The first part of this thesis sums up ideas, which the author had published in his essays. These ideas are mostly focused on the relationship between the class structure of current western societies and economic policy preferred by the governments. The next part is dedicated to Charles Wright Mills, his sociological method, his contribution to sociology of 50th as well as his heritage for current sociological thinking. Three idea streams, which can be used for supplementing Mills' point of view, are explained: public choice economy (mainly its version of Gordon Tullock), new class theory and theory of business innovation. New typology of business innovation is developed in this part. The core of this thesis consist in discussion of Mills' propositions about the growth of bureaucratic organizations, birth of white collars as a massive social class and its impact on social structure, economic development and political development of western societies. Mills conclusions are looked on in the light of socioeconomic development during 60 years since the first publishing of White collar. They are also compared with key finding of idea streams mentioned above. Theory of impact of growth of big bureaucracy on economic and political development is formulated that specifies and supplement Mills' theory. The...

As relações políticas existentes na construção do planejamento das cidades brasileiras constituem o objeto de pesquisa desta tese de doutorado. Apesar da criação do Estatuto da Cidade, em 2001, pouco se avançou na garantia do direito à cidade para aquelas pessoas que mais sofrem com as diversas desigualdades sociais, construídas historicamente sob um leque de privilégios de grupos dominantes nas cidades. Entre esses grupos estão os empresários que, reunidos em associações, pautam firmemente as ações estatais, sobretudo as políticas urbanas, desde as metrópoles até as pequenas cidades. Para analisar tal ação política, utilizaremos a teoria do rent-seeking, amplamente difundida na Economia e na Ciência Política. Esta tese busca provar a existência de um rent-seeking urbano, pois o que está em disputa na cidade é a renda a partir da terra urbana, maximizando lucros e expandindo as fronteiras da acumulação do capital, o qual está imbricado em uma extensa rede financeira global e se expressa nas cidades, lócus da reprodução da vida dos cidadãos. Aplicaremos essa tese ao caso da cidade de Joinville, situada no estado de Santa Catarina, detentora da terceira maior população da região Sul do país. Joinville possui uma grande articulação de entidades empresariais com poderoso capital político, capaz de influenciar os diversos grupos sociais e políticos locais. A partir da criação do Plano Diretor de Joinville, em 2008, coincidindo com o período da grande expansão do setor imobiliário brasileiro, novos interesses entram em disputa. Para garantir o rent-seeking urbano, a coalizão de empresários precisou realinhar conservadoramente as instâncias da democracia participativa, financiar campanhas eleitorais e exercer lobbies sob os principais marcos legais em discussão. Excluindo, assim, aqueles que contestam os privilégios políticos de alguns grupos e desmandos empresariais. / The existing political relations on construction of urban planning in Brazilian cities are the research object of this doctoral thesis. Despite the creation of the City Statute in 2001, little progress was made in guaranteeing city rights for those people who suffer most with several social inequalities, historically built under a range of privileges from dominant groups in the cities. Among these groups there are entrepreneurs who participate in associations and debate firmly on state actions, mainly urban politics, from metropolis to small cities. To analyze this political action the rent-seeking theory, which is widely used on Economy and Political Science, will be used. This thesis aims to prove the existence of urban rent-seeking, because what's on stake in the city is the wealth provision of urban land, maximizing profits and expanding the borders of capital accumulation, which is interwoven into an extensive financial network and this is expressed in the cities, locus of citizen's lives. This thesis will be applied in Joinville city, located in Santa Catarina state, with the third largest population of the country's southern region. Joinville has a great political business entities articulation with plenty political power which influences several social and political groups. With the creation of Joinville masterplan in 2008, coinciding with the expansion of Brazilian real estate industry, new interests are in disputation. To ensure the urban rent-seeking, the coalition of entrepreneurs needed realign conservatively the participatory democracy, fund election campaigns and lobby the principals legal frameworks in discussion. Thereby, excluding those who contest political privilege of some groups and business entities.

As relações políticas existentes na construção do planejamento das cidades brasileiras constituem o objeto de pesquisa desta tese de doutorado. Apesar da criação do Estatuto da Cidade, em 2001, pouco se avançou na garantia do direito à cidade para aquelas pessoas que mais sofrem com as diversas desigualdades sociais, construídas historicamente sob um leque de privilégios de grupos dominantes nas cidades. Entre esses grupos estão os empresários que, reunidos em associações, pautam firmemente as ações estatais, sobretudo as políticas urbanas, desde as metrópoles até as pequenas cidades. Para analisar tal ação política, utilizaremos a teoria do rent-seeking, amplamente difundida na Economia e na Ciência Política. Esta tese busca provar a existência de um rent-seeking urbano, pois o que está em disputa na cidade é a renda a partir da terra urbana, maximizando lucros e expandindo as fronteiras da acumulação do capital, o qual está imbricado em uma extensa rede financeira global e se expressa nas cidades, lócus da reprodução da vida dos cidadãos. Aplicaremos essa tese ao caso da cidade de Joinville, situada no estado de Santa Catarina, detentora da terceira maior população da região Sul do país. Joinville possui uma grande articulação de entidades empresariais com poderoso capital político, capaz de influenciar os diversos grupos sociais e políticos locais. A partir da criação do Plano Diretor de Joinville, em 2008, coincidindo com o período da grande expansão do setor imobiliário brasileiro, novos interesses entram em disputa. Para garantir o rent-seeking urbano, a coalizão de empresários precisou realinhar conservadoramente as instâncias da democracia participativa, financiar campanhas eleitorais e exercer lobbies sob os principais marcos legais em discussão. Excluindo, assim, aqueles que contestam os privilégios políticos de alguns grupos e desmandos empresariais. / The existing political relations on construction of urban planning in Brazilian cities are the research object of this doctoral thesis. Despite the creation of the City Statute in 2001, little progress was made in guaranteeing city rights for those people who suffer most with several social inequalities, historically built under a range of privileges from dominant groups in the cities. Among these groups there are entrepreneurs who participate in associations and debate firmly on state actions, mainly urban politics, from metropolis to small cities. To analyze this political action the rent-seeking theory, which is widely used on Economy and Political Science, will be used. This thesis aims to prove the existence of urban rent-seeking, because what's on stake in the city is the wealth provision of urban land, maximizing profits and expanding the borders of capital accumulation, which is interwoven into an extensive financial network and this is expressed in the cities, locus of citizen's lives. This thesis will be applied in Joinville city, located in Santa Catarina state, with the third largest population of the country's southern region. Joinville has a great political business entities articulation with plenty political power which influences several social and political groups. With the creation of Joinville masterplan in 2008, coinciding with the expansion of Brazilian real estate industry, new interests are in disputation. To ensure the urban rent-seeking, the coalition of entrepreneurs needed realign conservatively the participatory democracy, fund election campaigns and lobby the principals legal frameworks in discussion. Thereby, excluding those who contest political privilege of some groups and business entities.

Politically connected firms may extract rent which significantly improves their financial performance, but with social costs to others in form of market distortions. The thesis presents the first empirical analysis of personal political connections to government ministers in the Czech Republic. We estimated value of political connections and inspected subsidies and public procurements allocation as channels of rent extraction on firm-level data set of 1993-2015 period. For both approaches, cross-section regressions and dynamic matching on covariates and propensity score, we found that connected firms significantly underperform their similar rivals, but slightly improve their performance over the time of connection to minister in office. Connected firms gain significantly more subsidies which confirms subsidy allocation as a channel of rent extraction. We interpret our results that firms may seek political connections as the last option how to improve their bad financial results and remain on the market. Biased subsidy allocation to connected firms in sectors where firms are dependent on subsidies like agriculture creates market distortions and could lead to significant consumer harm.

Entrepreneurship is often linked to some of the most compelling economic and social issues of our time and can therefore be emphasised as essential and relevant. This thesis puts entrepreneurial behaviour in the spotlight and adopts the theoretical lens that enterprises may act as rent-seekers, striving to influence the distribution of income and wealth at the political level for their personal benefit. Because the resources expended on political influence can be seen as non-productive, this entrepreneurial behaviour harms innovation, competitiveness, and the economy as a whole. This work is based on two case studies from two institutionally, politically and socially different contexts and aims to understand the rent-seeking behaviour of enterprises under conditions of governance. Accordingly, cases of Anaklia Deep Sea Port in Georgia and Nord Stream 2 in Germany are brought up for further scrutiny and analysis. The study emphasises the relevance of entrepreneurship as a contextual phenomenon and concludes that governance conditions of a country can have different influences on the rent-seeking behaviour of enterprises. Moreover, this study develops a conceptual generalisation and provides opportunities for further studies.

Corruption, militarism, and conflict are bedfellows, and their coexistence feeds a vicious circle of violence and instability. Every dollar spent on the military is a dollar not spent on welfare-generating services such as education and healthcare. Yet, military spending makes up a bulk of government spending in several countries, and it is often shrouded from public purview. Rent-seeking behavior fostered within corrupt practices incentivize public officials to accept bribes from military suppliers, while the secrecy surrounding defense procurements allows them to act with perceived impunity. In this paper, I conduct a quantitative study using panel data from 175 countries from 2000 to 2020 to argue that corruption causes a distortion in public expenditure distribution by diverting valuable resources from social spending to military spending. Highly corrupt countries tend to spend a higher percentage of their GDP on the military, freeing up less of the finite resources for investment in education and healthcare. I find that corruption drives up military spending causing a crowding out of social spending.

財產權的發展，具有將外部成本內部化，以及減輕租值消散的功能，同時也會影響誘因機制與市場行為，因此，建立可執行的財產權或契約系統，有助於降低交易成本，促進市場交易的效率。土地使用分區管制是政府用以界定財產權的一項重要工具，但在執行的過程中，會受到資訊不完全的因素所限制，而產生許多社會經濟衝突的問題，所以，在財產權界定不完全的情形下，分區管制制度的執行可能是一種負和、零和或正和的賽局。 在台灣的都市規劃管制制度下，土地使用分區管制一直被視為政府執行都市公共政策的重要工具，但是土地使用分區管制制度變遷的原因及對財產權配置的影響，很少被深入的探討，亦少有相關的實證研究予以論述說明。由於分區管制決策直接影響人民的土地財產權範圍，因此，以財產權為研究的焦點，連結制度及執行層面的動態分析，可以更深入地了解政策運作的過程，檢視分區管制制度設計的問題，藉以提供更佳的制度環境。本研究嘗試以新制度經濟學的基礎，基於財產權的觀點，連結制度變遷及執行層面的分析，研究所有權人及利益團體如何透過與政府的協商，改變土地使用分區管制制度，進而影響財產權配置的問題。在方法上，則透過賽局理論及個案研究，建立參與者行為互動模式及進行實證分析，以剖析制度變遷的原因及問題。 本研究除了進行以上所述的議題，亦同時關注制度選擇、容積移轉的問題，以及違規使用的行為，並將從一系列的行為分析中，進一步探究尋租行為對分區管制制度及經濟發展的影響。研究的結果，除了對分區管制制度提出具體的建議外，亦對制度變遷的行為及政府角色，提供更多的認知面向，值得作為都市研究的參考。 / Zoning institution is regarded as an important instrument for enforcing urban policy in Taiwan. Zoning not only control the quality of urban environment, but affect the price of real estate. However, the reasons of zoning institution changed and the factors influenced the assignment of property rights are very rarely investigated. The decision of zoning will directly influence the scope of landowners’ property rights. Thus, based upon the viewpoint of property rights, incorporated with institutional and enforcing dimension to conduct a dynamic analysis can deeply investigate the process of policy operation and the problems of institutional design so as to provide better institutional environment for zoning. This research, based on the property rights perspective and the approach of property rights analysis of New Institutional Economics, intend to investigate the change of zoning institution and its enforcement. The study pays special attention to the bargaining among private landowners, interest groups and government authority. In order to improve the institutional environment, this paper will also try to find the institutional problems in the process of enforcement through cases study. Cases study is used for further analysis the interaction among the actors participated so as to understand the processes of bargaining, re-assignment of property rights and the reasons of zoning institution changed. After the cases study, the research will address some suggestions of institutional design of zoning and try to review the policy of urban development and land use control in Taipei city. A promise suggestion on the institutional design of zoning will be provided for the reference of understanding and research on zoning institution and behaviors. In addition, the impact of the rent-seeking patterns and the production paths on the zoning behaviors resulting in the change of zoning institution are explored. The results of the research will make further suggestions to the issues of institutional design of zoning, and to the avoidance of the negative effects of rent-seeking behavior. Moreover, the source and process of institutional change of zoning related to rent-seeking behavior, and the ways government responds to the rent-seeking behaviors are provided for the reference of further study of urban planning.

There is growing consensus that unless resource-rich developing countries improve their domestic governance systems, rising exploitation of mineral, oil and gas resources may result in long-term adverse developmental outcomes associated with the “resource curse”. Despite the consensus, reforms do not abound. This dissertation investigates the obstacles to such reforms, and the mechanisms and strategies that can possibly overcome these obstacles. I argue that two trapping mechanisms are binding these countries to a “weak governance curse”. One mechanism is the phenomenon of path dependence, which makes a dysfunctional governance path initiated at a past historical juncture resistant to change over time. The other mechanism is rent-seeking behaviour associated with high resource rents, which creates perverse incentives for political and economic actors to resist reforms. The Law and Development literature has recently produced a rich body of knowledge on governance reform in developing countries, yet it has largely neglected the potential role of innovative global regulatory mechanisms, beyond development assistance, in this process. I argue that this evolving literature ought to draw from global regulation studies to investigate the interaction between unconventional global regulatory mechanisms and domestic governance reform. In this thesis I analyze whether extraterritorial home country regulations, such as anti-bribery, anti-money laundering and securities disclosure regulations, and transnational public-private partnerships, such as the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, may offer institutional opportunities for external and internal actors to facilitate policy reforms in resource-rich and governance-poor countries. My conclusion is twofold. First, there is reason for cautious optimism regarding the potential for unconventional global regulatory mechanisms to provoke positive feedback effects in domestic governance reform. These mechanisms can open innovative institutional pathways of influence to outsiders and insiders promoting governance reform. Second, instead of searching for a regulatory silver bullet, the most promising way to promote reforms in resilient dysfunctional governance systems is to make use of the wide range of conventional and unconventional mechanisms available. A constellation of regulatory instruments opens up the possibility for outside and inside reformers to benefit from a different policy mix of available mechanisms, depending on the specific circumstances of a given country at a particular time.

There is growing consensus that unless resource-rich developing countries improve their domestic governance systems, rising exploitation of mineral, oil and gas resources may result in long-term adverse developmental outcomes associated with the “resource curse”. Despite the consensus, reforms do not abound. This dissertation investigates the obstacles to such reforms, and the mechanisms and strategies that can possibly overcome these obstacles. I argue that two trapping mechanisms are binding these countries to a “weak governance curse”. One mechanism is the phenomenon of path dependence, which makes a dysfunctional governance path initiated at a past historical juncture resistant to change over time. The other mechanism is rent-seeking behaviour associated with high resource rents, which creates perverse incentives for political and economic actors to resist reforms. The Law and Development literature has recently produced a rich body of knowledge on governance reform in developing countries, yet it has largely neglected the potential role of innovative global regulatory mechanisms, beyond development assistance, in this process. I argue that this evolving literature ought to draw from global regulation studies to investigate the interaction between unconventional global regulatory mechanisms and domestic governance reform. In this thesis I analyze whether extraterritorial home country regulations, such as anti-bribery, anti-money laundering and securities disclosure regulations, and transnational public-private partnerships, such as the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, may offer institutional opportunities for external and internal actors to facilitate policy reforms in resource-rich and governance-poor countries. My conclusion is twofold. First, there is reason for cautious optimism regarding the potential for unconventional global regulatory mechanisms to provoke positive feedback effects in domestic governance reform. These mechanisms can open innovative institutional pathways of influence to outsiders and insiders promoting governance reform. Second, instead of searching for a regulatory silver bullet, the most promising way to promote reforms in resilient dysfunctional governance systems is to make use of the wide range of conventional and unconventional mechanisms available. A constellation of regulatory instruments opens up the possibility for outside and inside reformers to benefit from a different policy mix of available mechanisms, depending on the specific circumstances of a given country at a particular time.

貪腐是先進國家檢視政府行政效率的重要指標，貪腐會影響國家整體形象，甚至左右外國直接投資與金融市場的評比。中國之國家預防腐敗局的機構定位突顯中國內部對貪腐問題與政治結構調整問題。因此，本研究針對中國大陸貪腐問題、貪腐機制之演變過程、國家預防腐敗局現階段工作成效與不足之處、國家預防腐敗局未來工作方向展望與挑戰等問題，以文獻分析方法進行探討與分析。 經過本研究的分析與討論，本研究歸納以下論點： 一、中國大陸貪腐問題可以用尋租理論解釋，當改革開放後，地方官員可以藉由經濟特區許可證或稅務等工作內容，進行利益勾結與建立政商貪腐集團。 二、貪腐機制可分為權權交易模式與權錢交易模式，其貪腐集團的交接與政權交接息息相關。改革開放前的貪腐模式為權權交易模式，改革開放後為權錢交易模式。 三、中共貪腐機制以政治運作角度分析其過程，可以視為政權交接期間的合作式賽局崩解與重新建立，其崩解原因在於內部利益分配不平均導致矛盾加深，藉著政權交接期間之權力洗牌模式，產生新的貪腐集團與經濟利益分配模式。 四、過去中共對於貪腐問題的處理模式屬於政權協商方式，例如屬於江澤明體系的陳良宇貪腐案歷經「陳良宇涉嫌貪污」至「陳良宇同志違紀問題」的兩種處理模式，透露出中共對於貪腐問題的防治處理屬於政權協商的模式。因此，國家預防腐敗局的設立過程背後潛伏著個政治派系的妥協。 五、就組織架構而言，國家預防腐敗局目前位於監察部之下，部門本身並無獨立監察權，僅被視為調研與幕僚單位，此與香港或新加坡之獨立性反貪腐機構的特性有所差異。 六、在中共維持黨政雙軌制下，中紀委與監察部將是反貪腐制度的主軸，所以短期而言，對內部角色定位，國家預防腐敗局的功能將定位於中紀委領導的執行單位，負責實際的反貪腐之協調運作；對外部角色定位，國家預防腐敗局將定位於接收國際組織的意見，國家預防腐敗局的角色將是整合國際反貪腐的科技運作。 七、就國家預防腐敗局之未來發展模式，國家預防腐敗局需要建立獨立監察權，且其成員任命方式必須擺脫派系協商的影子，但在中共目前政治角力過程下，國家預防腐敗局之未來發展將視內部政治利益與輿論壓力的角力結果而定。 / The extent of corruption is an important index to review the administrative efficiency of the governments among advanced countries. The corruption issue affects the image of a country, the foreign direct investment and the rating of financial market. The role of National Bureau of Corruption Prevention of China (thereafter as “NBCP”) stresses the problems of corruption in internal systems of China and political restructuring. Therefore, this study adopts the literature analysis method to explore and analyze the corruption problems in China, the development of corruption prevention scheme, the performance and deficiencies of NBCP, and the future prospects and challenges of NBCP. After the analysis and discussions in this study, the conclusions are as follows. First, the problems of corruption in China could be interpreted by the rent-seeking theory. After China’s reform, the local government officials could take advantage of the permission of economically-designated zone or taxation, etc. to collude with private enterprises based on interests, and form the corruption groups. Second, according to the past literatures, the patterns of corruption in China could be categorized as the exchange of privilege for privilege and the exchange of privilege for money, and the transition of both corruption groups and regimes is closely bound up. From the perspective of rent-seeking theory, the exchange of privilege for privilege is the pattern of corruption before China’s reform, with the exchange of privilege for money standing for the ones after China’s reform. Third, from the perspective of operation of political system in China, the transition of regimes could be interpreted as the process of collapse and rebuilding in the dynamics of cooperative games. The reasons of collapse could result from the disequilibrium in the allocation of internal interests and then conflicts from the disequilibrium. Therefore, by the reshuffle of political interests during the transition of regimes, the new corruption groups and new scheme for the allocation of economic interests appear. Fourth, China used to deal with corruption through regime consultation. For instance, the corruption case of Chen, Lian-yu in the administration of Jiang, Ze-ming ,which was shifted from original tone of “Chen, Lian-yu suspected in corruption” to “Chen, Lian-yu’s violating disciplines”, shows that the strategy for corruption in China could be categorized by the features of regime consultation. Hence, the setup of NBCP implies the compromises among different political groups. Fifth, in terms of organizational structure, NBCP is under the Ministry of Supervision, without independent supervision, and only works as the research and staff unit of independent supervision, which differs from the independence of the anti-corruption institute of Hong Kong and Singapore. Sixth, under the present dual-track system of China, the Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Central Committee of the CPC and Ministry of Supervision play the main roles in the system of anti-corruption. In the short term, as to the internal role, NBCP is regarded as the execution unit of Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. As to the external role, NBCP is responsible for receiving the opinions from international organizations and integrating the technology of international anti-corruption. Seventh, the future model of NBCP should build up the independent supervision and appoint the members without the influence of the political groups. However, in the struggle of different political groups in Chinese Communist party, the future development of NBCP will depend on the outcome of the struggle between internal political interests and public stress.