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THE fact that the forthcoming conference of the Library Association is to be held at Eastbourne this year should provide it with an additional official interest, as it is here that the Association Hon. Solicitor and Legal Adviser holds the important office of Town Clerk. Mr. Fovargue is the authority on Library Law in all its aspects, and is the author of several books on this important subject. We are particularly happy in being able to print an article from his pen in our special Conference number. The programme of the proceedings is by now, no doubt, in the hands of our readers, and will be found to be less crowded, but no less useful for that, than in previous years. Apart from the usual business programme, which should prove full of interest, the social side has been fully catered for and delightfully arranged. Several interesting motor trips are to take place, and delegates will be afforded an opportunity of enjoying the charms of the beautiful county of Sussex as well as those of one of our most favoured of seaside resorts.

Municipal financial decisions involve the interaction of political actors (including voters, elected officials, and bureaucrats) pursuing their own interests. Although voters should determine public choices through elected officials, bureaucrats have the incentives and may have the monopoly power to dominate the process. This study investigates the relationships among municipal spending, fiscal manipulation, and financial monitoring. Fiscal illusion (as measured by revenue complexity) is employed as an empirical surrogate for bureaucratic manipulation and it is hypothesized that financial audits are an effective monitoring technique for moderating possible bureaucratic manipulation. The results of the study suggest that expenditure levels are related to political power and that fiscal illusion is significant for explaining expenditure levels, especially for cities having qualified opinions. Weak support is provided for the hypothesis that the financial audit is a monitoring technique that may constrain bureaucratic overspending. These findings have important implications for both public administration and governmental accounting and suggest the need for further research on monitorig effectiveness.

This study aims to investigate the use of discretionary spending, especially by incumbents, to win the election and whether incumbents can take more advantage of such spending than the new local government heads. This study also examines the political monitoring effect in suppressing discretionary spending. By using panel regression on 225 local governments during 2013–2016, the results indicate that political motive positively affects discretionary spending proportion ahead of the election. Following the public choice theory that although local government heads act on the interests of voters, their primary motivation is personal interest. Incumbent’s victory does not affect total discretionary spending and the financial assistance expenditure/transfer but has a significant positive effect on grant and social assistance spending. It generally supports Corruption Eradication Commission’s allegations of “returning the favor” is carried out by elected heads in one year following the election. But, it shows that incumbents are more able to utilize grants and social assistance spending than the new local government heads. Political monitoring from the opposition party has proven to have a direct negative effect on discretionary spending proportion. Tracking of the one year after the election should be done to prevent misuse of discretionary spending for incumbent political interests. The results of this study are expected to provide input to regulators to develop more comprehensive regulation, for example, strict sanctions for violations related to accountability for the use of such funds to limit the opportunistic behavior of the local government heads.

Researcher Highlight: Dr. Carter G. Woodson (1875–1950)

OUR article on Colonial Libraries in the March issue has been much appreciated and has already led to a good deal of correspondence on the subject. A letter has reached us from Mr. H. Rutherford Purnell, of the Public Library of South Australia at Adelaide, which proves how very deeply he is interested in our affairs over here. We print it on another page and trust that somebody will take it upon themselves to answer his many queries in the same kindly spirit as they are asked.

Hoskin and Macve have suggested that the crucial discontinuity in accounting’s development over the last two centuries occurred with its use for disciplinary purposes at the Springfield Armory in the USA in the 1830s and 1840s. Questions the applicability of their thesis to Britain through an examination of the manuscript records of the Dowlais Iron Company. Determines that, at Dowlais, in the mid‐nineteenth century, the accounting system was used for administrative co‐ordination and managerial decision‐making purposes, but does not appear to have been used for purposes of labour discipline, even though this was a matter of concern. Suggests that the Dowlais management, through the use of other methods to counter indiscipline, was able to develop and utilize the accounting system in other ways; also suggests that accounting in Britain may have developed somewhat differently from that in the USA. Suggests that future research into the history of accounting needs to examine the possibility of separate development paths resulting from varying socio‐economic contexts in different countries.

This paper analyzes the impact of economic downturns on the revenue and expense sides of city financing for the period 2003 to 2009 using a convenience sample of the audited end of year financial reports for thirty midsized US cities. The analysis focuses on whether and how quickly and how extensively revenue and spending directions from past years are altered by recessions. A seven year series of Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) data serves to explore whether citiesʼ revenues and spending, especially the traditional property tax and core functions such as public safety and infrastructure withstood the brief 2001 and the persistent 2007 recessions? The findings point to consumption (spending) over stability (revenue minus expense) for the recession of 2007, particularly in 2008 and 2009.

The chapter examines and challenges the assumed necessity of a linkage between remembered series of exchanges, amicable social relations, and prestige found in the work of Marcel Mauss and many subsequent theorists of reciprocity and gift exchange.

The chapter uses the nearly 500 year history of the giving and taking of the Koh-i-noor Diamond by rulers of South and Central Asia, commencing with Babur, the first Mughal emperor, and ending with Queen Victoria, which includes some gift giving and much taking by force, to explore what happens when only two of the three elements Mauss assumed central to understanding gift exchange are present.

Based on a review of the historical material, the chapter demonstrates that though historical narratives or memories of exchanges were central to enhancing the prestige of the parties to the exchange and the diamond itself, that process could and did occur in the absence of any on-going amicable social relations, including in situations in which exchange or transfer of the diamond were coerced and nothing was given in return to the dispossessed former owner of the gem.

By suggesting an alternative configuration of the factors necessary for the association of exchange and prestige, the chapter provides the opportunity to reconsider assumptions common in the literature on gift exchange and further enhance our understanding of this central element of social theory.