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Darbe nagrinėjama problema - ar Tarptautinio Valiutos Fondo (toliau TVF) keliamos sąlygos bei reikalaujamos reformos krizės metu gali padėti sparčiai pagerinti šalies politinius-ekonominius rodiklius? Ar TVF reformos, vykdomos krizės metu gali būti taikomos bet kokioms šalims, bet kokioje aplinkoje? Tyrimo objektas – politiniai bei ekonominiai Japonijos ir P.Korėjos rodikliai. Darbo tikslas – ištirti, ar TVF savo įgyvendintų reformų dėka Azijos krizės metu, paskatinio spartesnį ekonomikos atsigavimą P.Korėjoje, ženkliai pagerino politinių-ekonominių rodiklių gerėjimą šalyje, paskatino TUI į P.Korėją srautus. Visą šią situaciją palyginti su Japonijos atveju, kur atitinkamos, anksčiau minėtos TVF reformos nebuvo įgyvendintos. Iš tyrimui atlikti darbe keliamo tikslo suformuota hipotezė, kurią siekiama patvirtinti arba paneigti tyrimo metu gautais rezultatais: Hipotezė - TVF pagerino P.Korėjos politinius-ekonominius rodiklius sparčiau nei tai padarė Japonija savo šalyje, nevykdydama TVF reformų. Kadangi TVF reformos buvo nukreiptos į Vakarų politinės ekonomijos modelio įvedimą P.Korėjoje, pasitvirtinus iškeltai hipotezei bus įrodyta, jog Vakarų modelis gali būti sėkmingai pritaikytas kaip alternatyva Azijos modeliui tiek Azijos, tiek kitose, Vakarų modeliui nebūdingose aplinkose. Darbo uždaviniai: • Pasirinkti konkrečius politinės ekonomijos teorinius aspektus, kurie padėtų susiaurinti ir sukonkretinti tyrimą; • Išskirti konkretų atvejį tyrimui atlikti; • Išanalizuoti TVF... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / This Final Master thesis is designeded to investigate the Western political economy model applicability to change Asian model in its region. During the Asia Financial Crisis in 1997 Korea republic (further South Korea) asked the IMF financial aid and accepted all the conditions and made many reforms in the country. Those reforms were directed into liberalizing the market, open up to foreign investors and to create more attractive foreign direct investment (further FDI) climate in S.Korea. This was about to change theretofore exited Asian political economy model into more liberal Western model. The problem – could IMF reforms help to recover countries‘ economies more effective and sharply after the crisis? Could those IMF reforms be successfully adjusted into any environment? The object – political-economical indicators of Japan and S.Korea. Objective of investigation – to find out if IMF reforms in S.Korea helped to recover its economy more rapidly and successfully than in Japan, where IMF reforms were not implemented. From objective the hypothesis that after investigation will be confirmed or rejected appear: Hypothesis – IMF improved political-economical indicators in S.Korea more sharply than Japan, where the government did not implemented any IMF reforms. Regarding to the fact that IMF reforms were designeded to implement Western political economy model into Asia country – S.Korea, confirmation of the hypothesis would also prove that Western model could be... [to full text]

Cubas provision of free health services to the entire population via neighborhood-based family doctors produced dramatic health gains and achieved a relative state of health equality. Since 1989, however, the termination of Soviet trade, a grave economic crisis, intensification of the US embargo, welfare reductions, and population aging have placed Cubas health successes and elder care services in jeopardy. Little independent research, though, has focused on the influence of post-Cold War circumstances on citizen attitudes about health programs and resources targeting Cubas older population. This research examined global and domestic factors since 1989 that have most influenced perceptions of the equitability and inequitability of health resources among older Cubans. Its multi-layered design drew on new International Political Economy, crystallization, and aspects of Grounded Theory. In-depth narrative interviews were conducted with Cubans age 60 years or older, their families and community support group members, family physicians and other medical personnel, and key health and government informants. Perceptions of health equity were found to correspond most with the geographic proximity and nearly unhindered physical access of older patients to their family doctors and the temporal availability of family physicians to their older patients. Conversely, perceptions of health inequity corresponded most with the older persons experience of medicine shortages and health resource rationing following global socio-political-economic change and domestic policy shifts after 1989. Furthermore, the life course influences of the pre- and post-revolutionary eras and pre-1989 and post-Cold War period were seminal in shaping the perceptions and expectations of the older participants regarding health care, the leadership, and Cuban socialism. The findings have added to the international health and cross-cultural gerontology literature. Decision-makers and health practitioners in Cuba and elsewhere have been informed about the importance of popular perceptions of the impact of health and elder policy change in an era of globalized social relations and capital. The research also has contributed a gerontological dimension and a narrative perspective to further the development of new International Political Economy.

Our current understanding of credit rating agencies’ influence on national sovereignty relies on a dichotomised and highly antagonistic view of the relationship between states and the global economy. This perspective is locked into the discursive confines of the structuralist-sceptics debate within the field of international political economy. CRAs are said to either erode state sovereignty or represent a manifestation of it. By abandoning the state-market, public-private and national-global dichotomies embedded within this debate, and the zero-sum mentality they are predicated upon, this thesis offers an alternative – “transformationalist” – perspective to view the power of CRAs and their influence on national sovereignty. Defying traditional categorization, CRAs’ power is the result of a state-market, public-private confluence of interest and therefore has no determinative influence on national sovereignty. In the course of this analysis, a second assumption embedded within the study of CRAs’ influence is criticised: the fixation on the “big three” rating agencies (Moody’s, S&P and Fitch) and the neglect of the significance of the credit rating itself. Because the rating determination process is opaque, and the credit rating itself is a highly simplified expression of an intricately complex financial, economic and political reality, the causes of a sovereign rating change are often “up for debate”. Governments, within certain degrees of interpretation, are able to embed their own domestic political interests into the “causes” of a rating change, thereby co-opting and co-constructing the power and expertise of CRAs. This can, when successful, enhance governments’ internal sovereignty over domestic social forces and their external sovereignty as they “filter” the influence of a non-state actor. New Zealand’s interaction with the CRAs throughout 2008 to 2012 illustrates how this dynamic occurs and its limitations. The thesis seeks to highlight the diversity and heterogeneity involved in the processes of globalization in general, and CRAs’ influence in particular, and in doing so open up political space to consider possible forms of resistance.

The evolution and impact of journalism in the developing world remains largely under-explored, especially in the Caribbean. This case study explores the role of the 21st century daily newspaper in Jamaica, during a period where the country endured its first widespread national crisis in almost three decades. This thesis deconstructs the coverage of Jamaica’s two daily newspapers and the role of civil society during the nine months prior to the extradition of alleged transnational drug dealer Christopher Coke to the United States. The extradition coverage of Coke, whom the American government deemed, one of the most wanted men in the world, highlighted growing concerns about the island’s diplomacy and its place in the global environment. It gave the news media an opportunity to focus on incidences of corruption, party-garrison clientelistic relationships and facilitate debates about good governance and a new vision for the island. In the aftermath of the Coke extradition, there have been questions about influence and who played what roles in the resolution of the crisis. This thesis considers the influence of the media and of wider civil society activism, specifically the way the newspapers and civic organizations shaped the extradition, opened a space for dialogue and created a shift in the nature of media/government relations on the island. An in-depth content analysis of the newspaper coverage leading up to the extradition forms the empirical basis for study. This is supplemented by interviews with journalists, academics and civic agents whose voices helped shape the Coke debate in the newspapers. This crisis provided a unique opportunity to assess the news agenda on the island along with the perspectives of community voices as they engaged to influence a peaceful resolution. The newspaper analysis of the extradition highlighted the political and social complexity of the island, in particular, the rampant political corruption, extreme social inequality, commonplace civil disobedience and criminality. The extradition revealed that there were obstacles to the cohesion of civil society groups in Jamaica. They were hampered by class and income disparities, political allegiances and questions of faith. These underlying concepts, along with newsroom culture, press-politics relationships, self-censorship, newspaper patronage, education, economic structures, and cultural identity can all be understood not by their individual meanings but as ways in which power is shaping the socio-political landscape of the island. The newspaper coverage of the extradition battle also exposed flaws in the island’s political and social fabric, this elevated government’s predicament from a routine extradition warrant to an armed conflict. This thesis reinforces the role of daily newspapers in ensuring governmental transparency and providing a space that facilitates differing views which ultimately allows democracy to work. The findings from the thesis contribute to an understanding of journalism outside of the context of the United States/ United Kingdom. It showed that in the Caribbean and especially Jamaica special considerations must be made for how socio-cultural factors impact newspaper journalism.

This thesis explores the evolution of the Coldstream Research Campus, a high-tech research park operated by the University of Kentucky. Conceived of in the late 1980s and built in 1992, Coldstream was expected to become the „economic engine‟ of central Kentucky through the commercialization of applied scientific and technological research coming out of the university. Twenty years later, with Coldstream having failed to live up to expectations, the university initiated the process of updating the Coldstream Master Plan to incorporate a decided emphasis on the concept of sustainability. Through a mix of archival research and semi-structured interviews, this thesis argues that the newfound emphasis on sustainability is important insofar as it opens up the possibility for perpetuating the existence of the Coldstream Research Campus as a real estate development, even in spite of its failures in other arenas.

This research seeks to elucidate the role of relatively large-scale ceramic productionindustries located at the Classic period center of Matacapan in the Sierra de los Tuxtlas, SouthernVeracruz, Mexico. Arnold et al. (1993) have suggested that the specialized production atComoapan, the largest production locality at Matacapan, was oriented toward supplying theregion with ceramics. This production locality overwhelmingly specialized in manufacturingone standardized ware, Coarse Orange, into necked and neckless jars, which are found in manyparts of the region.The compositional techniques of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) andpetrography were employed to investigate the distribution of this ware. Control groups weresampled from known production loci at Matacapan. The data does reveal strong evidence thatCoarse Orange was traded from Matacapan to other sites in the Tuxtlas. Comoapan was themost likely producer for this trade. Equally as important, this research yielded several differentcompositional groups, which indicates sites that either did not interact with Matacapan to procurethis ware, or who produced their own varieties of Coarse Orange. While Matacapan seems tohave had economic influence over parts of the Tuxtlas, the distribution of non-Matacapancompositional groups is useful to delineate areas of the Tuxtlas who display minimal economicinteraction with this regional center.

My thesis develops three models of political economy, examining different factors that affect equilibrium in political markets. The first paper develops a model based on that of Moutos (2001) whereby a government must choose between a tariff and an income tax in order to raise revenue to finance redistribution from rich to poor. I use a simple median voter model of political economy to show that an income tax may be preferred if it can raise more money than the tariff. This result links well with the empirical observation that more liberal trade regimes are often associated with larger government sizes. The second paper explores the idea of interactions between different parts of a political party’s platform and the benefit that different groups can receive from those policies. I show that even when parties have no predisposition towards any particular policy their policy announcements may differ due to the difference in demand for policy favours from special interests. I also discuss how this difference in demand can affect the relative success of interests groups and of the political parties themselves, and apply these results to a simple model of trade policy to show that left-wing parties proposing higher income tax rates may attract support from groups who support trade protection in developed countries. My third paper provides an extension to the well known model of special interest politics by Grossman and Helpman (1996). I introduce costly informative spending that special interests can use to convert uninformed voters into informed ones. This is advantageous to special interests when those being informed are of a similar political persuasion to the interest group members, thus skewing equilibrium policies towards the group’s objectives.

Disposition für ein Taschenbuch und für ein in 5 Bände zu gliederndes großes Werk

This dissertation provides an examination of the recent phenomenon of entrepreneurship and innovation promotion in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. Through the use of the structured, focused comparison method, this research examines two cases, Oman and Qatar, to provide a deep analysis of the policy and practice of entrepreneurship promotion in the region. Despite a claim of responding to regional challenges of economic diversification and the weak participation of nationals in the private sector, entrepreneurship as a key component of each country???s quest for a knowledge economy seems paradoxical in its ostensible inconsistency with the Gulf rentier state status quo. Path dependencies from oil-led development and the concomitant labour market bifurcation have perpetuated incentive structures which obstruct innovation and entrepreneurialism. Responding to this puzzle, this research answers two questions. The first is concerned with the character and motivation of these strategies in the Gulf, and what that reveals about the evolution of policy making practices. The second assesses the role of the millennial generation and regional transformation. Through interrogating the entrepreneurship policy experience in the case studies, this research extends beyond the often perfunctory assumptions of rentier state literature to investigate the unfolding of development policies in the current milieu. This research finds that entrepreneurship promotion risks only becoming a new way of recasting rentier tools: rentierism 2.0. The study argues that governance in the Gulf is best understood as a contestation between reforms and rentier patterns. Being cognizant of this tension provides a venue for understanding how some policies contravene classic rentier expectations while others appear hypocritical as the implementation of policy announcements become obstructed by structural contradictions. This dissertation makes an empirical contribution on a prominent policy shift in the Gulf that has been largely ignored in social sciences. As well, it provides a theoretical contribution by integrating literature on development and innovation which is generally disconnected from scholarly work on Gulf political economy to deepen understandings of development and transition in the region. Overall, this project provides a window into transition and transformation, demonstrating the way rentier patterns and a combination of novel pressures interact and affect the practices of development policy making and the Gulf ruling bargain.