The Dangers of Diversity: Ethnic Fractionalization and the Rule of Law

Research linking ethnic cleavages to economic underdevelopment is a hallmark of recent efforts to explain economic growth. Similarly, the rule of law as a credible commitment to property rights and contract enforcement is also identified with economic development. Rather than treating these factors as rival explanations for economic development around the world, I propose the rule of law as the causal mechanism through which ethnic fractionalization (EF) influences growth in many countries. I argue ethnic diversity negatively impacts the rule of law due to the prevalence of ethnically-based patronage networks in developing countries. Public officials, I argue, face greater incentives to undermine the rule of law in societies with pervasive ethnic cleavages than in those without. I employ pooled cross-sectional, time-series data for 55 developing countries between 1996 and 2010 to test my theoretical argument. Ultimately, my research demonstrates ethnic fractionalization\u27s deleterious effect on the rule of law and provides a uniform framework linking demographic inputs to economic outcomes

Campaigning for Capital: Fair Elections and Foreign Investment in Comparative Perspective

This paper addresses the question of what explains capital inflows. In so doing, it makes several contributions to the literature on political risk and the determinants of foreign investment. First, I clarify the relationship between capital flows and democracy’s constituent parts in a way that takes arguments beyond aggregate democracy indicators and static political institutional structures. Specifically, I argue that fair elections signal government respect for democracy and the rule of law in a highly visible manner that investors can access. I show how investors use the fairness of elections as a way to assess political risk and to inform their investment strategies. Furthermore, I show how the type of investment and the kinds of evidence of electoral misbehavior condition elections’ influence on capital flows. I also disaggregate capital flows into foreign direct investment (FDI) and portfolio investment. I argue that the logic of investing is different in the short-term (portfolio) vs. the long-term (FDI). When it comes to political risk, I provide evidence according to which portfolio investment is much more sensitive to risk factors than FDI due to the relative ease with which portfolio investors can extricate themselves from an increasingly risky market and seek safer returns elsewhere

The Benefits of Balance: Credibility, the Rule of Law, and Investment in Latin America

Research surrounding political institutions and credible commitment to the rule of law is integral to recent efforts to tie democracy to economic development. I identify the determinants of rule-of-law perceptions in Latin America and argue that constraining elected officials facilitates a commitment to democracy that makes government policies credible. I also argue that aspects of politics leading to deadlock might have a hidden upside in generating policy credibility. I test my arguments against pooled cross-sectional, time series data for twenty Latin American countries between 1996 and 2012. Ultimately, my research demonstrates the benefits of functioning checks and balances among elected officials for the rule of law and provides a uniform framework linking democratic inputs to legal and economic outcomes

Flipping the Classroom and Student Performance in Advanced Statistics: Evidence from a Quasi-Experiment

I administer a quasi-experiment using undergraduate political science majors in statistics classes to evaluate whether “flipping the classroom” (the treatment) alters students’ applied problem-solving performance and satisfaction relative to students in a traditional classroom environment (the control). I also assess whether general student characteristics such as when and where students took the prerequisite course, grade point average (GPA), and gender influence performance. I find flipping the classroom gives students statistically significant advantages in difficult, applied areas emphasized in class. Furthermore, students in the flipped classroom feel they learned more and enjoyed the course more than those in a traditional classroom. I argue students’ affective preference for a flipped classroom is important for student motivation, recollection, and future use of quantitative data analysis. Flipping the classroom entails high start-up costs, but it can merit implementing to improve both effective and affective instructional outcomes

Interaction and Interdependency of Software Engineering Methods and Visual Programming

Visual Programming Languages and Visual Programming Tools incorporate non-procedural coding mechanisms that may duplicate, or perhaps even conflict with, the analysis and design mechanisms promulgated by the mainstream Software Engineering methodologies. By better understanding such duplication and conflict, software engineers can take proactive measures to accommodate and, ideally, eliminate them. Better still, there may be opportunities for synergy that can be exploited if one is looking for them. This research explored, documented and classified the interactions and interdependencies, both positive (synergies) and negative (conflicts), between two closely related and rapidly evolving Computer Science subdisciplines: software engineering and visual programming. A literature search was conducted to surface, evaluate, and build upon (where appropriate) recent and ongoing research in this area. A mechanism was created to capture observations of conflicts and synergies. This capture mechanism was applied to an experimentation test bed that was established to provide concrete examples of gaps, overlaps, conflicts, and synergies. In this regard, two relatively simple applications, one data-base oriented and one algorithm oriented, were designed and implemented using multiple software engineering methods and multiple visual tools/languages. A software prototype, which bridges one of the gaps discovered during the research, was built to underscore the importance of eventually merging Computer Aided Software Engineering and visual development tools. The overall results as well as anticipated trends and developments in the area of software engineering and visual programming were summarized. The synergy/conflict observations, in conjunction with the literature search results, were used to develop strategies and guidelines for successfully using visual programming languages and tools in concert with sound software engineering methods

Participatory budgeting: adoption and transformation

Participatory budgeting programmes are spreading rapidly across the world because they offer government officials and citizens the opportunity to engage each other in new ways as they combine democratic practices with the ‘nitty gritty’ of policy-making. The principles and ideas associated with participatory budgeting appeal to a broad spectrum of citizens, civil society activists, government officials and international agencies, which helps explain why it is so popular and has expanded so quickly. This research briefing looks at how participatory budgeting is transforming in countries where international donors are active, where states struggle to provide public services, and where urban and rural communities are characterised by high levels of poverty. A workshop, held in Kenya, July 2017, brought together professionals from non-governmental organisations (NGOs) affiliated with the Making All Voices Count research programme, based in Indonesia, Kenya, Mozambique, the Philippines, Senegal, South Africa and Uganda. This enabled the identification of key transformations and adaptations in the participatory budgeting field. Key themes in this paper: participatory budgeting; adoption and transformation of practice in participatory budgeting over time; social justice and redistribution of resources.DFIDUSAIDSidaOmidyar Networ

The Brazilian experience: democracy, at its fullest, saves lives

Brazil is a deeply unequal democracy which enjoyed an economic boom in the 2000s – and is now suffering from a recession and the threat of austerity cuts. Michael Touchton, Natasha Borges Sugiyama and Brian Wampler analysed the factors that led to falls in infant mortality. They found that while competitive local elections were important, they alone were not enough. Citizen participation in how services are run, social welfare programmes and well-run local government mattered more

Participation and the Poor: Social Accountability Institutions and Poverty Reduction in Brazil

Democracy, according to a large body of research, contributes to human development by improving citizens\u27 lives (Prezeworkski et al. 2000; Gerrign et al. 2012; McGuire 2010; Baum and Lake 2003; Gerring et al. 2015). Broad evidence demonstrates that democracies provide higher standards of living, on average, for their citizens than authoritarian countries (Boix 2001; Brown and Hunter 2004; Brown and Mobarak 2009; Besley and Kudamatsu 2006; Lake and Baum 2001). But what is it about democratic practice that enhances the quality of its citizens\u27 lives? Proponents argue that democratic practices such as competitive elections, checks and balances, and protection of individual rights contribute to government\u27s responsiveness to citizens\u27 demands, which in turn improves the quality of government performance and citizens\u27 well-being (Rueschemayer, Stephens, and Stephens 1992; Przeworkski et al. 2000; Fox 2015; Sen 1999; Diamond 1999; Gerring et al. 2015; O\u27Donnell 1998). But many new democracies are beset by weak party systems, low voter knowledge, entrenched clientelistic practices, fragmented states, and partial protection of the rights formally guaranteed by new constitutions. These limitations often combine to hinder the ability of democratically elected governments to improve basic human development (Przeworski et al. 1999; O\u27Donnell 1998; Weyland 1996; Cleary 2010). And yet, some new democracies are new improving and expanding public goods provisions, which enhances citizens\u27 basic social well-being and helps them to develop basic capabilities (Sen 1999; Gerring et al. 2015). In this article, we identify three casual pathways that establish a close link between democracy and human capabilities to provide a more robust accounting of how specific features of democratic regimes lead to specific improvements in human development. It is important to note that we control for elections\u27 potential influence on local poverty rates, but we argue that elections are too distant from ongoing policy cycles to impact poverty directly. Instead, we present evidence for specific institutions and policies\u27 role for reducing local poverty in Brazil. We also control for economic growth, which represents the dominant explanation for poverty reduction in Brazil and around the world