Daniel Santos Kosinski, Valter Duarte Ferreira Filho
O bitcoin foi lançado em 2009 com a pretensão de ser moeda privada, não institucional e livre dos arbítrios governamentais. Não teve êxito como tal, mas mostrou-se um meio para transferir direitos fora da vigilância e do controle das autoridades nacionais e internacionais. Por isso, o governo da China, extremamente cioso da sua soberania monetária, o considerou uma ameaça à segurança financeira, reprimindo o seu uso. Apesar disso, identificou nas tecnologias do bitcoin uma oportunidade para criar uma moeda digital governamental. O resultado foi a instituição do “renmimbi digital”, com o qual pretende maior rapidez e eficácia na execução das políticas internas, controlar essa nova modalidade de transações comerciais e, se possível, erguer as bases de uma nova ordem financeira centrada na China.
Despite the predominance of liberal ideology in the United States since its formation as an independent nation, the US has consistently expanded its capacity to finance and support the efforts of the private sector to create and commercialize new technologies in strategic sectors. As such, this study aims to identify and describe the characteristics of interventions by the American state to foster economic development. It also seeks to analyze how these characteristics fit within the different typologies of the Developmental State. A case study was conducted on the nanotechnology sector in the US, complemented by mini case studies on the computation, semiconductor, and biotechnology sectors. The empirical findings were compared to the ideal types of the Regulatory State, the Developmental Bureaucratic State, and the Developmental Network State. These ideal types were constructed using the Weberian model using concepts from the literature pertaining to the Developmental State. This study concludes that the American Developmental State has adopted a model that is closely related to the Developmental Network State, acting in a fragmented and decentralized manner, dedicated to promoting collaboration and joint action with the private sector. This is in line with the triple helix model (industry, academia, and government) with the intention of fostering development and growth of high-technology sectors, which are considered economically, scientifically, or militarily strategic. Furthermore, the State also carries out various actions designed to facilitate transforming technological innovations into commercialized products, with the idea of ensuring the country's scientific and technological leadership, its international competitiveness, the vitality of its domestic industry, and the dynamism of the national economy.
What political factors influence the allocation of economic patronage in democracies? Answering this question is vital to improving our knowledge of how states and markets interact. In this paper, I argue that changing levels of party centralization can drive important changes in the allocation of state largess. When governing parties are centralized, national party leaders will control sources of patronage, targeting benefits to particularly influential regions and industries. By contrast, when governing parties are decentralized, influential sub-national party leaders will advocate for their constituents, allocating patronage evenly through a national logroll. I find evidence for these relationships by comparing India's distribution process for industrial licenses and government finance under a decentralized Congress Party (1954-61) to its distribution process under a centralized Congress Party (1969-75).