Der Titel dieses Vortrags suggeriert, daß es sich bei der Marxschen Theorie um eine in sich stimmige, ein für alle mal feststehende Theorie handle, und es nur noch darum gehen könne, sie in das Spektrum gegenwärtiger Wissenschaft einzuordnen, bzw. zu erörtern, inwieweit sie den Kriterien...

Recent government pronouncements in the UK and above all the recent Conservative Party (2008) policy document on welfare reform suggest that US welfare reform is increasingly being taken as a model for the UK. What lessons should the UK draw from US experience? The long established means tested...

All rulers face political competition, both from rivals within their state, andfrom other states to which their subjects may exit. In a simple model, both kinds of competitionare substitutes. Internal competition (democracy) benefits citizens by allowingthem to replace rent-seeking rulers. But...

This paper explores these issues further by reconsidering the link between democracy and health using panel data from a cross-section of countries. The data show a strong (conditional) correlation between life expectancy and democracy. This relationship is strongest for the decades of the 1960s...

Die politische Interessenvertretung von Unternehmen in Deutschland e-fährt insbesondere seit dem Regierungsumzug von Bonn nach Berlin im Jahr 1999 einen bedeutenden Wandel. Einige sprechen sogar von Berlinisierung (Alemann, 2000: 6). Dabei übernehmen vornehmlich Großunternehmen ihre...

This paper analyses how governance or institutional quality and tax morale affect the shadoweconomy, using an international country panel and also within country data...

The G20 summits in 2009 have proposed major changes in governance of the InternationalMonetary Fund (IMF). Most important seems to be the acknowledgment that the IMF in itscurrent form lacks legitimacy and ownership. Accordingly, the G20 suggests a reallocation ofvoting shares to emerging and...

We propose a distinction between active waste and passive waste as determinantsof the cost of public services. Active waste entails utility for the publicdecision maker (as in the case of bribery) whereas passive waste does not (asin the case of inefficiency due to red tape). To assess the...

We introduce a model of redistributive income taxation and public expenditure. Thisjoint treatment permits analyzing the interdependencies between the two policies: onecannot be chosen independently of the other. Empirical evidence reveals that partisanconfrontation essentially falls on...

The new Labour Government in Britain has made the reduction of childpoverty one of its central objectives. This paper describes the specificinitiatives involved in Labour’s approach and weighs them up in termsof their potential impact. After setting out the extent of the problem ofchild...