Seid Hassan | Murray State University (original) (raw)

Papers by Seid Hassan

Economics and Political Studies, 2019

In 2001, Ethiopia established a centralised anti-corruption agency (ACA), the Federal Ethics and ... more In 2001, Ethiopia established a centralised anti-corruption agency (ACA), the Federal Ethics and Anti-corruption Commission (FEACC), purportedly to be used for curbing the rampant corruption. By the government’s repeated admissions, corruption continues to engulf the country, indicating the failure of the FEACC to curb corruption. Various researchers attribute the FEACC’s failures to curb corruption to a host of reasons. This article follows a different route to show why the FEACC was doomed to fail from the outset. We show that the war against corruption in Ethiopia collapsed mainly because of mischaracterisation of the nature of corruption in the country and how the FEACC was established – a conventional anti-corruption agency for a nonconventional problem of corruption. We deploy some testable hypotheses to explore the scenarios under which an anticorruption agency would be effective. Drawing from the corruption literature of post-communist countries, the article shows that corrupt Ethiopian practices can easily be subsumed under an extreme version of the highest form of corruption known as state capture. The article then moves onto unpacking the systemic and predatory nature of the Ethiopian corruption conundrum and how the FEACC approached in tackling it. Doing so allows us to illustrate the endogenous nature of the country’s corruption patterns and why a traditional ACA is incapable of tackling a state-driven patronage. It also lays out the flawed structures and practices of the FEACC showing why, under a state-crafted corruption conundrum, the FEACC was doomed to fail from the start. The article concludes by illustrating the detrimental effects of using the agency as a political weapon to neutralise the ruling party’s political opponents as well as the failure of the war against corruption. It calls for a different approach in combating the Ethiopian systemic corruption, a governance regime change being one of them.

Keywords: Corruption, state capture, administrative corruption, post-communist transition, anti-corruption agency, principal-agent theory

Ethiopian E Journal For Research and Innovation Foresight, Oct 25, 2010

Abstract: Thinking education could boost their economic well-being, many Sub-Saharan nations (in ... more Abstract: Thinking education could boost their economic well-being, many Sub-Saharan nations (in collaboration with multinational and bilateral donors), have devoted, and continue to devote a lot of treasure and effort towards education. Despite the huge sums of government ...

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captur... more This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captured nature of foreign aid in Ethiopia and its use of something other than development: penetrate households at the individual level and control them. The paper establishes that, by creating opportunities to the highly organized groups and elites, donor aid has led to a legacy of corruption, maladministration, cruelty, brutality, money laundering and the establishment of a ruthless oligarchy in Ethiopia. I show that the type of corruption which has transpired in Ethiopia is the strongest and highest form of corruption known as State Capture, a severe form of corruption that is observed in transition (formerly communist) countries. The work also shows how, when it comes to Ethiopia, donor aid has poisoned the wells with deep corruption and, by implication, it also the unholy alliance between donor aid and corruption and donor aid and tyranny. The paper documents how various powerful ethnic, social, personal, regional, political and economic groups in Ethiopia are able to extract aid-related rents and use them for their own political survival and hegemony. The paper also goes further to show that misusing and abusing of foreign aid by the TPLF/EPRDF is a learned behavior it acquired when it was a guerrilla force. This case study shows that development aid has been overwhelmingly captured by the ruling elites in Ethiopia and consequently, those who are able to capture the foreign aid resources have used the same resources as tools of control and repression. In addition to foreign aid being used to finance repression, it has exacerbated the extent and level of the income gaps between the haves and the have-nots while at the same time increasing the vulnerabilities of the poor. Such a scenario and the increased level of rent-seeing that one finds in the country indicates that foreign aid has undermined governance in the country. By exploring the heavy handed use of development aid by the ruling party and the culpability of donors and aid agencies, the paper provides analytical support behind the connection of aid and corruption, aid and extraction of rents and the type of corruption that one finds in the country. Humanitarian aid was both the motive and the means for the TPLF and other Ethiopian rebel forces expand their war-making business and set the stage for state capture. It is now donor (official) aid which is being used for forced relocations, has been a vehicle for deep-rooted cancer of corruption and used for a multitude of sinister purposes. The paper concludes, therefore, that development aid has led to a retrogress and curse and both Ethiopia and its people would have been better off without foreign aid than with it. http://www.nesglobal.org/eejrif4/eejrif-v-5-1-13.php. JEL Classification: D82, D74, F35, H84

Southern Economic Journal, 1996

... PRIMER ON COINTEGRATION WITH AN APPLICATION TO MONEY AND INCOME David A. Dickey, Dennis W. Ja... more ... PRIMER ON COINTEGRATION WITH AN APPLICATION TO MONEY AND INCOME David A. Dickey, Dennis W. Jansen and Daniel L. Thornton ... We are grateful to Dr. Giovanna Davitti, Commissioning Editor of the Macmillan Press, for her encouragement, patience and guidance ...

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

Southern Economic Journal, 1996

Fiscal deficits were at the forefront of macroeconomic adjustment in the 1980s, in both developin... more Fiscal deficits were at the forefront of macroeconomic adjustment in the 1980s, in both developing and industrial countries. They were blamed in large part for the assortment of ills that beset developing countries during the decade: overindebtedness, leading to the debt ...

This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captur... more This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captured nature of foreign aid in Ethiopia and its use of something other than development: penetrate households at the individual level and control them. The paper establishes that, by creating opportunities to the highly organized groups and elites, donor aid has led to a legacy of corruption, maladministration, cruelty, brutality, money laundering and the establishment of a ruthless oligarchy in Ethiopia. I show that the type of corruption which has transpired in Ethiopia is the strongest and highest form of corruption known as State Capture. The work also shows how, when it comes to Ethiopia, donor aid has poisoned the wells with deep corruption and, by implication, the unholy alliance between donor aid and corruption and donor aid and tyranny. The paper documents how various powerful ethnic, social, personal, regional, political and economic groups in Ethiopia are able to extract rents and use them for their own political survival and hegemony. The paper also goes further to show that misusing and abusing of foreign aid by the TPLF/EPRDF is a learned behavior it acquired when it was a guerrilla force. This case study shows that development aid has been overwhelmingly captured by the ruling elites in Ethiopia and consequently, those who are able to capture the foreign aid resources using them as tools of control and repression. In addition to foreign aid being used to finance repression, it has exacerbated the extent and level of the income gaps between the haves and the have-nots while at the same time increasing the vulnerabilities of the poor. Such a scenario and the increased level of rent-seeing that one finds in the country indicates that foreign aid has undermined governance in the country. By exploring the heavy handed use of development aid by the ruling party and the culpability of donors and aid agencies, the paper provides analytical support behind aid and corruption, aid and extraction of rents and the type of corruption that one finds in the country. The paper concludes development aid has been a curse and both Ethiopia and its people would have been better off without foreign aid than with it. http://www.nesglobal.org/eejrif4/eejrif-v-5-1-13.php. JEL Classification: D82, D74, F35, H84

In both theory and practice, pull and push factors drive migrants out of their own countries of o... more In both theory and practice, pull and push factors drive migrants out of their own countries of origin. The factors are complex but they are in general categorized as: (a) demand-pull factors, represented by better economic opportunities and jobs in the host (new) country; (b) supply-push factors, represented by the lack of economic opportunities, jobs, and economic downturns, political oppressions, abuses of human rights by home country governments, religious intolerance (constraints), war, conflict and insecurity in the home country; (c) mediating factors that accelerate or constrain migration which may include the existence or prevalence of opportunities available to human smugglers, fly by night recruitment agencies, registered recruitment agencies operating within the legal system and government policies encouraging/incentivizing citizens to migrate; and (d) social network (pull) factors such as the existence of relatives, friends and acquaintances in host countries, available opportunities for family unifications in host countries, and success stories of diaspora migrants. The role played by each of these factors and their relative importance and dynamics depend on the economic, political, societal conditions and geographical proximity between the home, transit and destination countries.

International Journal of Green Energy, 2012

The sensitivity of various solar photovoltaic technologies to dust, temperature, and relative hum... more The sensitivity of various solar photovoltaic technologies to dust, temperature, and relative humidity is investigated for Doha's environment. Results obtained show that monocrystalline photovoltaics (PVs) have efficiencies as high as 85% compared to 70% for amorphous ones. Also, dust accumulation degrades more critically the efficiency of amorphous and monocrystalline silicon PVs than the panel's temperature or relative humidity. In addition, the results show that amorphous PVs are more affected by temperature and relative humidity than monocrystalline PVs. However, amorphous PVs prove to be more robust against dust settlement than monocrystalline PVs and hence are more suitable for implementation in desert climates like Doha unless cleaning strategies are devised. It was estimated that 100 days of dust accumulation over monocrystalline PV panels, caused the efficiency to decrease by around 10%. This limitation makes solar PVs to represent an unreliable source of power for unattended or remote devices and thus strongly suggests the challenge of cleaning the panel's surface regularly or injecting technical modifications. Furthermore, the study suggests operating solar PV plants in Doha from 11:00 am to 02:00 pm to optimize production.

Background: Evidence suggests that n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) are beneficial for main... more Background: Evidence suggests that n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) are beneficial for maintenance of bone health and possibly bone development.

The results of this paper show that per capita income disparities rose in the U.S. in the last tw... more The results of this paper show that per capita income disparities rose in the U.S. in the last twenty years. We calculated per capita income by major components and industry sectors to account for the disparities. The Wage and Salary Disbursements and the Dividend, Interest, and Rental Income of Persons contribute to increased income disparities while the Transfer Income and

Thinking education could boost their economic well-being, many Sub-Saharan nations (and Internati... more Thinking education could boost their economic well-being, many Sub-Saharan nations (and International organizations such as the World Bank and the United Nations) have devoted a substantial portion of their government funds towards education. Despite the huge sums of government funds allocated to education, these countries still languish in their ability to catch up with the rest of the world. In the professional literature, there is a lack of empirical consensus about the impact of education on economic growth. That is, several studies have indicated a lack of positive association between economic growth and the rate of growth of education (human capital) measured using alternative methods. This lack of consensus applies to Sub-Saharan Africa as well. In this paper, we test the hypothesis that education has a positive impact on growth but with significant country variation. Using crosssection panel data regression, we find positive correlations between growth and various definitions of human capital.

Economics and Political Studies, 2019

Keywords: Corruption, state capture, administrative corruption, post-communist transition, anti-corruption agency, principal-agent theory

Ethiopian E Journal For Research and Innovation Foresight, Oct 25, 2010

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

Southern Economic Journal, 1996

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

Southern Economic Journal, 1996

This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captur... more This article exclusively focuses on theme-based (sector-based) development aid to show the captured nature of foreign aid in Ethiopia and its use of something other than development: penetrate households at the individual level and control them. The paper establishes that, by creating opportunities to the highly organized groups and elites, donor aid has led to a legacy of corruption, maladministration, cruelty, brutality, money laundering and the establishment of a ruthless oligarchy in Ethiopia. I show that the type of corruption which has transpired in Ethiopia is the strongest and highest form of corruption known as State Capture. The work also shows how, when it comes to Ethiopia, donor aid has poisoned the wells with deep corruption and, by implication, the unholy alliance between donor aid and corruption and donor aid and tyranny. The paper documents how various powerful ethnic, social, personal, regional, political and economic groups in Ethiopia are able to extract rents and use them for their own political survival and hegemony. The paper also goes further to show that misusing and abusing of foreign aid by the TPLF/EPRDF is a learned behavior it acquired when it was a guerrilla force. This case study shows that development aid has been overwhelmingly captured by the ruling elites in Ethiopia and consequently, those who are able to capture the foreign aid resources using them as tools of control and repression. In addition to foreign aid being used to finance repression, it has exacerbated the extent and level of the income gaps between the haves and the have-nots while at the same time increasing the vulnerabilities of the poor. Such a scenario and the increased level of rent-seeing that one finds in the country indicates that foreign aid has undermined governance in the country. By exploring the heavy handed use of development aid by the ruling party and the culpability of donors and aid agencies, the paper provides analytical support behind aid and corruption, aid and extraction of rents and the type of corruption that one finds in the country. The paper concludes development aid has been a curse and both Ethiopia and its people would have been better off without foreign aid than with it. http://www.nesglobal.org/eejrif4/eejrif-v-5-1-13.php. JEL Classification: D82, D74, F35, H84

International Journal of Green Energy, 2012