IASPS

Quarterly Report
Fall 2000

The Best Come to IASPS for an Education

Comments of the President

The Director's Column

IASPS Debuts New-Look Website

The Internet/Telcom Corner

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Vol. 10, No.1 Fall 2000

The Best Come to IASPS for an Education

One after another the new IASPS Koret Fellows walked upstairs at IASPS-Jerusalem to meet Program Director Zev Golan, as the first week of the IASPS Economic Policy Seminar drew to a close.

"I don't want this to sound like hype," says Golan, "so I am going to be precise. Of the nine students I interviewed, five began before I could even speak, by asking permission to tell me how much they are enjoying the program - as two of them said, 'more and more every day.' The other four opened by telling me how much they were learning from the program - one woman put it this way: 'I am asking so many questions because I have never heard economics taught in this way before, with freedom at the center.'"

Indeed, when Golan asked the class, during a recess in one lecture, how many were familiar with Hayek, none of these Israeli postgraduates in economics had ever even heard of him or the Austrian school of economics. Golan tried a different tack, but none knew who Ayn Rand was, either. Marx, they had studied; Keynes, they had all read.

The Fellowship Program is undergoing many changes this year. First, the Class of 2001 consists entirely of first-year Fellows, nine new students who have come to IASPS for training and hands-on practice in economic policy research. Second, two former Fellows - two of the most impressive of all the former Fellows - have returned to IASPS as Teaching Fellows. Bar Dadon and Amir Etzioni, along with former "mentor" to the Institute Fellows, Yossi Laster, are now lecturing during an intensive two-month seminar. As Etzioni says, "I am teaching the new Fellows what I learned in my three years at IASPS. This will give them a tremendous head start as they begin their research and set out to research policy reform in the Knesset."

Etzioni served for three years, during his Institute Fellowship, with Knesset Member Mickey Eitan. Etzioni published three Policy Studies at IASPS: on the Israeli government-backed cement monopoly, on how to reform Israeli ports, and on the government-imposed impediments to Internet development in Israel.

During her Fellowship, Bar Dadon provided economic policy research to the Prime Minister's Office, to Industry and Trade Minister Natan Sharansky, and to Communications Minister Limor Livnat. She, too, published three Policy Studies at IASPS: on the need to reform Israel's auto insurance industry, which is currently dominated by a state-authorized monopoly, on public housing, and on the need for taking economic considerations into account in the army reserves. Just this week, Dadon was invited to explain to the head of army reserve manpower, how to implement her economic policy recommendations.

Both Dadon and Etzioni are using their personal experiences in the world of Israeli economics to highlight the lessons they are teaching the new Fellows. Etzioni is discussing the behavior of state monopolies based on his research into the cement monopoly; Dadon is using insights she gained into the over-regulation of the communications sector to explain how governments can stifle the private sector and prevent the development of markets. Both plan on involving the Fellows in their courses: The students will be given assignments and are expected to complete mini-research projects, for presentation before the entire class.

Yossi Laster is teaching the basics of policy research, using the Israeli economy as a model. "I plan to explode the myths they have grown up with. Our first session," Laster notes, "focused for instance on the Histadrut. Israelis are taught that the Histadrut is a benevolent labor union, similar to ones in other countries, that actually helped build the country and that looks out for the interests of the average worker. I am showing them the damage the Histadrut has caused from the very beginning, how there is nothing even closely similar to it in any other country including the extinct Soviet Union, and that even the devil can quote the Bible and make it sound like he is doing something holy as he undermines everything."

Golan meanwhile, has been assigning the new Fellows to Knesset members, for whom they will provide policy research over the next year. This year, the following Knesset members have asked for and received IASPS Koret Fellows: Minister of Labor Raanan Cohen; Natan Sharansky; Eliezer Moody Zandberg; Rabbi Moshe Gafny; Nissim Dehan; Nahum Langenthal; Silvan Shalom; Limor Livnat; and Zippi Livni.
This group of Knesset members includes one sitting minister of labor, and former ministers of interior, trade, communications, and science; former deputy ministers of finance and defense; a former director of the Transportation Ministry; and a former director of the state's privatization efforts. "This is one of the most high-powered groups of MKs we have ever worked with," notes Golan. "The MKs are going to have their eyes opened by the Fellows," Golan states. "And the Fellows are going to have their eyes opened by the Teaching Fellows. By the end of this calendar year, the MKs will be exploring policy reforms they did not have the time or staff for until now; and the Fellows will be deep into research projects at a level they have not till now been trained to do." And, Golan adds, "all the Fellows will know who Hayek is."

Also in this issue:

Florida
Robert J. Loewenberg on the meaning of the battle for Florida's votes.

Shohat Wants New Taxes
Alvin Rabushka on the Finance Minister's New Old Idea

The New Website
Fred Cedoz on the Institute's New-Look Website

Mastering the Art of NBNs
The Institute's Internet-based approach to getting the facts out