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41. Majoritarian versus Proportional Representation Voting

Author:
Ethan Kaplan
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Economics for Inclusive Prosperity (EfIP)
Abstract:
What kind of voting system should countries have? This policy brief discusses the two main electoral systems in modern political democracies. It makes an argument that majoritarian systems such as what exists in the United States fail to properly represent voters. It suggests replacing the U.S. majoritarian political system with a proportional representation system and shows how this could be done within the context of current U.S. law. Both economists and political scientists have worked on the impact of electoral systems. Empirical methods from economics as well as economic analysis of the incentives created by different political systems have contributed to our understanding of the consequences of electoral systems on representation. Additionally, economists have estimated the impact of electoral system on fiscal expenditures, something we will discuss towards the end of the policy brief. There are two main voting systems in modern democratic societies: majoritarian systems and proportional representation systems. Federal voting in the United States is majoritarian though some states such as Maryland have proportional representation at the state level. In a majoritarian system, also known as a winner-take-all system or a first-past-the-post system, the country is divided up into districts. Politicians then compete for individual district seats. The candidate who receives the highest vote share wins the election and represents the district.
Topic:
Economics, Democracy, Representation, Macroeconomics, Voting, and Electoral Systems
Political Geography:
United States

42. EfIP Online Panel: A New Macroeconomics?

Author:
Jón Steinsson
Publication Date:
07-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Economics for Inclusive Prosperity (EfIP)
Abstract:
There is a narrative within our field that macroeconomics has lost its way. While I have some sympathy with this narrative, I think it is a better description of the field 10 years ago than of the field today. Today, macroeconomics is in the process of regaining its footing. Because of this, in my view, the state of macroeconomics is actually better than it has been for quite some time. The most important problem with macro over the past few decades has been that it has been too theoretical. When I say this, I don‘t at all mean to say that theory is useless. To the contrary, theory is an essential element of a healthy science. But a healthy science needs a balance between theory and empirical work. Macro lost this balance in the 1980s and is only regaining it now. Most narratives about the evolution of macro focus on the evolution of macroeconomic theory and the rational expectations revolution in particular. An under-appreciated part of this story is that the rational expectations revolution shifted the field away from empirical work. This was partly because building models that met the higher standards of rigor set by Lucas and his co-revolutionaries was a challenging and therefore highly absorbing task. But that isn’t the only reason. For reasons that are not entirely clear to me, a very substantial fraction of macroeconomists came to believe that the Lucas critique implied that quasi-experimental empirical methods could not be used in macro. The idea that changes in policy could radically alter empirical regularities (i.e., the Lucas critique) somehow came to be interpreted to mean that the only way to do empirical work in macro was to write down fully specified general equilibrium models of the whole economy and evaluate the entire model (either by full-information inference methods or moment matching). Sargent, for example, placed enormous emphasis on the idea of “cross-equation restrictions.“ It seems that this line of thinking led large numbers of macroeconomists astray in terms of how to think about empirical work in macro for several decades.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, and Macroeconomics
Political Geography:
United States

43. New Directions in Macroeconomics

Author:
Gillian Brunet
Publication Date:
07-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Economics for Inclusive Prosperity (EfIP)
Abstract:
Without being overly prescriptive, macro research must meet two standards to keep the field moving in a productive direction: models must be tested empirically and researchers must think carefully about how underlying assumptions restrict the set of questions that can be answered with a given model. Models move knowledge forward through rigorous empirical testing. Matching moments in model calibration is not enough—nor should it be considered true empirics. When economics is done well, theory and empirics are complements: empirical research disciplines models and theory disciplines empirical research. In recent decades, macro research has tilted very heavily towards theory, forgoing the feedback generated by rigorous empirical testing and, as a consequence, dramatically reducing the ratio of insight to effort. Macro as a field must value empirical contributions to flourish fully. There has been significant progress in the last decade, but the balance still tilts heavily towards theory. Macroeconomists must stop dismissing empirical contributions as trivial for macro theory to reach its potential. It’s not an accident that many of today’s best macroeconomists stand out for their work in both theory and empirics: empirical work disciplines their theoretical research. Over the past 40-50 years, research in short-run macroeconomics has focused on the goal of creating unified, internally consistent models of the macroeconomy. While this is a worthy goal, it has perhaps become too dominant—and imposes hidden costs on research. The emphasis on developing a central baseline model to which idiosyncratic features are added for addressing a specific problem discourages many researchers from considering the suitability of the underlying model to the specific question being asked. As economists we are taught that every model is a simplification, so that the relevant question is not whether a model is good or bad but whether it is good or bad for answering a specific question. Yet choosing a single baseline model of the macroeconomy tends to obscure the closeness of the relationship between the model and the question it is used to answer. Often macroeconomists think carefully about the relationship between their question and the idiosyncratic features they add to the baseline model, but many of the assumptions underlying the baseline model become invisible and thus unquestioned. This is understandable given the complexity of modern macro models, but it has high costs. More careful consideration of the assumptions underlying baseline models and their appropriateness to individual research questions can help move the field forward.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, Macroeconomics, and Models
Political Geography:
United States

44. A Movement Between Parliamentary Politics and the Pathway to Violence and Terrorism: Germany’s Radical Right Narratives and Counter-narratives

Author:
Maximilian Kreter
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Hedayah
Abstract:
This country report, written by Maximilian Kreter, is one of the outputs of the CARR-Hedayah Radical Right Counter Narratives Project, a year-long project under the STRIVE Global Program at Hedayah funded by the European Union and implemented by the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right (CARR). The overall project creates one of the first comprehensive online toolkits for practitioners and civil society engaged in radical right extremist counter narrative campaigns. It uses online research to map narratives in nine countries and regions, including Australia, Canada, Germany, Hungary, New Zealand, Norway, Ukraine, United Kingdom, and the United States. It also proposes counter narratives for these countries and regions and advises on how to conduct such campaigns in an effective manner.
Topic:
Civil Society, Far Right, Radical Right, Civil Society Organizations, and Countering Violent Extremism
Political Geography:
United States, United Kingdom, Ukraine, Canada, Norway, Germany, Hungary, Australia, and New Zealand

45. Radical Right Narratives and Norwegian Counter-narratives in the Decade of Utøya and Bærum Solo-actor Attacks

Author:
Mette Wiggen
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Hedayah
Abstract:
This country report, written by Dr. Mette Wiggen, is one of the outputs of the CARR-Hedayah Radical Right Counter Narratives Project, a year-long project under the STRIVE Global Program at Hedayah funded by the European Union and implemented by the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right (CARR). The overall project creates one of the first comprehensive online toolkits for practitioners and civil society engaged in radical right extremist counter narrative campaigns. It uses online research to map narratives in nine countries and regions, including Australia, Canada, Germany, Hungary, New Zealand, Norway, Ukraine, United Kingdom, and the United States. It also proposes counter narratives for these countries and regions and advises on how to conduct such campaigns in an effective manner.
Topic:
Civil Society, Terrorism, Violent Extremism, Counter-terrorism, Political Extremism, Civil Society Organizations, and Countering Violent Extremism
Political Geography:
United States, United Kingdom, Ukraine, Canada, Norway, Germany, Hungary, Australia, and New Zealand