Category Archives: Political theory

On the Origins and Consequences of Racism

Posted on February 13, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

We use a novel method to measure racism at both the individual and the country level. We show that our measure of racism has a strong negative and significant impact on economic development, quality of institutions and education. We then … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Philosophy, Political theory, Politics - international | 3 Comments

Slow Democracy: how representation by random selection can rebalance our stricken democracy

Posted on February 5, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

I’ve outlined some of the pathologies of what I call ‘vox pop’ democracy in various posts from time to time. As Western democracy degrades before our very eyes (President Donald Trump wasn’t really imaginable a decade or so ago and is still hard … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Democracy, Economics and public policy, Political theory | 2 Comments

Elections and development #NeverLetAGoodDeedGoUnpunished

Posted on January 18, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

Do anti-poverty programs sway voters? Experimental evidence from Uganda By: Blattman, Christopher ; Emeriau, Mathilde ; Fiala, Nathan A Ugandan government program allowed groups of young people to submit proposals to start skilled enterprises. Among 535 eligible proposals, the government … Continue reading →

Posted in Best From Elsewhere, Democracy, Economics and public policy, Political theory | Leave a comment

Little platoons of the left and right

Posted on November 28, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

The intimidatingly well informed Brad Delong used the following quote from Rosa Luxemburg to bid “good riddance” to Fidel Castro. I don’t know enough to agree or disagree, but as I read Luxemburg’s words, I wasn’t thinking of communism. I was … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy, History, Political theory | 10 Comments

Dispatch no. 2 from the epistemic swamp

Posted on October 30, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

I’ve just posted the first version of the introduction to this post on the first dispatch from the epistemic swamp, but I thought I’d open up the discussion again on a new thread. The tweet above surely highlights different ideas of truth and authenticity. Of course, … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Political theory, Politics - international | Leave a comment

Investor-State Dispute Settlement

Posted on October 25, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

I gave a talk at the Lowy Institute last Wednesday to which I initially gave a long-winded title “Intellectual Property- Economics, Diplomacy and Australia’s strategic interests” but managed to get more cut-through under the pressure of Twitters 140 character limit “DFAT goes AWOL on IP”. … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy, Intellectual Property, Law, Political theory, Politics - international | Leave a comment

Care: the essay

Posted on September 29, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

This essay is the third of three starting with my essay on the Evaluator General in two parts followed by an essay responding to the Productivity Commission’s inquiry into competition in human services. Part One A couple of days ago I came upon care ethics via … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Innovation, Philosophy, Political theory | 25 Comments