We construct a model of simultaneous change and persistence in institutions. The model consists of landowning elites and workers, and the key economic decision concerns the form of economic institutions regulating the transaction of labor (e.g., competitive markets versus labor repression). The main idea is that equilibrium economic institutions are a result of the exercise of de jure and de fa...

The role of religion in American politics and civil society has drawn significant scholarly focus, but most of the recent attention has fallen on the religious right’s political influence and, more recently, on new initiatives to broaden the channeling of social service funding through faithbased organizations. These are important issues, but they exclude another historically important face of ...

This paper uses the case of Russia in the 1990s to demonstrate the utility of approaching transitional regimes not just as emerging democracies but as failed or unconsolidated authoritarian regimes. Even for many competitive or democratic regimes, it is essential to focus not just on the development of constitutions, civil society, or party systems, but on the success or failure of efforts to b...

Political and economic decentralization of governance structure and the promotion of self-goveming local adninistration have been considered as high priority public policy issues in the developing countries in recent years. Conventional literature on decentralization focuses only on the managerial and economic dimensions of the process. It generally ignores the analysis of political feasbility ...

Moral attributes such as honesty, being devoted to one's social duty and principles, responsibility for one's words and action are very important for civil servants. Morality as a basis for personnel management and the moral features of civil servants are of special value, especially during the deep political, social and economic reforms taking place in Russia. Global social changes are extreme...

In a recent study, the authors reveal with structural equation models that the positive effect of information technology on generalized trust is mediated by political institutions. Although insightful, a key question remains: Is it the effectiveness and efficiency, the universality, and/or the power-sharing capacity of the state that mediates this effect? Drawing on new institutional economics,...

Political analysts, policy makers, and aid agencies concerned with Melanesia have recently begun to pay attention to the role of Christian churches in governance. As Douglas notes, “churches, with their intensely local roots but broadly global reach,” are increasingly being seen “as alternative structures in the context of ineffective or even absent state institutions” (2007, p. 158). The impor...