in the outlet’s news reports. The news spread via a communication chain in a population of agents with heterogeneous preferences. The slant has an impact on whether the agents find the news credible and on their incentives to pass the news to others. The analysis elucidates how partisanship of media can be driven by political polarisation of the public and by the tendency of people to interact with people with similar political views. The second essay, co-authored by Jakub Redlicki, investigates falsification of scientific evidence by interest groups. We analyse a game between a biased sender (an interest group) and a decision maker (a policy maker) where the former can falsify scientific evidence at a cost. The sender observes scientific evidence and knows that it will also be observed by the decision maker unless he falsifies it. If he falsifies, then there is a chance that the decision maker observes the falsified evidence rather than the true scientific evidence. First, we investigate the decision maker’s incentives to privately acquire independent evidence, which not only provides additional information to her but can also strengthen or weaken the sender’s falsification effort. Second, we analyse the decision maker’s incentives to acquire information from the sender. The third essay analyses competition between interest groups for access to a policy maker. I study a model of lobbying in which two privately-informed experts (e.g., interest groups) with opposite goals compete for the opportunity to communicate with a policy maker. The main objective is to analyse the benefits which competition for access brings to the policy maker as opposed to hiring an expert in advance. I show that competition for access is advantageous in that it provides the policy maker with some information about the expert who did not gain access and gives the experts an incentive to invest in their communication skills. On the other hand, hiring an expert in advance allows the policy maker to use a monetary reward to incentivise the expert to invest more in his communication skills.

Submitted by Bruna Rodrigues (bruna92rodrigues@yahoo.com.br) on 2016-09-22T13:13:29Z No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseAFI.pdf: 2022856 bytes, checksum: 4115baed94b90edb929358d16194957e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-04T18:44:40Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseAFI.pdf: 2022856 bytes, checksum: 4115baed94b90edb929358d16194957e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-04T18:44:47Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseAFI.pdf: 2022856 bytes, checksum: 4115baed94b90edb929358d16194957e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-10-04T18:44:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseAFI.pdf: 2022856 bytes, checksum: 4115baed94b90edb929358d16194957e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-10-23 / Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) / This PhD thesis is an ethnography of policies made by the Indians in the Upper Rio Negro in two main areas: the indigenous movement and the Government’s municipality of São Gabriel da Cachoeira, Amazonas State, Brazil. The indigenous organized movement exists in the region since at least the 1970s. However, the debates about political parties politics and attempts to indigenous alliances aiming to hold office in the county, they have intensified only over the years 1990. In both cases some indigenous leaders took ahead the process with a certain way of speech and work, who often expressed the movement as a kind of "laboratory" for partisan politics. That is, there are so many points of intersection of these two spheres which cannot let us think of them as separated or independent in that context. On the other way round, the descriptions and analyzes of some narratives and political events of the upper Rio Negro that are presented in this work show how in these spaces the Indians dialogue, debate, fight and dispute among themselves, but also with two other key players: White people and State. In this sense, the thesis also reflects on the political processes of establishing an indigenous sociality from the state, when, in 2008, there were elected two Indians for mayor and vice-mayor positions in São Gabriel da Cachoeira. The plots, narratives, actions and evaluations of these processes underlie an argument in which the strongest language is on the transformation, instability and reversibility. / Esta tese é uma etnografia das políticas feitas pelos índios no alto rio Negro em dois espaços principais: o movimento indígena e a prefeitura de São Gabriel da Cachoeira. O movimento organizado existe naquela região pelo menos desde a década de 1970. Já os debates acerca da política partidária, bem como as tentativas de alianças indígenas visando ocupar cargos eletivos no município, se intensificaram ao longo dos anos 1990. Em ambos os processos tomaram à frente das falas e trabalhos alguns líderes indígenas, que muitas vezes expressavam o movimento como espécie de “laboratório” para a política partidária. Ou seja, há diversos pontos de intersecção entre essas duas esferas que fazem com que não possam ser pensadas de modo apartado. Ao contrário, as descrições e análises de algumas narrativas e acontecimentos políticos do alto rio Negro que são apresentadas neste trabalho mostram como nesses espaços os índios dialogam, debatem, lutam e disputam entre si, mas também com dois outros agentes fundamentais: brancos e Estado. Nesse sentido, a tese reflete também sobre os processos políticos de constituição de uma socialidade indígena em relação ao Estado, que eles passam a “ocupar” quando, em 2008, são eleitos dois índios para os cargos de prefeito e vice-prefeito do município de São Gabriel da Cachoeira. Os enredos, narrativas, ações e avaliações desses processos fundamentam uma argumentação na qual o idioma mais forte é o da transformação, da instabilidade e da reversibilidade.

O Brasil possui uma característica incomum entre as democracias, seu altíssimo número de partidos políticos. Em sentido clássico, muitos partidos poderiam significar várias clivagens sociais. Na teoria, uma ampla participação partidária na arena política favoreceria uma democracia mais consensual, mais benevolente. Por outro lado, elevado número de atores partidários inibiria a clareza de responsabilidade de quem é governo, dificultando, com isso, a responsabilização eleitoral. Utilizando-se de dados eleitorais, como o índice de volatilidade eleitoral, o índice de coerência partidária e o índice do número efetivo de partidos políticos, o trabalho elabora a seguinte hipótese: no Legislativo, quanto maior a fragmentação partidária, maior a dificuldade do eleitor em identificar o partido governista. Para testá-la, foi criado uma proxy inédita de clareza de responsabilidade e um banco de dados de países presidencialistas do continente americano. Os resultados mostram como países com alta fragmentação partidária e com coalizões de governo dificultam a associação entre o sucesso ou o fracasso do partido governista no Legislativo e no Executivo. Mostra-se, ainda, que o multipartidarismo brasileiro não deriva da fragmentação sócio-cultural e sugere que as instituições políticas brasileiras atuais constrangem os partidos políticos a não sustentarem uma condição de oposição ao Poder Executivo. / The Brazil has an unusual characteristic between the democracies, yours very high number of political parties. In classic sense, many parties can mean multiple social cleavages. In theory, a wide partisan participation in political arena favors a democracy more consensual, more benevolent. By other side, a high number of partisan actors inhibit the clarity of responsibility of who is government, difficulting the electoral accountability. Utilizing electoral data, like the index of electoral volatility, the index of partisan coherence and the index of effective number of parties, the work elaborates the hypothesis: in Legislative, as bigger the party fragmentation, more difficult to the voter identify the government party. To test it, was created an inedited proxy of clarity of responsibility and a database of presidentialist countries of american continent. The results show how countries with high party fragmentation and with government coalitions hamper the association between the success or fail of party government in Legislative and Executive. It also shows that brazilian multiparty system doesn’t derives from social or cultural fragmentation and suggest that the current brazilian political institutions constrains the political parties to not sustain an condition of opposition to Executive Power.