The management of Natura 2000 Network sites: a discrete choice experiment approach

One of the main problems that public institutions face in the management of protected areas, such as the European Natura 2000 network, is how to design and implement sustainable management plans accounting both for the social cost and benefits of conserving these sites. This paper provides with an empirical application of a discrete choice experiment undertaken in a Natura 2000 site in the Basque Country (Spain) aimed at evaluating the social preferences for different land-use options. This information is then used to evaluate the social desirability of some future management plans.environmental valuation, discrete choice experiments, choice modelling, Natura 2000

Corruption and Positive Selection in Privatization

We consider the supply of a public good based on a publicly-owned facility. The Government has a choice between provision in-house and privatizing the facility and then outsourcing the production. In particular, we focus on corruption in the decision to privatize and on its effect on social welfare when there is asymmetric information on the public and private manager's efficiency. Our analysis shows that a corrupt Government, that chooses to privatize only in exchange for a bribe, makes a positive selection on the private firm's efficiency and, thus, may raise expected social welfare above what an honest Government could get.Corruption, Privatization, Private vs. public provision.

Occupation Choice: Family, Social and Market Influences

The advance of knowledge-based societies has modified the labor markets and qualification requirements. In this sense, and considering that individual choices about careers and occupations have pervasive social effects, there is a growing interest from both academics and policy makers in understanding and influencing the process of education choice. Specifically, there is a worldwide renewed concern on achieving higher levels of graduation from scientific and technological disciplines. Available evidence shows that mobilizing individual wills towards these highly priority careers is not an easy nor mechanical task. Thus, it is necessary to expand the standard view about the process of occupation choice by adding non pecuniary factors, influence of social networks and the role of information and guidance policies. With these objectives in mind, and after reviewing the theoretical literature about occupation choice in economics, the present paper analyzes the effects that diverse personal, family, social and economic aspects have in the selection of an university career. Based on the empirical findings, some policy recommendations are put forward.Occupational Choice, Professions, Public Policy

Optimizing information in the herd : guinea pigs, profits, and welfare

Herding arises when an agent's private information is swamped by public information in what M. O. Jackson and E. Kalai (1997, Games Econ. Behavior21, 102–134) call a recurring game. The agent will fail to reveal his own information and will follow the actions of his predecessor and, as a result, useful information is lost, which might have highlighted a better choice for later decision-makers. This paper evaluates the strategy of forcing a subset of agents to make their decision early from the perspective of a social planner, and a firm with a valuable or valueless product. Promotional activity by firms can be explained as an attempt to overcome the herd externality and maximize sales

Mechanism Choice

Mechanism choice can generally be described as the selection of some way to structure rules for social behavior. Nobel Laureate Eric Maskin recently described a mechanism as “an institution, procedure, or game for determining outcomes” (Maskin 2008: 568). In the realm of public law, mechanism choice is synonymous with “instrument choice” or policy design. The selection of the policy instrument can be as important to success or failure as the intended policy outcome. Good intentions or objectives are not enough: the choice of tools matters. A large and growing literature in instrument choice and mechanism design examines both the normative criteria for correcting market failures, matching optimal instruments to different types of problems, minimizing costs, and overcoming incomplete information; and also the positive political factors that may influence the actual selection of instruments, and the pattern of such choices across issue areas, governance systems, and time. Public policy instruments are selected and designed by public bodies –legislatures, executive agencies, and courts – that are comprised of individuals with their own policy preferences, and that are subject to pressures from private interests through lobbying, campaign contributions, and elections. Thus, it is no surprise to the student of public law that the mechanisms actually selected to implement public policy are not necessarily the ones that best pursue the public interest. This chapter begins with a brief summary of normative mechanism choice, including the legal literature on instrument choice and the economics literature on mechanism design. It then moves to a more detailed discussion of positive mechanism choice, also called public choice, political economy, or positive politics. This positive literature explores how political institutions and pressures shape the selection of mechanisms to implement policy, notably when the selected instrument departs from the normative ideal. The positive study of mechanism choice not only informs how political processes shape policy outcomes, but also sheds useful insights into those processes themselves.

R&D cooperation, asymmetric technological capabilities and rationale for technology parks

Starting from the premise that firms are distinct in terms of their capacity to create radical product innovations, the present paper attempts to explore how firms choose between different forms of R&D cooperation and their consequences for social welfare. It studies a duopolistic market, where firms have to choose between R&D competition, a cost sharing alliance, an information sharing alliance or an R&D cartel. The paper demonstrates that asymmetry has an impact on alliance choice and social welfare. With similar firms, the cost sharing alliance will be preferred to R&D competition or any other form of collaboration. With significant asymmetry no alliance may be formed. In terms of social welfare, any alliance is preferable to R&D competition and the R&D cartel is the best. Given this inherent contradiction between private preferences and optimal social choice, the paper provides a rationale for public investment in terms of science and technology parks to promote R&D cartels. --R&D competition,R&D cooperation,technology parks

The role of incomplete information and others' choice in reducing traffic: a pilot study

In this study, we investigate the role of payoff information and conformity in improving networkperformance in a traffic dilemma known as the Braess paradox. Our goal is to understand whendecisions are guided by selfish motivations or otherwise by social ones. For this purpose, weconsider the manipulation of others’ choice, public and private monitoring and information ondistribution of choices. Data show that when social comparison was not salient, participantswere more cooperative. By contrast, cooperativeness of others’ choice made participants morecompetitive leading to traffic and collective performance decrease. The implications of these findingsto the literature on social dilemmas are discussed

Post Mortem Reputation, Compensatory Gifts and Equal Bequests

The empirical evidence suggests that parents use inter vivos gifts (i.e., transfers of tangible and financial property) to compensate less well off children whereas post mortem bequests are divided equally among siblings. We study a theoretical model assuming, first, that the amounts given is private information, only known to the donor and the donee, while the amounts bequeathed is public information. Second, we assume that parents care about the reputation that their bequest behavior will leave them after their death. More specifically, this reputation is deteriorating in the difference in amounts inherited. We show that, given optimal choice of altruistic parents is compensatory gifts and equal bequests.altruism; bequests; inheritances; gifts; equal division; post mortem reputation; social norm; information

The Theory of Implementation of Social Choice Rules

Suppose that the goals of a society can be summarized in a social choice rule, i.e., a mapping from relevant underlying parameters to final outcomes. Typically, the underlying parameters (e.g., individual preferences) are private information to the agents in society. The implementation problem is then formulated: under what circumstances can one design a mechanism so that the private information is truthfully elicited and the social optimum ends up being implemented? In designing such a mechanism, appropriate incentives will have to be given to the agents so that they do not wish to misrepresent their information. The theory of implementation or mechanism design formalizes this “social engineering” problem and provides answers to the question just posed. I survey the theory of implementation in this article, emphasizing the results based on two behavioral assumptions for the agents (dominant strategies and Nash equilibrium). Examples discussed include voting, and the allocation of private and public goods under complete and incomplete information.Implementation Theory, Mechanism Design, Asymmetric Information, Decentralization, Game Theory, Dominance, Nash Equilibrium, Monotonicity

To use or not to use? An empirical study of pre-trip public transport information for business and leisure trips and comparison with car travel

This quantitative study provides more insight into the relative strength of various factors affecting the use and non-use of pre-trip Public Transport (PT) information for business and leisure trips. It also illuminates comparing car with public transport and its consequences for mode choice. The factors affecting PT information use most strongly are travel behaviour and sociodemographics, but travel attitudes, information factors, and social surrounding also play a role. Public transport use and PT . information use are closely connected, with travel behaviour having a stronger impact on information use than vice versa. Information service providers are recommended to market PT information simultaneously with public transport use. © 2011