A striking feature of South Africa`s trade liberalisation is that, until 1995, it did not involve any import liberalisation. The focus of earlier liberalisation was the reduction of anti-export bias, and, on the import side, the replacement of QRs with equivalent tariffs and other duties. This...

A fundamental macroeconomic problem in Zimbabwe is that the sum of public-sector projects is greater than the resources available to finance them. The government`s difficulty in discerning the macroeconomic limitations on new initiatives was greatly increased by the unusual circumstances of the...

Social instability is a concept that economists rarely analyse, and yet it can lurk behind much economic policy-making.  China’s leadership has often publicly expressed its concerns to avoid ‘social instability’.  It is viewed as a threat both to the political order and to...

This is a pioneering study of the determinants of the subjective well-being of ethnic minority people in rural China, using a specially designed sample survey relating to 2011.  The underlying hypothesis is that the lifestyle and attitudes of ethnic minorities contribute to their happiness. ...

The empirical literature on the economics of happiness has grown rapidly, and much has been learned about the determinants of subjective well-being.  Less attention has been paid to its normative implications.  Taking China as a case study, this paper first summarises empirical results on the...

The paper contrasts early theories of the utility function (starting with Bentham and elaborated by Jevons) with the modern theory (laid down by Fisher and Samuelson).  The former include in the utility function not only the sensation of current events but also the memory of past events and the...