Improving intergovernmental finance: a message from the northland

Municipal finance ; Minnesota ; State finance

Camera Surveillance as a Measure of Counterterrorism?

Camera surveillance has recently gained prominence in policy proposals on combating terrorism. We evaluate this instrument of counterterrorism as resting on the premise of a deterrence effect. Based on comparative arguments and previous evidence on crime, we expect camera surveillance to have a relatively smaller deterrent effect on terrorism than on other forms of crime. In particular, we emphasize opportunities for substitution (i.e., displacement effects), the interaction with media attention aspired to by terrorists, the limits of real-time interventions, the crowding-out of social surveillance, the risk of misguided profiling, and politico-economic concerns regarding the misuse of the technology.Camera surveillance, closed-circuit television (CCTV), public security, deterrence, terrorism

Camera Surveillance as a Measure of Counterterrorism?

Camera surveillance has recently gained prominence in policy proposals on combating terrorism. We evaluate this instrument of counterterrorism as resting on the premise of a deterrence effect. Based on comparative arguments and previous evidence on crime, we expect camera surveillance to have a relatively smaller deterrent effect on terrorism than on other forms of crime. In particular, we emphasize opportunities for substitution (i.e., displacement effects), the interaction with media attention aspired to by terrorists, the limits of real-time interventions, the crowding-out of social surveillance, the risk of misguided profiling, and politico-economic concerns regarding the misuse of the technology.Camera surveillance, closed-circuit television (CCTV), public security, deterrence, terrorism.

Active Decisions and Pro-social Behavior: A Field Experiment on Blood Donation

In this paper, we propose a decision framework where people are individually asked to either actively consent or dissent to some pro-social behavior. We hypothesize that confronting individuals with the choice of engaging in a specific pro-social behavior contributes to the formation of issue-specific altruistic preferences while simultaneously involving a commitment. The hypothesis is tested in a large-scale field experiment on blood donation. We find that this "active-decision" intervention substantially increases the actual donation behavior of people who have not fully formed preferences beforehand.active decision, pro-social behavior, field experiment, blood donation

Ökonomische Überlegungen zur Kameraüberwachung als Massnahme gegen den Terrorismus

In recent times, camera surveillance or closed-circuit television (CCTV) as an instrument potentially deterring crime and terrorism has become a focus of the public discourse. CCTV might be the most rapidly spreading and, at the same time, one of the most disputed measures of contemporary public security policy. This article presents theoretical arguments and empirical results that need to be considered in plans of future CCTV schemes as well as in methodically challenging CCTV evaluations. Previous evidence shows that the effectiveness of this situational crime prevention instrument is substantially depending on the context within which it is implemented. According to a comparative economic analysis of illegal behavior, we expect a relatively smaller deterrent effect of CCTV on terrorism than on other forms of crime. On the one hand, terrorists can switch to numerous alternative targets not monitored by cameras. On the other hand, CCTV images raise the degree of publicity terrorists can achieve.

Overstrained citizens? The number of ballot propositions and the quality of the decision process in direct democracy

We study how the number of ballot propositions affects the quality of decision making in direct democracy, as reflected in citizens` knowledge, voting behavior, and attitudes toward democracy. Using three comprehensive data sets from Switzerland with over 3,500 propositions, we exploit variation in the number of federal and cantonal propositions. Voters know the most about the content of federal propositions when they are exclusively presented and less with a high number of concurrent cantonal propositions on the ballot. Across other outcomes we find no consistent indications that - for the observed variation in the exposure to popular votes - a high number of propositions impedes the quality of decision making in Swiss federal direct democracy. In the medium to longer term, more federal propositions on the ballot rather relate to higher perceived political influence and satisfaction with democracy

Time consistency of optimal plans: an elementary primer

Time consistent optimal plans are defined within the context of a simple, discrete time optimal control framework. Three possible sources of inconsistency are identified and discussed with reference to the literature.