Model Code

One nearly untouchable aspect of government ethics is the role of parties.

This is less a problem in municipalities than at other levels of government, because most municipalities in the U.S. are nonpartisan, although parties still play a role. But many municipalities and, in some states, particularly in the Northeast, all municipalities are still partisan. And most counties are partisan, as well.

In many cases, partisanship and local government are hard to separate. That is,...

In an upcoming book, The Rule of Law and Development, Michael Trebilcock and Ron Daniels divide developing countries into three groups (according to an article in last week’s Economist):

1. Those where politicians, lawyers, and the public all support legal reform (e.g., Central Europe after the end of communism);
2. Those where politicians support legal reform, but lawyers and the police do...

Jacksonville's Ethics Commission recently went through a two year revision process of their City's Ethics Code. The resulting updates were finally ratified by the City Council last Tuesday night. See the Times Union article below... Note that I will get the code revisions up in a separate blog entry later.

From: http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/113007/opl_221526913.shtml.

What a nice thing to wake up to: reading in the newspaper that at least some American institutions are using words like 'transparency' and 'accountability' as if they really meant it.

In an article in today's New York Times, we learn that foundations are now publicizing their failures as well as their successes. A consultant to foundations is quoted as saying, 'there's an...