Elected Oligarchy and Economic Underdevelopment: The Case of Guyana

This study proposes the idea that Guyana’s present government can be categorized as an elected oligarchy. It highlights the existence of several binding constraints (or structural bottlenecks) and demonstrates how these constraints are exacerbated by the elected oligarchy to impair the economic development of the country. Using stylized data on economic trends, the paper illustrates the direct and indirect channels through which the elected oligarchy stifles the private sector and consequently economic progress. As such, the paper presents the elected oligarchy as an alternative channel through which private investments are crowded out by the political strategy of the state.Private sector crowding out; Elected oligarchy

A new condition for the transition from runaway to oligarchic growth

Accretion among macroscopic bodies of ~km size or larger is enhanced significantly due to gravitational focusing. Two regimes can be distinguished. Initially, the system experiences runaway growth, in which the gravitational focusing factors increase, and bodies at the high-mass tail of the distribution grow fastest. However, at some point the runaway body dynamically heats its environment, gravitational focusing factors decrease, and runaway growth passes into oligarchic growth. Based on the results of recent simulations, we reconsider the runaway growth-oligarchy transition. In contrast to oligarchy, we find that runaway growth cannot be approximated with a two component model (of small and large bodies) and that the criterion of Ida & Makino (1993), which is frequently adopted as the start of oligarchy, is not a sufficient condition to signify the transition. Instead, we propose a new criterion based on timescale arguments. We then find a larger value for the runaway growth-oligarchy transition: from several hundreds of km in the inner disk regions up to ~10^3 km for the outer disk. These findings are consistent with the view that runaway growth has been responsible for the size distribution of the present day Kuiper belt objects. Our finding furthermore outlines the proper initial conditions at the start of the oligarchy stage.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letter

Co-orbital Oligarchy

We present a systematic examination of the changes in semi-major axis caused by the mutual interactions of a group of massive bodies orbiting a central star in the presence of eccentricity dissipation. For parameters relevant to the oligarchic stage of planet formation, dynamical friction keeps the typical eccentricities small and prevents orbit crossing. Interactions at impact parameters greater than several Hill radii cause the protoplanets to repel each other; if the impact parameter is instead much less than the Hill radius, the protoplanets shift slightly in semi-major axis but remain otherwise unperturbed. If the orbits of two or more protoplanets are separated by less than a Hill radius, they are each pushed towards an equilibrium spacing between their neighbors and can exist as a stable co-orbital system. In the shear-dominated oligarchic phase of planet formation we show that the feeding zones contain several oligarchs instead of only one. Growth of the protoplanets in the oligarchic phase drives the disk to an equilibrium configuration that depends on the mass ratio of protoplanets to planetesimals, $\Sigma/\sigma$. Early in the oligarchic phase, when $\Sigma/\sigma$ is low, the spacing between rows of co-orbital oligarchs are about 5 Hill radii wide, rather than the 10 Hill radii cited in the literature. It is likely that at the end of oligarchy the average number of co-orbital oligarchs is greater than unity. In the outer solar system this raises the disk mass required to form the ice giants. In the inner solar system this lowers the mass of the final oligarchs and requires more giant impacts than previously estimated. This result provides additional evidence that Mars is not an untouched leftover from the oligarchic phase, but must be composed of several oligarchs assembled through giant impacts.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures. v2 includes major revisions including additional results motivated by the referee's comment

Whose Opinion Counts? Political Processes and the Implementation Problem

The mechanism used in Nash implementation is a form of direct democracy, taking everyone''s opinion into account. We augment this mechanism with a political process that selects the opinions of a subset of the individuals. We study three such processes -- oligarchy, oligarchic democracy and random sampling -- and compare the social choice rules (SCRs) that can be implemented using each of these processes with those that can be Nash implemented. In oligarchy, only the opinions of a fixed subset of the individuals -- the oligarchs -- determine the implemented alternative. We obtain a negative result for oligarchies: there exist Nash implementable SCRs that cannot be implemented by any oligarchy. Oligarchic democracy is a perturbation of oligarchy, in which the opinions of the oligarchs “almost always” determine the implemented alternative but sometimes, everyone''s opinions are considered. In a sharp contrast to the negative result for oligarchies, we show that in economic environments, every Nash implementable SCR can be implemented by an oligarchic democracy in which any three individuals act as oligarchs. In random sampling, opinions of a fixed number of individuals are selected randomly, which then determine the implemented alternative. We show that in economic environments, every Nash implementable SCR can be implemented by randomly sampling opinions of four individuals.microeconomics ;

Inefficient lobbying, populism and oligarchy

This paper analyses the efficiency consequences of lobbying in a production economy with imperfect commitment. We first show that the Pareto efficiency result found for truthful equilibria of common agency games in static exchange economies no longer holds under these more general conditions. We construct a model of pressure groups where the set of e.cient truthful common-agency equilibria has measure zero. Equilibria are generally inefficient as a direct result of the existence of groups with conflicting interests, which allocate real resources to lobbying. If lobbies representing "the poor " and "the rich " have identical organizational capacities, we show that these equilibria are biased towards the poor, who have a comparative advantage in politics, rather than in production. If the pressure groups di.er in their organizational capacity, both pro-rich (oligarchic) and pro-poor (populist) equilibria may arise, all of which are inefficient with respect to the constrained optimum.

Inefficient lobbying, populism and oligarchy

The authors investigate the theoretical effects of lobbying and pressure group activities on both economic efficiency and on equity. Looking at lobbying as a political activity that takes place alongside production, they find that lobbies may generate economic inefficiency as part of the process of shifting the allocation of government expenditures in their favor. Outcomes of this non-electoral political process will always be biased toward the group with a comparative advantage in politics, rather than in production. In a context where the main political conflict is one between"the rich"and"the poor,"political equilibria may be either populist (inefficiently pro-poor) or oligarchic (inefficiently pro-rich), depending on each group's lobbying effectiveness.Labor Policies,Environmental Economics&Policies,National Governance,Economic Theory&Research,Fiscal&Monetary Policy,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,National Governance,ICT Policy and Strategies,Knowledge Economy

Fiscal decentralization and development: How crucial is local politics?

Does fiscal decentralization in a politically decentralized less developed country help strengthen democratic institutions at the grass root level? And is the impact of such decentralization on local politics important in determining local development? Our study on Indonesia suggests that fiscal decentralization enhanced free and fair local elections, though the incidence of elite capture, and the consequent breakdown of local democracy, was also present in significant proportions. Fiscal decentralization promoted development mostly in communities which transited out from elite capture to embrace free and fair elections. This was followed by communities that experienced the emergence of elite capture. Communities that continued to remain under either elite capture or free and fair elections did the worst. These findings suggest that while the emergence of elite capture exists, it may not necessarily be the most harmful. Instead, and surprisingly so, stability of local polity hurts development the most

Oligarchic Versus Democratic Societies

This paper develops a model to analyze economic performance under different political regimes. An oligarchic society, where political power is in the hands of major producers, protects their property rights, but also tends to erect significant entry barriers against new entrepreneurs. Democracy, where political power is more widely di used, imposes redistributive taxes on producers, but tends to avoid entry barriers. When taxes in democracy are high and the distortions caused by entry barriers are low, an oligarchic society achieves greater efficiency. Nevertheless, because comparative advantage in entrepreneurship shifts away from the incumbents, the inefficiency created by entry barriers in oligarchy deteriorates over time. The typical pattern is therefore one of rise and decline of oligarchic societies: of two otherwise identical societies, the one with an oligarchic organization will first become richer, but later fall behind the democratic society. I also discuss how democratic societies may be better able to take advantage of new technologies, how an oligarchic society might transition to democracy because of within-elite conflict, and how the unequal distribution of income in oligarchy supports the oligarchic institutions and may keep them in place even when they become significantly costly to society.democracy, economic growth, entry barriers, oligarchy, political economy, redistribution, sclerosis.

Pers, Demokrasi Dan Negara Indonesia Post-Soeharto: Sebuah Perspektif

The resignation of President Soeharto in May 1998 marked the end of new order era and started a fundamental change within democracy in Indonesia. As a democratic state, Indonesia arguably provides a system to guarantee the freedom of press and good environment of mass media; as the media is supposedly not to be power driven. Several factors have been observed to understand the relationship between press and democracy. Those are democratic revolution, freedom of press, political oligarchy, the role of students, and criminal democracy practice in Indonesia. This article found that under the President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono-Boediono (SBY-Boediono) era, newspeople freedom in journalism was gripped by the practice of "criminal democracy" which continues to undermine the development of press freedom. To conclude, democracy in Indonesia is decayed by unjust practices from the political elites; it further affects the way press and mass media in performing their roles as the fourth pillar of democracy