The Fast Plasma Investigation (FPI) was developed for flight on the Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission to measure the differential directional flux of magnetospheric electrons and ions with unprecedented time resolution to resolve kinetic-scale plasma dynamics. This increased resolution has been accomplished by placing four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for electrons and four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for ions around the periphery of each of four MMS spacecraft. Using electrostatic fieldof-view deflection, the eight spectrometers for each species together provide 4pi-sr field-ofview with, at worst, 11.25-degree sample spacing. Energy/charge sampling is provided by swept electrostatic energy/charge selection over the range from 10 eV/q to 30000 eV/q. The eight dual spectrometers on each spacecraft are controlled and interrogated by a single block redundant Instrument Data Processing Unit, which in turn interfaces to the observatory's Instrument Suite Central Instrument Data Processor. This paper describes the design of FPI, its ground and in-flight calibration, its operational concept, and its data products.

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Studies of state fiscal and budgetary policies often use balanced budget requirements (BBRs) as explanatory variables. While current measures laid the crucial groundwork for a basic understanding of state BBRs, their lack of comprehensiveness threatens the validity of empirical work. Based on comprehensive legal research, this article offers a framework for analyzing state requirements: each state's BBRs form a coherent system for achieving budget balance through budget cycles; a fully developed BBR system offers a three‐line construct against imbalance; and the more complete, developed, and explicit a BBR system is, the more stringent it will be in achieving budgetary balance.

Fiscal transparency and citizen participation in budgeting processes are widely promoted as means toward the ends of democratic accountability and responsiveness in the allocation and use of public funds. In the past decade, academics and practitioners enthusiastic about e-government have emphasized the potential for using information technology to enhance democratic governance. Putting these two streams of public administration theory and practice together, the authors developed criteria for assessing e-budgeting efforts and applied them to a sample of Web sites operated by state and local governments. Although practitioners are ahead of academics in exploring the potential of e-government for improving fiscal accountability and responsiveness, practice lags behind the relevant basic recommendations of the Government Finance Officers Association. This finding leads to research and practice agendas aimed at enhancing the use of egovernment to enhance fiscal transparency and participation.

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Budgeting, Institutions, Fiscal policy, Balanced budget requirements, H7, H71, H72,

Economic theory suggests that it is optimal for governments to use precautionary saving as a countercyclical tool. However, the availability of surplus funds often triggers political pressure for tax cuts and spending increases. Mechanisms for alleviating that pressure include limiting the transparency of slack resources and limiting politicians' discretion to use slack resources for purposes other than stabilization. Th is article investigates the extent to which these two mechanisms are substitutes. In particular, the authors examine whether the widespread adoption of budget stabilization funds (BSFs) in the U.S. states over the past several decades has been accompanied by a decline in conservative revenue forecast bias. Using panel data from 47 states over a 22-year period, they fi nd that the adoption of a BSF reduces revenue underestimation by approximately two-thirds; however, the size of the eff ect depends in part on how much a state saves in the BSF and the rules governing BSF deposits and withdrawals. Th e results suggest that BSFs have the unintended eff ect of increasing fi scal transparency.

This study tests the effects of balanced budget requirements on three measures of state expenditure using data on 48 states for the years 1950–2004. We find that the following rules are effective in constraining expenditures: (1) requiring that the governor submits a balanced budget; (2) placing controls on supplemental appropriations; and (3) prohibiting the carry‐over of a deficit from one fiscal year or biennium into the next. The latter two rules exert larger individual effects than the first. All else equal, states can best improve their prospects of reigning in spending by instituting technical rules that govern budgetary outcomes, as opposed to political rules that dictate how the budget is assembled and approved.