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1511. Underdevelopment in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Role of the Private Sector and Political Elites

Author:
Moeletsi Mbeki
Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Economic growth in Africa, as in the rest of the world, depends on a vibrant private sector. Entrepreneurs in Africa, however, face daunting constraints. They are prevented from creating wealth by predatory political elites that control the state. African political elites use marketing boards and taxation to divert agricultural savings to finance their own consumption and to strengthen the repressive apparatus of the state. Peasants, who constitute the core of the private sector in sub-Saharan Africa, are the biggest losers. In order for Africa to prosper, peasants need to become the real owners of their primary asset—land—over which they currently have no property rights.
Topic:
Economics, Human Rights, and Politics
Political Geography:
America

1512. CATO Institute: Saving Money and Improving Education: How School Choice Can Help States Reduce Education Costs

Author:
David Salisbury
Publication Date:
10-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Historically, elementary and secondary education has been the largest item in state budgets. During the past three decades, state spending on public education has grown both in terms of revenues spent per pupil and as a percentage of total personal income. Spending on K–12 education is expected to continue to rise during the next few years, mainly because of the increased number of teachers and other school personnel that will be needed to meet increased enrollment.
Topic:
Civil Society, Economics, Education, and Politics

1513. CATO Institute: The Personal Lockbox: A First Step on the Road to Social Security Reform

Author:
Michael Tanner
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
With President Bush's call for comprehensive Social Security reform bogged down in the morass of partisan politics, many reform advocates have suggested starting the process with smaller steps. Recently, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), Rep. Jim McCrery (R-LA), Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX), and others have proposed legislation to rebate Social Security surpluses to workers in the form of contributions to personal accounts.
Topic:
Security, Development, Economics, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States

1514. CATO Institute: Uncompetitive Elections and the American Political System

Author:
Dennis Polhill and Patrick Basham
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
American representative government suffers from the handicap of a largely uncompetitive political system. American politics has fewer and fewer competitive elections. In arguing that political competition matters a great deal, this paper traces the increasing trend toward uncompetitiveness and details the role and nature of incumbency advantage in fostering an uncompetitive political system.
Topic:
Demographics, Political Economy, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States and America

1515. CATO Institute: Treating Doctors as Drug Dealers: The DEA's War on Prescription Painkillers

Author:
Ronald T. Libby
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
The medical field of treating chronic pain is still in its infancy. It was only in the late 1980s that leading physicians trained in treating the chronic pain of terminally ill cancer patients began to recommend that the "opioid therapy" (treatment involving narcotics related to opium) used on their patients also be used for patients suffering from nonterminal conditions. The new therapies proved successful, and prescription pain medications saw a huge leap in sales throughout the 1990s. But opioid therapy has always been controversial. The habit-forming nature of some prescription pain medications made many physicians, medical boards, and law enforcement officials wary of their use in treating acute pain in nonterminal patients. Consequently, many physicians and pain specialists have shied away from opioid treatment, causing millions of Americans to suffer from chronic pain even as therapies were available to treat it.
Topic:
Crime, Human Welfare, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States and America

1516. CATO Institute: Corruption in the Public Schools: The Market Is the Answer

Author:
Neal McCluskey
Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
One of the most frequently voiced objections to school choice is that the free market lacks the "accountability" that governs public education. Public schools are constantly monitored by district administrators, state officials, federal officials, school board members, and throngs of other people tasked with making sure that the schools follow all the rules and regulations governing them. That level of bureaucratic oversight does not exist in the free market, and critics fear choice-based education will be plagued by corruption, poor-quality schools, and failure.
Topic:
Economics, Education, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States

1517. CATO Institute: Health Care in a Free Society: Rebutting the Myths of National Health Insurance

Author:
John C. Goodman
Publication Date:
01-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Almost everyone agrees that the U.S. health care system is in dire need of reform. But there are differing opinions on what kind of reform would be best. Some on the political left would like to see us copy one of the government-run “single-payer”systems that exist in Western Europe, Canada, and New Zealand, among other places. Proponents of socialized medicine point to other countries as examples of health care systems that are superior to our own. They insist that government will make health care available on the basis of need rather than ability to pay. The rich and poor will have equal access to care. And more serious medical needs will be given priority over less serious needs.
Topic:
Government, Human Welfare, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Canada, and New Zealand

1518. From The Élysée Salon To The Table Of The Republic State-Islam Relations and the Integration of Muslims in France

Author:
Jonathan Laurence
Publication Date:
03-2005
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
French Politics, Culture Society
Institution:
Conference Group on French Politics Society
Abstract:
The creation of a representative council for observant Muslims-the Conseil Français du Culte Musulman-is a landmark accomplishment of Fifth Republic France. It is a strong reaffirmation of the republican framework in which the representatives of organized religion are expected to operate in lay France. But it is also an uncharacteristic official acknowledgment of contemporary religious diversity. How did a country whose political system has been notoriously allergic to organized religion decide to assemble and embed Muslim leaders within a state-sponsored institution? Some clues are contained in the remarks above, which hint at the mindset of the ministers in charge of religious affairs. These statements, made by two key actors in the French government's efforts to integrate Islam into French state-church relations, can be seen as rhetorical bookends of a policy process aiming to bring France's Muslim population closer to the state. Over a nearly fifteen-year period, politicians of distinct party traditions drew on competing models of state-society relations to make this politically feasible.
Topic:
Islam and Politics
Political Geography:
France

1519. The Politics Of Publishing During The Second Empire: The Trial of Madame Bovary Revisited

Author:
Christine Haynes
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
French Politics, Culture Society
Institution:
Conference Group on French Politics Society
Abstract:
The limited objections raised by members of the book trade to the press law at the time of the trial of Madame Bovary serve to highlight some fundamental characteristics and contradictions of liberalism in mid-nineteenth-century France. In general, liberalism in this time and place emphasized commercial freedom and property rights, at the expense of freedom of speech. In contrast to Anglo-American liberals, French liberals readily sacrificed this last freedom in the interest of "order," which was deemed necessary to promote the growth of commerce. As some of the most recent scholarship on the political culture of the Second Empire (and early- to mid-nineteenth-century France more generally) has shown, property, alongside education, was the main priority for liberals. It was only because property and education seemed to require it that freedom of the press eventually became important to French liberals and republicans. Intellectual freedom entered the political culture, for authors and publishers as well as statesmen, only through the back door of economic liberalism.
Topic:
Politics and Culture
Political Geography:
America and France

1520. Jospin, Political Cohabitation And Left Governance

Author:
John P. Willerton and Martin Carrier
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
French Politics, Culture Society
Institution:
Conference Group on French Politics Society
Abstract:
This article illuminates the record of the Gauche Plurielle (GP) and Jospin-led coalition government-built upon a diverse parliamentary majority opposed by a sitting president-to construct a coherent political program and realize unanticipated policy-making achievements. Contrary to past cohabitation regimes and most Fifth Republic presidential-prime ministerial teams composed of officials from the same political party, the 1997-2002 Gauche Plurielle government retained power for its entire five-year elected mandate while advancing an aggressive domestic socio-economic agenda. The GP program, which Lionel Jospin termed a "réalisme de gauche," would combine Socialist Party (PS) commitments to social justice with economic growth and Communist Party (PCF) concerns over a heightened minimum wage and serious youth employment efforts. The allied Greens and other Left factions would be provided the opportunity to win seats in the National Assembly (in the Greens' case, for the first time) with an ability to influence policy making in their areas of special interest. Overall, the early years of the Left-Greens coalition would see the construction of major initiatives upon which all partners generally agreed, with pressures on the coalition becoming more evident in subsequent years as hard policy choices-reflective of the dominant PS-increasingly troubled the smaller partners.
Topic:
Government, Politics, and Governance