The European Public Choice Society has its annual conference in Braga (Portugal) in the week of the 11th of April. To give you an idea of what is hot and happening in the field of political economy, Joes is interviewing attendants of the conference. For this interview, he spoke with Thomas Apolte, who is writing … Continue reading Interview with Thomas Apolte (Professor at the University of Münster)
Since the 1950s the number of municipalities in the Netherlands has been reduced from over 1,000 to around 350 now. Yet, we know virtually nothing about the effects of these municipal amalgamations on the social fabric and local politics of these local communities. Joes and Brandon ask the question: Maybe we should look before we … Continue reading Municipal amalgamation: Look before you leap.
Much attention (incl. mine) is now focused on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Fortunately, the Netherlands is not a autocracy like Russia. But the rule of law and liberal democracy in the Netherlands are also under pressure. I wrote an essay about it: https://europeanconservative.com/articles/commentary/sinking-below-sea-level/ https://twitter.com/TheCoronaKreml1/status/1501173552103493634
As I wrote previously, fiscal federalism allows local governments to adjust their policies to local circumstances, but this often entails transfers from the central government to local governments. Often, the central government can set particular policy goals for local governments, for instance, Dutch municipalities execute many parts of Dutch social policy. They have fairly little … Continue reading Preventing local profligacy (or Fiscal Federalism 201)
Part I: a discussion of Margit Tavits’ 2009 Presidents with Prime Ministers From kings and archons to presidents and prime ministers, positions of leadership and authority form a crucial part of every state. Different states have institutionally different positions of executive and legislative authority and different rules structuring their respective powers and relations, known as … Continue reading A Ballot Throne: does direct election matter for presidential power?
A great deal of the literature comparing political institutions across countries has been devoted to the study of executive type (or executive format). By executive type I mean the institutional structure of the executive and legislative branches of a country (or other jurisdiction), their constitutionally-defined relationship and relative powers. Most people will be familiar with … Continue reading Executive type: basic definitions
Governments execute a wide array of tasks in modern societies, from maintaining infrastructure for traffic and water management, via providing health care and education to providing national defense and safety. With the exception of a few tiny countries like the Vatican, countries tend to have multiple levels of government to execute these tasks. For instance, … Continue reading Governments are like onions (or: Fiscal federalism 101).
"In response to Hungary’s new law banning “promoting or portraying as an end in itself” homosexuality or sex reassignment to minors and limiting sexual education in schools, the European Union and the Western media discourse has been indulging its worst nature. While touting the virtues of federalism, tolerance, and diversity in pursuit of stability, the … Continue reading The Golden Rule is Key: President von der Leyen and Western European Leaders are Undermining the EU’s Stability
In the Netherlands, like in other Western countries, we have been hearing the stories about the angry or alienated voter for a long time. Right wing populism has been present in parliament since the 1980s, and became really big with the electoral victory of Pim Fortuyn in the 2000s. Yet looking at the incumbency effect … Continue reading Dutch voters have not become more punitive since the 1990s
We’ve Got to Get our Shit Together if We Want to Stay Together Hungary has been flouting liberal democratic norms for nearly a decade. In June 2021, it introduced a law regulating sex education and television programming for people under 18 to exclude ‘promotion’ of gay and transgender ways of being. Suddenly, the debate on … Continue reading Federal Constitutional Politics: The Big Picture of the EU-Hungarian LGTBQ+ Law Controversy
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