Persuasion: Reflections on Economics, Data and the 'Homogeneity Assumption'

This paper discusses issues to do with the empirical basis of modern economics and points towards the need to look more closely at the ‘homogeneity assumption’ that underpins much economic theory. It argues that severe problems currently prevent economics from becoming more persuasive to both students of economics and those outside the discipline. The issue involves the management of disciplinary boundaries, and excessive use of the ‘homogeneity assumption.’ Three areas of concern are explored. First is the literature on causes of growth, and the role of policy. The paper documents reasons to doubt the existence of robust relationships between growth and policy variables. Second is the ‘homogeneity assumption’ that different countries are usefully viewed as members of a single population. Third is evidence suggesting that an assumption of ‘normal’ maximizing behaviour has to be justified, not just assumed, and that regular deviations from the usual maximizing assumptions occur with gender and culture. The paper argues that a central issue in economic methodology and pedagogy should be, as North implicitly argues, the negotiation of disciplinary boundaries: what economics can versus cannot explain. It suggests more explicitly basing the choice of explanatory models on empirics identifying where the model applies.homogeneity, neo- institutional economics, robustness testing, methodology, policy advice, experimental economics.

What Might International Development Assistance Be Able to Tell Us About Contemporary "Policy Government" in Developed Countries?

The article examines international development assistance—aid. Donors assert that experts possess predictive knowledge and project belief in such knowledge into organizational form—the Logical Framework Approach. While such beliefs lack predictive power, as aid operates under multiple sovereignty conditions, no single authority determines truth. Donors ease pressure on experts by accepting variation in intervention logics, yet assert the validity of “single truth ” knowledge; knowledge production practices have not basically changed. Belief that what is believed is true, revealed in aid work, illuminates the nature of policy in rich countries and helps explain low confidence in government

Vietnam in 2012: The end of the party

The paper reviews political and other trajectories in Vietnam in 2012, concluding that a systemic political crisis continues. Trying to rule over an increasingly open and globalizing society with unreformed Communist political institutions, the Vietnamese Communist Party has seen its institutional authority evaporate, so that it no longer functions as a coherent source of sovereign power.</jats:p

Vietnam: Economic strategy and economic reality

The paper examines the nature of the growing Vietnamese economy and its changing structural characteristics and contrasts this with two core elements of official thinking. The first element is the slogan of ‘industrialisation and modernisation’ (IM) and how this sits with the rather fast current growth in the services sectors, given the issues of transitioning through the recently reached ‘middle income status’. The second is that of “a socialist-oriented market economy” (SOME) with reference to its origins, the nature of debates around it and its positive and negative implications for Vietnam’s development. Our basic conclusions are that IM is misplaced, as it ignores services and is out-of-date, and the SOME has largely been a somewhat confused and transparent fig-leaf for support for essentially private commercial interests associated with certain state conglomerates. Recent changes around the 2016 XIIth Congress suggest that lessons are being learned by some elements in the Party

Political Authority in Vietnam: Is the Vietnamese Communist Party a Paper Leviathan?

In a contribution to the political analysis of contemporary Vietnam - a single-party state often wrongly assumed to be an author of reform and deploying considerable and varied powers - this paper seeks to provide an understanding of the Vietnamese term ‘authority’ (uy) and its relationship to power. Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan serves as a reference to the notion of authority in Vietnam and is compared to data: what the Vietnamese thought their word best translated as authority meant. The paper concludes that in the ‘two-way street’ of social contracts, the ruling Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) actually has little authority. This helps to explain the chronic problems the VCP has faced in securing state capacity and generalised ability to implement policy. It high-lights gaps between the current anachronistic use of Soviet-style power in Vietnam and what could be done if the regime deployed new powers based on authority. The authors conclude that, given the identified lack of authority, the VCP is no real Leviathan. Although more research is needed, this conclusion implies that proactive political tactics in Vietnam may move towards a search for acquiring authority in a ‘two-way street’ relationship within the Vietnamese political community. Enhanced state capacity and Party authority could follow