In which country does State funding of elections take place? ?->(Show Answer!)

1. In which country does State funding of elections take place?

Answer: Germany and Austria

Reply

Comments

Tags

Show Similar Question And Answers

QA->In which country does State funding of elections take place?....

QA->Which country cut off funding to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, after the body voted to accept a bid for full membership by the Palestinians?....

QA->Which is the main funding agency of the NRLM?....

QA->…………..is a form of equity financing designed specially for funding high risk and high reward project?....

QA->In the case of a ‘test-tube baby’ where does fertilisation take place?....

MCQ-> The conventional wisdom says that this is an issue-less election. There is no central personality of whom voters have to express approval or dislike; no central matter of concern that makes this a one-issue referendum like so many elections in the past; no central party around which everything else revolves — the Congress has been displaced from its customary pole position, and no one else has been able to take its place. Indeed, given that all-seeing video cameras of the Election Commission, and the detailed pictures they are putting together on campaign expenditure, there isn't even much electioning: no slogans on the walls, no loudspeakers blaring forth at all hours of the day and night, no cavalcades of cars heralding the arrival of a candidate at the local bazaar. Forget it being an issue-less election, is this an election at all?Perhaps the ‘fun’ of an election lies in its featuring someone whom you can love or hate. But Narasimha Rao has managed to reduce even a general election, involving nearly 600 million voters, to the boring non-event that is the trademark of his election rallies, and indeed of everything else that he does. After all, the Nehru-Gandhi clan has disappeared from the political map, and the majority of voters will not even be able to name P.V.Narasimha Rao as India's Prime Minister. There could be as many as a dozen prime ministerial candidates ranging from Jyoti Basu to Ramakrishna Hegde, and from Chandra Shekar to (believe it or not) K.R.Narayanan. The sole personality who stands out, therefore, is none of the players, but the umpire: T.N.Seshan. .As for the parties, they are like the blind men of Hindustan, trying in vain to gauge the contours of the animal they have to confront. But it doesn't look as if it will be the mandir-masjid, nor will it be Hindutva or economic nationalism. The Congress will like it to be stability, but what does that mean for the majority? Economic reform is a non-issue for most people with inflation down to barely 4 per cent, prices are not top of the mind either. In a strange twist, after the hawala scandal, corruption has been pushed off the map too.But ponder for a moment, isn't this state of affairs astonishing, given the context? Consider that so many ministers have had to resign over the hawala issue; that a governor who was a cabinet minister has also had to quit, in the wake of judicial displeasure; that the prime minister himself is under investigation for his involvement in not one scandal but two; that the main prime ministerial candidate from the opposition has had to bow out because he too has been changed in the hawala case; and that the head of the ‘third force’ has his own little (or not so little fodder scandal to face. Why then is corruption not an issue — not as a matter of competitive politics, but as an issue on which the contenders for power feel that they have to offer the prospect of genuine change? If all this does not make the parties (almost all of whom have broken the law, in not submitting their audited accounts every year to the income tax authorities) realise that the country both needs — and is ready for-change in the Supreme Court; the assertiveness of the Election Commission, giving new life to a model code of conduct that has been ignored for a quarter country; the independence that has been thrust upon the Central Bureau of Investigation; and the fresh zeal on the part of tax collectors out to nab corporate no-gooders. Think also that at no other point since the Emergency of 1975-77 have so many people in power been hounded by the system for their misdeeds.Is this just a case of a few individuals outside the political system doing the job, or is the country heading for a new era? The seventies saw the collapse of the national consensus that marked the Nehruvian era, and ideology took over in the Indira Gandhi years. That too was buried by Rajiv Gandhi and his technocratic friends. And now, we have these issue-less elections. One possibility is that the country is heading for a period of constitutionalism as the other arms of the state reclaim some of the powers they lost, or yielded, to the political establishment. Economic reform free one part of Indian society from the clutches of the political class. Now, this could spread to other parts of the system. Against such a dramatic backdrop, it should be obvious that people (voters) are looking for accountability, for ways in which to make a corrupted system work again. And the astonishing thing is that no party has sought to ride this particular wave; instead all are on the defensive, desperately evading the real issues. No wonder this is an ‘issue-less’ election.Why does the author probably say that the sole personality who stands out in the elections is T.N.Seshan?
...

MCQ-> Read the following passage based on an Interview to answer the given questions based on it. Certain words are printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.A spate of farmer suicides linked to harassment by recovery agents employed by micro finance institutions (MFLs) in Andhra Pradesh spurned the state government to bring in regulation to protect consumer interests. But, while the Bill has brought into sharp focus the need for consumer protection, it tries to micro-manage MFI operations and in the process it could scuttle some of the crucial bene ts that MFIs bring to farmers, says the author of Micro nance India, State Of The Sec-for Report 2010. In an interview he points out that prudent regulation can ensure the original goal of the MFIs - social uplift of the poor. Do you feel the AP Bill to regulate Mils is well thought out? Does it ensure fairness to the borrowers and the long-term health of the sector? The AP Bill has brought into sharp focus the need for customer protection in four critical areas. First is pricing. Second is lender's liability whether the lender can give too much loan without assessing the customer's ability to pay. Third is the structure of loan repayment - whether you can ask money on a weekly basis from people who don't produce weekly incomes. Fourth is the practices that attend to how you deal with defaults. But the Act should have looked at the positive bene ts that institutions could bring in, and where they need to be regulated in the interests of the customers. It should have brought only those features in. Say, you want the recovery practices to be consistent with what the customers can really manage. If the customer is aggrieved and complains that somebody is harassing him, then those complaints should be investigated by the District Rural Development Authority. Instead what the Bill says is that MF1s cannot go to the customer's premises to ask for recovery and that all transactions will be done in the Panchayat of ce. With great dif culty, MFIs brought services to the door of people. It is such a relief for the customers not to be spending time out going to banks or Panchayat of ces, which could be 10 km away in some cases. A facility which has brought some relief to people is being shut. Moreover, you are practically telling the MFI where it should do business and how it should do it. Social responsibilities were inbuilt when the MIrls were rst conceived. If kills go for profit with loose regulations, how are they different from moneylenders? Even among moneylenders there are very good people who take care of the customer's circumstance, and there are really bad ones. A large number of the MF1s are good and there are some who are coercive because of the kind of prices and processes they have adopted. But Moneylenders never got this organised. They did not have such a large footprint. An MFI brought in organisation, it mobilized the equity, it brought in commercial funding. It invested in systems. It appointed a large number of people. But some of them exacted a much higher price than they should have. They wanted to break even very fast and greed did take over in some cases.Are the for-profit 'Ms the only ones harassing people for recoveries? Some not-for-profit out ts have also adopted the same kind of recovery methods. That may be because you have to show that you are very ef cient in your recovery methods and that your portfolio is of a very high quality if you want to get commercial funding from a bank. In fact, among for-profits there are many who have sensible recovery practices. Some have fortnightly recovery, some have monthly recovery. So we have differing practices. We just describe a few dominant ones and assume every for-profit MFI operates like that. How can you introduce regulations to ensure social upliftment in a sector that is moving towards for-profit models? I am not really concerned whether someone wants to make a profit or not The bottom-line for me is customer protection. The rst area is fair practices. Are you telling your customers how the loan is structured ? Are you being transparent about your performance? There should also be a lender's liability attached to what you do. Suppose you lend excessively to a customer without assessing their ability to service the loan, you have to take the hit. Then there's the question of limiting returns. You can say that an MFI cannot have a return on assets more than X, a return on equity of more than Y. Then suppose there is a privately promoted MFI, there should be a regulation to ensure the MFI cannot access equity markets till a certain amount of time. MFIs went to markets perhaps because of the need to grow too big too fast. The government thought they were making profit off the poor, and that's an indirect reason why they decided to clamp down on MF1s. If you say an MFI won't go to capital market, then it will keep political compulsions under rein.Which of the following best explains "structure of loan repayment" in this context of the rst question asked to the author ?...

MCQ->Climate change is a complex policy issue with major implications in terms of finance. All actions to address climate change ultimately involve costs. Funding is vital for countries like India to design and implement adaptation and mitigation plans and projects. Lack of funding is a large impediment to implementing adaptation plans. The scale and magnitude of the financial support required by developing countries to enhance their domestic mitigation and adaptation actions are a matter of intense debate in the multilateral negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)' The Convention squarely puts the responsibility for provision of financial support on the developed countries, taking into account their contribution to the stock of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere. Given the magnitude of the task and the funds required, domestic finances are likely to fall short of the current and projected needs of the developing countries. Global funding through the multilateral mechanism of the Convention will enhance their domestic capacity to finance the mitigation efforts. According to the passage, which of the following is/are a matter of intense debate in the multilateral negotiations under UNFCCC regarding the role of developing countries in climate change? 1. The scale and size of required financial support.2. The crop loss due to climate change in the developing countries.3. To enhance the mitigation and adaptation actions in the developing countries.Select the correct answer using the code given below:...

MCQ-> Since World War II, the nation-state has been regarded with approval by every political system and every ideology. In the name of modernisation in the West, of socialism in the Eastern bloc, and of development in the Third World, it was expected to guarantee the happiness of individuals as citizens and of peoples as societies. However, the state today appears to have broken down in many parts of the world. It has failed to guarantee either security or social justice, and has been unable to prevent either international wars or civil wars. Disturbed by the claims of communities within it, the nation-state tries to repress their demands and to proclaim itself as the only guarantor of security of all. In the name of national unity, territorial integrity, equality of all its citizens and non-partisan secularism, the state can use its powerful resources to reject the demands of the communities; it may even go so far as genocide to ensure that order prevails.As one observes the awakening of communities in different parts of the world, one cannot ignore the context in which identity issues arise. It is no longer a context of sealed frontiers and isolated regions but is one of integrated global systems. In a reaction to this trend towards globalisation, individuals and communities everywhere are voicing their desire to exist, to use their power of creation and to play an active part in national and international life.There are two ways in which the current upsurge in demands for the recognition of identities can be looked at. On the positive side, the efforts by certain population groups to assert their identity can be regarded as "liberation movements", challenging oppression and injustice. What these groups are doing - proclaiming that they are different, rediscovering the roots of their culture or strengthening group solidarity - may accordingly be seen as legitimate attempts to escape from their state of subjugation and enjoy a certain measure of dignity. On the downside, however, militant action for recognition tends to make such groups more deeply entrenched in their attitude and to make their cultural compartments even more watertight. The assertion of identity then starts turning into self-absorption and isolation, and is liable to slide into intolerance of others and towards ideas of "ethnic cleansing", xenophobia and violence.Whereas continuous variations among peoples prevent drawing of clear dividing lines between the groups, those militating for recognition of their group's identity arbitrarily choose a limited number of criteria such as religion, language, skin colour, and place of origin so that their members recognise themselves primarily in terms of the labels attached to the group whose existence is being asserted. This distinction between the group in question and other groups is established by simplifying the feature selected. Simplification also works by transforming groups into essences, abstractions endowed with the capacity to remain unchanged through time. In some cases, people actually act as though the group has remained unchanged and talk, for example, about the history of nations and communities as if these entities survived for centuries without changing, with the same ways of acting and thinking, the same desires, anxieties, and aspirations. Paradoxically, precisely because identity represents a simplifying fiction, creating uniform groups out of disparate people, that identity performs a cognitive function. It enables us to put names to ourselves and others, form some idea of who we are and who others are, and ascertain the place we occupy along with the others in the world and society. The current upsurge to assert the identity of groups can thus be partly explained by the cognitive function performed by identity. However, that said, people would not go along as they do, often in large numbers, with the propositions put to them, in spite of the sacrifices they entail, if there was not a very strong feeling of need for identity, a need to take stock of things and know "who we are", "where we come from", and "where we are going".Identity is thus a necessity in a constantly changing world, but it can also be a potent source of' violence and disruption. How can these two contradictory aspects of identity be reconciled? First, we must bear the arbitrary nature of identity categories in mind, not with a view to eliminating all forms of identification—which would be unrealistic since identity is a cognitive necessity—but simply to remind ourselves that each of us has several identities at the same time. Second, since tears of nostalgia are being shed over the past, we recognise that culture is constantly being recreated by cobbling together fresh and original elements and counter-cultures. There are in our own country a large number of syncretic cults wherein modern elements are blended with traditional values or people of different communities venerate saints or divinities of particular faiths. Such cults and movements are characterised by a continual inflow and outflow of members which prevent them from taking on a self-perpetuating existence of their own and hold out hope for the future, indeed, perhaps for the only possible future. Finally, the nation-state must respond to the identity urges of its constituent communities and to their legitimate quest for security and social justice. It must do so by inventing what the French philosopher and sociologist, Raymond Aron, called "peace through law". That would guarantee justice both to the state as a whole and its parts, and respect the claims of both reason and emotions. The problem is one of reconciling nationalist demands with the exercise of democracy.According to the author, happiness of individuals was expected to be guaranteed in the name of:
...

MCQ-> Governments looking for easy popularity have frequently been tempted into announcing giveaways of all sorts; free electricity, virtually free water, subsidized food, cloth at half price, and so on. The subsidy culture has gone to extremes. The richest farmers in the country get subsidized fertilizers. University education, typically accessed by the wealthier sections, is charged at a fraction of cost. Postal services are subsidized, and so are railway services. Bus fares cannot be raised to economical levels because there will be violent protest, so bus travel is subsidized too. In the past, price control on a variety of items, from steel to cement, meant that industrial consumer of these items got them at less than actual cost, while the losses of the public sector companies that produced them were borne by the taxpayer! A study done a few years ago, came to the conclusion that subsidies in the Indian economy total as much as 14.5 per cent of gross domestic product. At today's level, that would work out to about 1,50,000 crore. And who pay the bill? The theoryand the Political fiction on the basis of I which it is sold to unsuspecting votersis that subsidies go the poor. and are paid for by the rich. The fact is that most subsidies go the 'rich' (defined in the Indian context as those who are above the poverty line), and much of the tab goes indirectly to the poor. Because the hefty subsidy bill results in fiscal deficits, which in turn push up rates of inflationwhich, as everyone knows, hits the poor the hardest of all. That is why taxmen call inflation the most regressive form of taxation. The entire subsidy system is built on the thesis that people cannot help themselves, therefore governments must do so. That people cannot afford to pay for variety of goods and services, and therefore the government must step in. This thesis has been applied not just in the poor countries but in the rich ones as well; hence the birth of the welfare state in the west, and an almost Utopian social security system; free medical care, food aid, old age security, et.al. But with the passage of time, most of the wealthy nations have discovered that their economies cannot sustain this social safety net, which in fact reduces the desire among people to pay their own way, and takes away some of the incentive to work, in short, the bill was unaffordable, and their societies were simply not willing to pay. To the regret of many, but because of the laws of economies are harsh, most Western societies have been busy pruning the welfare bill. In India, the lessons of this experience over several decades, and in many countriesdo not seem to have been learnt. Or they are simply ignored in the pursuit of immediate votes. People who are promised cheap food or clothing do not in most cases look beyond the gift horsesto the question of who picks up the tab. The uproar over higher petrol, diesel and cooking gas prices ignored this basic question; if the user of cooking gas does not want to pay for its cost, who should pay? Diesel in the country is subsidised, and if the user of cooking gas does not want to pay for its full cost, who does he or she think should pay the balance of the cost? It is a simple question, nevertheless if remains unasked. The Deva Gowda government has shown some courage in biting the bullet when it comes to the price of petroleum products. But it has been bitten by much bigger subsidy bug. It wants to offer food at half its cost to everyone below the poverty line, supposedly estimated at some 380 million people. What will be the cost? And of course, who will pick up the tab? The Andhra Pradesh Government has been bankrupted by selling rice as 2 per kg. Should the Central Government be bankrupted too, before facing up to the question of what is affordable and what is not? Already, India is perennially short of power because the subsidy on electricity has bankrupted most electricity boards, and made private investment wary unless it gets all manner of state guarantees. Delhi's subsidised bus fares have bankrupted the Delhi Transport Corporation, whose buses have slowly disappeared from the capital's streets. It is easy to be soft and sentimental, by looking at programmes that will be popular. After all, who does not like a free lunch? But the evidence is surely mounting that the lunch isn't free at all. Somebody is paying the bill. And if you want to know who, take at the country's poor economic performance over the years. Which of the following should not be subsidised over the years ?
...