What are bid-protests? What functions do they perform? This article proposes that government contracting, especially the source-selection process, gives rise to a particularly intractable set of transactional hazards: governmental opportunism, involving elected officials and public employees,...

Government contracting is rife with miscommunication and misperception, sometimes unavoidably, and is often associated with secrecy, autarky, and opportunism. These qualities undermine trust, increase contracting costs, and reduce effective collaboration between business and government. In this...

After decades of studying municipal charters largely by looking for patterns in the data, we have a good basis for proceeding more formally with testable theories. The political significance of demographic change becomes apparent by looking at its impact on political conflict in combination with...

What do appeals of administrative decisions tell us about the processes that give rise to them? Bid protests of Department of Defense source selections are illustrative. Rejected bidders can appeal to the Government Accountability Office. GAO sustains protests – few, but costly and growing –...

Three paradoxes afflict mediation. First, if self-determination is a psychological need motivating the parties and the mediator, how can the parties and the mediator jointly satisfy their potentially conflicting needs? Second, if parties are having difficulty resolving their conflicting...