Governments unable to make credible promises hinder economic development and effective policy making. Scholars have focused considerable attention on checks and balances and the delegation of authority to independent agencies as institutional solutions to this problem. The political conditions under which these institutions enhance credibility, rather than policy stability, are still unclear, however. We show that checks – multiple veto players – enhance credibility, depending on the extent of uncertainty about the location of the status quo, on how agenda control is allocated among the veto players, and on whether veto players have delegated policy making authority to independent agencies. In the context of monetary policy and independent central banks, we find evidence supporting the following predictions: delegation is more likely to enhance credibility and political replacements of central bank governors are less likely in the presence of multiple political veto players; this effect increases with the polarization of veto players.

/pdf/the-limits-of-delegation-veto-players-central-bank-17mtymitnf.pdf

The Limits of Delegation: Veto Players, Central Bank Independence, and the Credibility of Monetary Policy

During the last three decades, the arena of biodiversity conservation has largely aligned itself with the globally dominant political ideology of neoliberalism and associated governmentalities. Schemes such as payments for ecological services are promoted to reach the multiple ‘wins’ so desired: improved biodiversity conservation, economic development, (international) cooperation and poverty alleviation, amongst others. While critical scholarship with respect to understanding the linkages between neoliberalism, capitalism and the environment has a long tradition, a synthesized critique of neoliberal conservation - the ideology (and related practices) that the salvation of nature requires capitalist expansion - remains lacking. This paper aims to provide such a critique. We commence with the assertion that there has been a conflation between ‘economics’ and neoliberal ideology in conservation thinking and implementation. As a result, we argue, it becomes easier to distinguish the main problems that neoliberal win-win models pose for biodiversity conservation. These are framed around three points: the stimulation of contradictions; appropriation and misrepresentation and the disciplining of dissent. Inspired by Bruno Latour’s recent ‘compositionist manifesto’, the conclusion outlines some ideas for moving beyond critique.

/pdf/towards-a-synthesized-critique-of-neoliberal-biodiversity-6dzsqxg3vt.pdf

Towards a Synthesized Critique of Neoliberal Biodiversity Conservation

http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/arose/FM599.pdf

Government size and automatic stabilizers: international and intranational evidence

A new world order: explaining the international diffusion of the gold standard, 1870–1913

Have Monetary Policies Failed

VII Apart from the effect of the Federal Reserve Act of I9I3 on our credit system, its relations to our currency system will have special interest to the general public, notably to those who have been concerned with the struggles over government issues and free silver. For a long time this country has been facing a decision on the question whether the forms of money (irrespective of the standard, be it gold or silver) needed as media of exchange by the daily round of business should be issued by the government, after the example of the United States notes (i.e., greenbacks), or by the banks, after the example of national bank notes.\" In order to determine the bearing of the new law on this general question, a statement of the provisions regarding note-issues will first be given. No change is made in regard to any of the following forms of money: gold, gold certificates, silver, silver certificates and United States notes. Indeed, all past questions touching the standard were definitely settled by a remarkable amendment in the House, now embodied in sec. 26 of the new act, which emphasized the maintenance of the gold standard: Nothing in this Act contained shall be construed to repeal the parity provision or provisions contained in an Act approved March fourteenth, nineteen hundred, entitled \"An Act to define and fix the standard of value, to

/pdf/the-banking-and-currency-act-of-1913-ii-4ixs65kgwi.pdf

The Banking and Currency Act of 1913: II

I In the panic of 1907 it was impressed on the public and on Congress that our monetary system was not of the kind that could successfully withstand the stress of a coming monetary stringency or the greater dangers of a serious financial collapse. These impressions have led to the widespread demand for monetary reform, to the appointment by Congress of the National Monetary Commission, and to the publication by this commission of a great mass of material on money and banking. These volumes may help in the education of Congress, but because of their bulk they are not likely to help very much in the education of the public. It is clear, however, from these volumes and from knowledge previously in our possession that the lessons to be had from other countries as well as from our own country must inevitably be drawn upon in framing the concrete proposals of the commission to Congress. Moreover, under our political methods, it is not a question as to what outside experts may propose but what the leaders in Congress think can be passed through both houses under the present conditions of public opinion (educated, of course, as far as possible). This situation we must keep in mind in all our discussions. The lessons to be got out of these volumes and the inferences from them which are applicable to conditions in the United States can without doubt be very simply presented. If so, and if made intelligible to the general public, there is a gooid chance that they can be impressed upon Congress and enacted into, law.

Banknotes and Lending Power

The "Baltimore Plan" of Bank-Issues

The Aldrich Bill

The arguments iin favor of a bill to establish an elastic currency failed to produce legislation in the session of Congress just closed; nor is this result to be wondered at, if the validity of the arguments sometimes proposed be closely examnined. While the necessity of having the means of expanding and contracting our bank-issues is highly important for certain conditions and districts, it is obviously undesirable to assume that an increase of a bank's denmand obligatioins is as effective as an increase of its resources; or, that exchanges are carried on in this country only by the use of bank-notes. It cannot be too emphatically repeated just now that laws, which would enable a city bank to issuie more of its own notes, would not thereby increase one whit the amount of its reserves, and consequently would not increase one wlhit its ability to make discounts to borrowers. When banking institutions have absorbed their funds in carrying large loans to railways, or to industrial syndicates, the only way they can meet the varying and legitimate demands of the merchant and manufacturer for loans based on exchanges of goods is by introducing more capital into the banking business; or by making less use of existing banking capital iin promotions, or in other speculative operations, which are more or less removed from the usual demands of business. And it should also be emphatically repeated that a high and changeable rate of interest at the banks is an indication, not necessarily of a scarcity of money, but of a scarcity of capital in the loan market. Therefore, when a sensitive and high rate of interest in New York is referred to as a reason why our currency system is dangerously inelastic, the claim has very little, in principle or fact, to support it. Although interest is paid for capital, which gives control over purchasing power, the function of money, while important, is really secondary. In this case, money only serves as a medium of exchange to transfer capital from the lender to the borrower. Anything which serves as a medium of exchange, whether gold, banknotes, or checks, will serve to convey the capital to a borrower. In truth, if a bank has capital to lend, there is little real trouble

J. Laurence Laughlin

Papers

The Banking and Currency Act of 1913: II

Banknotes and Lending Power

The "Baltimore Plan" of Bank-Issues

The Aldrich Bill

Elastic Currency and the Money Market