Commissars and cars: A case study in the political economy of dictatorship.
We use unique archival data on the allocation of vehicles, i.e. cars and trucks, in the 1930s by a three-person commission of top Soviet officials for an empirical investigation of resource allocation by a dictatorship. Two distinct models of dictatorial allocative behavior, namely, an economic plan...
| Published in: | Journal of Comparative Economics Vol. 31; no. 1; pp. 1 - 20 |
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| Main Authors: | , |
| Format: | Article |
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Academic Press Inc.
March 2003
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=513128850&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 513128850 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 01475967 JCE jtl: Journal of Comparative Economics issn: 01475967 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: March 2003 vid: 31 iid: 1 pid: 735 pub: Academic Press Inc. artinfo: ui: 513128850 10.1016/S0147-5967(02)00015-X ppf: 1 ppct: 19 formats: tig: atl: Commissars and cars: A case study in the political economy of dictatorship. aug: au: Lazarev, Valery Gregory, Paul su: Motor vehicles Dictatorship Resource allocation -- Mathematical models Communism & society Soviet Union sug: subj: Soviet Union Motor vehicles Dictatorship Resource allocation -- Mathematical models Communism & society ab: We use unique archival data on the allocation of vehicles, i.e. cars and trucks, in the 1930s by a three-person commission of top Soviet officials for an empirical investigation of resource allocation by a dictatorship. Two distinct models of dictatorial allocative behavior, namely, an economic planning model and a political gift exchange model, are considered. We use censored regression and ordered probit to show that the political gift exchange model is supported strongly by the data, but the economic model is rejected. Moreover, the political model explains better the rejection of petitions rather than their success, suggesting that the dictator preferred unconstrained decision-making discretion. We argue that the dictator used gift exchange to purchase loyalty against uncontrolled market exchanges and that political bias in resource allocation was undermining the dictator's power in the long run. Copyright (c) 2003 Elsevier Science (USA) pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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