A MODEL OF ETHNIC CONFLICT

We present a model of conflict in which discriminatory government policy or social intolerance is responsive to various forms of ethnic activism, including violence. It is this perceived responsiveness—captured by the probability that the government gives in and accepts a proposed change in ethnic policy—that induces individuals to mobilize, often violently, to support their cause. Yet, mobilization is costly and militants have to be compensated accordingly. The model allows for both financial and human contributions to conflict and allows for a variety of individual attitudes (“radicalism”) towards the cause. The main results concern the effects of within‐group heterogeneity in radicalism and income, as well as the correlation between radicalism and income, in precipitating conflict.     

REDISTRIBUTION,PORK, AND ELECTIONS

Why might citizens vote against redistributive policies from which they would seem to benefit? Many scholars focus on ‘wedge’ issues such as religion or race, but another explanation might be geographically‐based patronage—or pork. We examine the tension between redistribution and patronage with a model that combines partisan elections across multiple districts with legislation in spatial and divide‐the‐dollar environments. The model yields a unique equilibrium that describes the circumstances under which poor voters support right‐wing parties that favor low taxes and redistribution, and under which rich voters support left‐wing parties that favor high taxes and redistribution. The model suggests that one reason standard tax and transfer models of redistribution often do not capture empirical reality is that redistributive transfers are a less efficient tool for attracting votes than are more targeted policy programs. The model also underlines the central importance of party discipline during legislative bargaining in shaping the importance of redistribution in voter behavior, and it describes why right‐wing parties should have an advantage over left‐wing ones in majoritarian systems.     

WORKERS,WARRIORS, AND CRIMINALS: SOCIAL CONFLICT IN GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM

We incorporate appropriation activities (social conflict) into canonical models of trade and study how economic shocks and policies affect the intensity of conflict. We show that not all shocks that could make society richer reduce conflict: positive shocks to labor‐intensive industries diminish conflict, while positive shocks to capital‐intensive industries increase it. The key requirement is that conflict activities be more labor intensive than the economy as this determines how shocks affect the returns and costs of conflict. Our theory is consistent with several observed patterns of conflict and implies that empirical work should take into account the relative factor intensities of the productive and conflict sectors in each country. Incorporating appropriation into a canonic general equilibrium model affects what policies may be deemed desirable: in order to reduce conflict and generate Pareto‐improvements policy must be distortionary, while reforms that appear efficiency‐enhancing under the unrealistic assumption of perfect property rights may backfire. This offers one explanation for why reforms based on traditional models without appropriation may be delayed and become unpopular when implemented, and why societies may sympathize with seemingly inefficient redistribution.     

THE BALANCED US PRESS

We measure the relative ideological positions of newspapers, voters, interest groups, and political parties, using data on ballot propositions. We exploit the fact that newspapers, parties, and interest groups take positions on these propositions, and the fact that citizens ultimately vote on them. We find that, on average, newspapers in the United States are located almost exactly at the median voter in their states—that is, they are balanced around the median voter. Still, there is a significant amount of ideological heterogeneity across newspapers, which is smaller than the one found for interest groups. However, when we group propositions by issue area, we find a sizable amount of ideological imbalance: broadly speaking, newspapers are to the left of the state‐level median voter on many social issues, and to the right on many economic issues. To complete the picture, we use two existing methods of measuring bias and show that the news and editorial sections of newspapers have almost identical partisan positions.     

DEMOCRATIC PEACE AND ELECTORAL ACCOUNTABILITY

Democracies rarely engage in conflicts with one another, though they are not averse to fighting autocracies. We exploit the existence in many countries of executive term limits to show that electoral accountability is the key reason behind this “democratic peace” phenomenon. We construct a new dataset of term limits for a sample of 177 countries over the 1816–2001 period, and combine this information with a large dataset of interstate conflicts. Our empirical analysis shows that, although democracies are significantly less likely to fight each other, democracies with leaders who face binding term limits are as conflict prone as autocracies. The study of electoral calendars confirms the importance of re‐election incentives: in democracies with two‐term limits, conflicts are less likely to occur during the executive's first mandate than in the last one. Our findings support the Kantian idea that elections act as a discipline device, deterring leaders from engaging in costly conflicts.     

Intergroup leadership

Strong leadership within a group can increase the likelihood of conflict with other groups. This ingroup/outgroup leadership trade-off, occurring in contexts from businesses and political parties to ethnic groups and nations, raises questions about how a different kind of leadership can improve intergroup relations. Although leadership theory often focuses on a single group, sidelining questions of intergroup dynamics, some leadership literature addresses intergroup relations. Concurrently, some intergroup relations literature directly addresses leadership. Here, we synthesize and attempt to catalyze research on leadership that promotes positive intergroup relations: intergroup leadership. We begin by reviewing the ingroup/outgroup leadership trade-off. Next, we examine five theoretical approaches to leadership that show potential to promote positive intergroup relations. Finally, we identify six characteristics of the literature as it has developed and might develop in the future. These serve as possible directions for research to further illuminate the science and practice of intergroup leadership.     

ETHNIC DIVERSITY AND THE SPREAD OF CIVIL WAR

This paper theoretically and empirically investigates the relationship between local‐level ethnic composition and the spread of conflict. Cross‐country literature on conflict finds that ethnic diversity, and ethnic polarization in particular, are associated with greater incidence of conflict. However, the question remains as to where within ethnically diverse countries conflict begins and where and how it spreads. To study this question, I present a model in which local ethnic groups' decision to attack depends on three key variables: ethnic population shares, ethnic groups' weapons ratio, and the share of co‐ethnic successes in the battles that took place in the previous period. The model generates three predictions: conflict starts in ethnically homogeneous areas and only later spreads to ethnically heterogeneous areas; neighbor co‐ethnics' success increases subsequent probability of winning and may lead to attack; and greater ethnic diversity is associated with costlier conflict. I find strong support for these predictions using detailed municipal‐level data on attacks and ethnic polarization during the initial spread of the Bosnian Civil War. Moreover, my conflict model is able to predict the sequence of actual conflict outcomes with reasonably high accuracy. (JEL: D39, D74, J15, R12)     

Making ‘my’ problem ‘our’ problem: Warfare as collective action,and the role of leader manipulation

Warfare is a collective action problem, and groups often stand to benefit from the quick and coordinated action that leaders can provide. This basic principle is as true in modern political contexts as it has been across our evolutionary history, and there is growing evidence that leadership has evolved, in part, to solve such collective action problems. Despite the material and reproductive benefits of leadership for groups, leaders may also seek private gains at the expense of group interests. Drawing upon insights from social and evolutionary psychology, I explain how leaders solve collective action problems in warfare, but also how leaders manipulate audience preferences when their own interests do not align with group interests. Specifically, when leaders anticipate great private gain from foreign aggression while facing steep public resistance at home, leaders will misframe the conflict as defensive rather than offensive in nature. I provide an evolutionary analysis that explains why leaders exploit this framing specifically, and I identify the specific aspects of conflict framing that are most likely to be exploited toward this end.     

Arguments for Testing Ethnic Identity and Acculturation as Factors in Risk Judgments

Understanding of risk views in multiethnic societies and in a globalizing world may be enhanced by use of measures of ethnic identity and acculturation. Ethnic identity includes such attributes as positive attitudes about one's ethnic group and a sense of belonging to it, voluntary and frequent association with other ethnic group members, and ethnic practices (preferred music, food, language; attendance at ethnic festivities). Acculturation is absorption of the "host" society's cultural norms, beliefs, attitudes and behavior patterns by immigrants, or by other groups historically excluded from the larger society. Both generic and ethnicity-specific measures of these concepts are available in the literature. This Perspective reviews the literature on risk implications of these concepts, how the nature of these measures presents both opportunities and challenges to risk researchers, and the degree to which ethnic identity and acculturation may be correlated with sociodemographic factors. Conceptual and methodological suggestions are made for risk research using these concepts, and hypotheses are offered about what such research might find.     

The dysfunctions of power in teams: A review and emergent conflict perspective

We review the new and growing body of work on power in teams and use this review to develop an emergent theory of how power impacts team outcomes. Our paper offers three primary contributions. First, our review highlights potentially incorrect assumptions that have arisen around the topic of power in teams and documents the areas and findings that appear most robust in explaining the effects of power on teams. Second, we contrast the findings of this review with what is known about the effects of power on individuals and highlight the directionally oppositional effects of power that emerge across different levels of analysis. Third, we integrate findings across levels of analysis into an emergent theory which explains why and when the benefits of power for individuals may paradoxically explain the potentially negative effects of power on team outcomes. We elaborate on how individual social comparisons within teams where at least one member has power increase intra-team power sensitivity, which we define as a state in which team members are excessively perceptive of, affected by, and responsive to resources. We theorize that when power-sensitized teams experience resource threats (either stemming from external threats or personal threats within the team), these threats will ignite internal power sensitivities and set into play performance-detracting intra-team power struggles. This conflict account of power in teams integrates and organizes past findings in this area to explain why and when power negatively affects team-level outcomes, and opens the door for future research to better understand why and when power may benefit team outcomes when power’s dark side for teams is removed.     

A STRUCTURAL MODEL OF TURNOUT AND VOTING IN MULTIPLE ELECTIONS

This paper develops a unified approach to study participation and voting in multiple elections. The theoretical setting combines an uncertain‐voter model of turnout with a spatial model of voting behavior. We apply our framework to the study of turnout and voting in US Presidential and Congressional elections. We structurally estimate the model using individual‐level data for the 2000 elections, and quantify the relationships between observed individual characteristics and unobserved citizens’ ideological preferences, information, and civic duty. We then use the estimated model, which replicates the patterns of abstention, selective abstention, split‐ticket voting, and straight‐ticket voting observed in the data, to assess the effects of policies that may increase citizens’ information and sense of civic duty on their turnout and voting behavior.     

Ethnic Minority Women in the Scottish Labour Market: Employers' Perceptions

This paper contributes to an under‐researched area through investigating employers' perceptions of ethnic minority women in the Scottish labour market. Adopting a social constructionist approach which acknowledges agency and structure and incorporates insights relating to organizational and social group culture, the study highlights the influence of individual (micro), organizational (meso) and contextual (macro) factors on ethnic minority women's participation in the labour market. The paper is based on qualitative research involving Scottish employers in the public and private sectors to examine perceptions and practices related to the employment of ethnic minority women. Institutional commitment to equality issues is questioned, although individual instances of engagement with key equality issues were sometimes evident. Proactive recruitment strategies and career support for ethnic minority women and men were not in evidence, and there was low awareness of the unique position of ethnic minority women in employment and society. We argue that these findings call for a multi‐level approach to advancing human resources management policy, practice and research within a wider socio‐political environment in which the responsibilities and duties of public sector organizations are clarified and more support is provided for organizational promotion of equal opportunities.     

Fostering Risk Taking in Research and Development: The Importance of a Project's Terminal Value

Large firms face a conflict in managing a portfolio of high-risk projects. When an ongoing project is thought to have a low likelihood of success, project team members take risks to improve its chances of success. However, upper-level managers who allocate resources tend to withhold resources from a project with a low likelihood of success in favor of others in the portfolio that look more promising. Because this paucity of resources influences project team members to avoid risk, the total effect of success likelihood on risk taking is conflicted. The influence on risk taking of a project's terminal value—defined as the value that remains in the firm in the event of project failure—is unequivocally positive, because both senior management resource allocation and project team risk-taking propensity are encouraged by terminal value. Thus, firms can override the ambivalent effect of likelihood of success on project decision making by focusing attention on a project's terminal value.     

DICTATORS AND THEIR VIZIERS: ENDOGENIZING THE LOYALTY–COMPETENCE TRADE‐OFF

The possibility of treason by a close associate has been a nightmare of most autocrats throughout history. More competent viziers are better able to discriminate among potential plotters, and this makes them more risky subordinates for the ruler. To avoid this, rulers, especially those who are weak and vulnerable, sacrifice the competence of their agents, hiring mediocre but loyal subordinates. Furthermore, any use of incentive schemes by a personalistic dictator is limited by the fact that all punishments are conditional on the dictator’s own survival. We endogenize loyalty and competence in a principal‐agent game between a dictator and his viziers in both static and dynamic settings. The dynamic model allows us to focus on the succession problem that insecure dictators face.     

AUCTION DESIGN WITHOUT COMMITMENT

In anonymous platforms like the Internet, committing to honor the outcome of an auction is difficult since the seller can benefit by reauctioning the good. We argue that how information is processed within the auction mechanism is crucially important in such circumstances. In our model, the seller uses an intermediary to extract information from the buyers but is not tied to sell the good with terms that the mechanism proposes. Instead, she may reauction the good again via some other intermediary. There are no restrictions on how many times and through which mechanisms the good can be reauctioned. The buyers may also choose their outside option at any stage of the game. We argue that a sequentially rational seller can only implement a version of the English auction, in particular the popular version where bidders employ proxy bids. This is a consequence of the informational properties of the English action: it reveals just the right information for the seller to be able to commit to the mechanism.     

Improving human resources for health planning in developing economies

There is a universal consensus that human resources represent the heart and soul of effective health systems everywhere. However, despite this consensus, human resource planning in low income countries remains a neglected, often poorly implemented and ineffective component of health-system development. The planning exercises that do take place are often inefficient, use inappropriate planning models or fail to adequately prioritize human resource investment decisions. This article briefly discusses possible reasons why this failure occurs and describes four key steps that can help health system planners more effectively prioritize and link human resource for health investment decisions to health system strategy and programmatic initiatives. Implications for human resource development practice and national human resource development are discussed.     

Pyramids and the separation between direction and control of non-financial Italian family companies

This paper uses a multiple case study analysis of ten Italian business groups controlled by families to answer the following research questions: Does the controlling shareholder, through the parent company at the top of the pyramidal group, always exercise the direction activity of the subsidiaries? If not, why does the parent company not exercise that activity, delegating it to its subsidiaries? What is the degree of separation between control and direction within the group? A high percentage of our sample declares not to be directed by the parent company. However, the presence of family members on the subsidiaries’ boards and the low boards’ independence makes the separation between direction and control more apparent than real. The credibility of the separation is questioned mostly for those non-directed subsidiaries that operate in the same sector. Our analysis suggests some elements, in order to understand in which cases the direction activity by the parent (or its delegation to the subsidiaries) should be interpreted positively or negatively in terms of controlling shareholder expropriation, by proposing to use the degree of separation between direction and control as a proxy to assess indirectly the degree of that expropriation.     

Obstacles and opportunities for female leadership in mammalian societies: A comparative perspective

Women remain universally underrepresented in the top leadership positions. A comparative evolutionary framework may offer new insights into the value of and potential barriers to female leadership. Here we define leaders as individuals who impose a disproportional influence on the collective behaviors of group members. We reviewed data for 76 social species of non-human mammals to reveal the circumstances favoring female leadership and species exhibiting female-biased leadership in two or more contexts (e.g., collective movements, group foraging, conflict resolution within groups, or conflicts between groups). Although rare across the lineage, female-biased leadership is pervasive in killer whales, lions, spotted hyenas, bonobos, lemurs, and elephants; leaders emerge without coercion and followers benefit from the social support and/or ecological knowledge from elder females. Our synthesis elucidates barriers to female leadership, but also reveals that traditional operationalizations of leadership are themselves male-biased. We therefore propose a new agenda for assessing the overlooked ways that females exert influence in groups.     

一种基于区间直觉梯形模糊数偏好的大群体决策冲突测度研究

针对决策偏好为区间直觉梯形模糊数的大群体决策冲突测度问题,首先给出了两个区间直觉梯形模糊数的距离,提出了群体成员冲突函数,基于该函数对大群体成员偏好进行聚类形成若干聚集,以此为基础提出了聚集冲突测度模型并集结为群体冲突测度模型,然后应用于大群体偏好集结。最后通过一个算例对模型进行了验证。该模型便于大群体意见的分析与协调,适用于群决策支持系统,在应急决策中具有实际应用价值。     

Claiming more than equality: Should leaders ask for forgiveness?

In organizations, leaders are often paid more than lower-level employees. Social dilemma research also shows that leaders feel entitled to earn more, and because of this, are more inclined to contribute less than an equal share to a public good, which may damage the collective. In two experiments, the social dilemma context is used to examine how group members react when either a leader or a follower violates the equality norm. Moreover, we demonstrate how asking for forgiveness sometimes mitigates people's reactions to equality norm violations. Results show that asking for forgiveness attenuates negative emotions, retribution, and non-cooperation—but more so if followers, relative to leaders, violated equality. In fact, leaders are less likely to be seen as even violating norms, suggesting that group members perceive leaders to be entitled.