Development strategies : integrating governance and growth

A frontier challenge for development strategy is to move beyond prescribing optimal economic policies, and instead – taking a broad view of the interactions between economic, political and social constraints and dynamics -- to identify entry points capable of breaking a low-growth logjam, and initiating a virtuous spiral of cumulative change. The paper lays out four distinctive sequences via which the different dimensions might interact and evolve over time, and provides country-specific illustrations of each. Each sequence is defined by the principal focus of its initial step: 1) State capacity building provides a platform for accelerated growth via improved public sector performance and enhanced credibility for investors; strengthened political institutions and civil society come onto the agenda only over the longer term; 2) Transformational governance has as its entry point the reshaping of a country’s political institutions. Accelerated growth could follow, insofar as institutional changes enhance accountability, and reduce the potential for arbitrary discretionary action -- and thereby shift expectations in a positive direction; 3) For'just enough governance', the initial focus is on growth itself, with the aim of addressing specific capacity and institutional constraints as and when they become binding -- not seeking to anticipate and address in advance all possible institutional constraints; 4) Bottom-up development engages civil society as an entry point for seeking stronger state capacity, lower corruption, better public services, improvements in political institutions more broadly -- and a subsequent unlocking of constraints on growth. The sequences should not be viewed as a technocratic toolkit from which a putative reformer is free to choose. Recognizing that choice is constrained by history, the paper concludes by suggesting an approach for exploring what might the scope for identifying practical ways forward in specific country settings.Governance Indicators,National Governance,Parliamentary Government,Public Sector Corruption&Anticorruption Measures,Political Economy

Do exchange rates in caribbean and latin american countries exhibit nonlinearities?

This paper applies the recently developed Kapetanios et al. (2003) nonlinear stationary test to annual time series data on real exchange rates in selected Caribbean and Latin American countries over the period 1980-2003, to determine whether or not these real exchange rates exhibit nonlinearities. Generally, the ADF rejects the null hypothesis of a unit root in real exchange rates for most of the countries in our study, whereas the Kapetanios et al. (2003) test fails to reject the null hypothesis of a unit root in real exchange rates for most countries. The fact that the real exchange rates in most of the countries included in our study are nonlinear stationary implies that the nominal exchange rate and relative price are cointegrated irrespective of which price indices are used to compute the real exchange rate.

Education and development in the caribbean: a cointegration and causality approach

This paper uses cointegration and vector error-correction models to analyse the causal relationship between education and development in Barbados, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago using annual time series data from 1964 to 1998. Expenditure on education per capita is used as the proxy for education, while gross national income (GNI) per capita is the proxy for development. The empirical results provide some evidence of bi-directional causality in the short in Jamaica. There is no evidence of causation running from per capita expenditure on education to per capita gross national income in either the short or long run in Barbados, and Trinidad and Tobago. A major policy implication of the findings is that countries with higher per capita gross national income (GNI) seem to be spending more per capita on education.

Modeling heterogeneity in ranked responses by nonparametric maximum likelihood:How do Europeans get their scientific knowledge?

This paper is motivated by a Eurobarometer survey on science knowledge. As part of the survey, respondents were asked to rank sources of science information in order of importance. The official statistical analysis of these data however failed to use the complete ranking information. We instead propose a method which treats ranked data as a set of paired comparisons which places the problem in the standard framework of generalized linear models and also allows respondent covariates to be incorporated. An extension is proposed to allow for heterogeneity in the ranked responses. The resulting model uses a nonparametric formulation of the random effects structure, fitted using the EM algorithm. Each mass point is multivalued, with a parameter for each item. The resultant model is equivalent to a covariate latent class model, where the latent class profiles are provided by the mass point components and the covariates act on the class profiles. This provides an alternative interpretation of the fitted model. The approach is also suitable for paired comparison data

The Lancaster Postgraduate Statistics Centre CETL:building trust and statistical skills across disciplines

Statistics is often assumed to be a series of techniques. While it may be possible to teach postgraduate students generic techniques to enable them to carry out quantitative research, it is questionable how meaningfully this can be taught when separated from thinking about research data. Teaching students as close as possible to their own postgraduate degree scheme is one way forward, but this strategy presents teachers of statistics with new problems. Both students and departments have not necessarily understood statistics as a way of thinking - or understood it as a discipline with multiple and sometimes discordant approaches. The Lancaster CETL has allowed an opportunity to focus on teaching postgraduate statistics, yet in providing a focus for statistics attracts audiences from diverse interest groups. It presents us with the challenge to find a balance between what is possible generically and what needs to be specific

Middle-class Offenders as Employees – Assessing the Risk:A 35-year Follow-up

A 35-year follow-up of a series of 317 middle-class offenders in England and Wales suggests that the dangers of employing offenders may be more limited than expected. Although 40% were subsequently convicted, only 8% were subsequently convicted of offenses that directly and adversely affected an employer. This work should challenge the “exaggerated fears” of employers. Interestingly, variables which normally predict subsequent criminal activity made no impact in trying to predict offenses against an employer

Modelling dependency in multivariate paired comparisons:a log-linear approach.

A log-linear representation of the Bradley-Terry model is presented for multivariate paired comparison data, where judges are asked to compare pairs of objects on more than one attribute. By converting such data to multiple binomial responses, dependencies between the decisions of the judges as well as possible association structures between the attributes can be incorporated in the model, providing an advantage over parallel univariate analyses of individual attributes. The approach outlined gives parameters which can be interpreted as (conditional) log–odds and log–odds ratios. As the model is a generalised linear model, parameter estimation can use standard software and the GLM framework can be used to test hypotheses on these parameters

Developing Measures of Severity and Frequency of Reconviction

This report examines the scope for focusing on the seriousness and frequency of recidivism and presents methodology for determining how to measure offence seriousness, and how to measure frequency of offending. It also discusses the advantages and disadvantages of combining these two measures into a combined seriousness/frequency score. However, one needs to recognise that the task of providing alternative measures of recidivism is not simply a technical exercise, for there are both philosophical and practical issues to confront. Hence, while the main body of the report focuses largely on the feasibility of producing the alternative measures and provides some solid evidence of developing these approaches (sections 3-5), the philosophical issues – which embrace definitional, conceptual and moral concerns – are not overlooked (see section 2). Furthermore, some of the practical issues of introducing these measures are recognised in the final section (section 6). First, however, what are the stated aims and objectives of the work

Computational modelling of structural integrity following mass loss in polymeric charred cellular solids

A novel computational technique is presented for embedding mass-loss due to burning into the ANSYS finite element modelling code. The approaches employ a range of computational modelling methods in order to provide more complete theoretical treatment of thermoelasticity absent from the literature for over six decades. Techniques are employed to evaluate structural integrity (namely, elastic moduli, Poisson’s ratios, and compressive brittle strength) of honeycomb systems known to approximate three-dimensional cellular chars. That is, reducing the mass of diagonal ribs and both diagonal-plus-vertical ribs simultaneously show rapid decreases in the structural integrity of both conventional and re-entrant (auxetic, i.e., possessing a negative Poisson’s ratio) honeycombs. On the other hand, reducing only the vertical ribs shows initially modest reductions in such properties, followed by catastrophic failure of the material system. Calculations of thermal stress distributions indicate that in all cases the total stress is reduced in re-entrant (auxetic) cellular solids. This indicates that conventional cellular solids are expected to fail before their auxetic counterparts. Furthermore, both analytical and FE modelling predictions of the brittle crush strength of both auxetic and conventional cellular solids show a relationship with structural stiffness