There is a widespread concern that, in some parts of the world, governments are unable to exercise effective authority. When governments fail, more sinister forces thrive: warlords, arms smugglers, narcotics enterprises, kidnap gangs, terrorist networks, armed militias. Why do governments fail? This book explores an old idea that has returned to prominence: that authority, effe...
There is a widespread concern that, in some parts of the world, governments are unable to exercise effective authority. When governments fail, more sinister forces thrive: warlords, arms smugglers, narcotics enterprises, kidnap gangs, terrorist networks, armed militias. Why do governments fail? This book explores an old idea that has returned to prominence: that authority, effectiveness, accountability and responsiveness is closely related to the ways in which governments are financed. It matters that governments tax their citizens rather than live from oil revenues and foreign aid, and it matters how they tax them. Taxation stimulates demands for representation, and an effective revenue authority is the central pillar of state capacity. Using case studies from Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America, this book presents and evaluates these arguments, updates theories derived from European history in the light of conditions in contemporary poorer countries, and draws conclusions for policy-makers.
原文摘录
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In the late seventeenth century, the British state ended tax farming and established permanent bureaucracies to collect excise and customs taxes. These were staffed by full-time, salaried employees who were recruited by examinations or apprenticeships, promoted on merit through steps in a hierarchy and retired with a pension. With its standard operating procedures and staff training, the British Excise Office in particular rapidly became the model for the administrative revolution taking place across Europe. It was the largest and the most competent part of the government, closer ‘to Max Weber’s idea of bureaucracy than any other government agency in eighteenth-century Europe’. Moreover, the growth of the revenue bureaucracy and its technical approach to assessment and collection created a... (查看原文)
The existence of a professional tax bureaucracy allowed Britain and other countries to develop a sophisticated system of bond finance. Knowing that their governments had access to reliable sources of revenue, investors and financiers could accept lower rates of interest for these bonds, allowing the government to invest not only in weapons and manpower for wars, but, many decades later, in the construction of systems of sanitation and water that would boost living standards for the increasingly urban populations. (查看原文)
还没人写过短评呢
还没人写过短评呢