This paper examines and tests the existence of political budget cycles in Papua New Guinea during the period 1988–2004. Several factors point to the existence of political budget cycles in Papua New Guinea. The paper provides an overview of the political business cycle literature, and...

Viewing fiscal policies as the outcome of democratically resolved conflicts of households over public goods and taxes, the “economic model of politics” proposes a public choice approach, which does not rely on social welfare functions. With it, a country’s overall budget can be derived...

We study the effects of electoral institutions on the size and composition of public expenditure in OECD and Latin American countries. We present a model emphasizing the distinction between purchases of goods and services, which are easier to target geographically, and transfers, which are...

The paper presents a new approach to EU governance by stressing the interdependence of governance and integration. It suggests that EU governance is not just shaped by the emerging properties of the EU polity but has a strong impact both on system formation at national and European level. It is...

A debate has emerged between S. Hix and S. Bartolini on the plausibility and desirability of the politicization of the EU. By this it is usually meant a more important role for mass, competitive, and partisan politics both on the input- (expression of preferences) and on the output-...

This article aims to provide a better understanding as to why different institutional arrangements have the particular structural properties which they are found to have. Drawing on the system theoretical tradition in sociology and on ‘complexity theory’, this paper presents an analytical...

Understanding of the domestic political environment is key to building broad country ownership and the successful implementation of reform programs supported by international financial institutions (IFIs). But recipient countries are not unitary actors: policymakers are influenced by special...

IMF lending is generally conditional on specified policies and outcomes. These conditions usually are negotiated compromises between policies initially favored by the Fund and by the country's authorities. In some cases the authorities might be satisfied enough with the outcome to take...

This paper assesses the implementation of IMF-supported programs using measures of program interruptions, compliance with conditionality, and the share of committed funds disbursed. The econometric model allows an evaluation of the importance for program implementation of political conditions in...

Whereas the economics discipline possesses a highly refined theoretical apparatus to analyze the effects of government behaviour on the economy, it has not (yet) managed to fully develop a positively formulated "economic theory of politics" that would permit the integration of the...