Acronyms for groups of countries provide an often useful shorthand to capture emergent similarities, and terms such as PIIGS, BRICs and LDCs pervade the lexicon of international and comparative political economy. But they can also lead to misleading narratives, since the grounds for use of these terms as heuristic devices are usually not well elaborated. This can become problematic when the use of such heuristics drives market responses in areas such as risk perception and changes in interest rates. In this paper we look at the narrative construction of the group of countries that has been grouped as 'PIIGS' (Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, and Spain).We examine the process whereby the group came into being, trace how Ireland became a member of this grouping, and assess the merits of classifying these countries together. Our contention is that the repetition of the acronym in public debate shaped the behaviour of market
State institutions mediate the challenges of globalization for the domestic political community: the concerns of specialists in comparative politics and in public administration are increasingly converging round an interest in the nature and functioning of state institutions. This paper draws on preliminary findings from a time‐series database of national‐level political institutions in Ireland to track continuity and change in state functions through analysis of state agencies. It also identifies four modes of state action: developmental, regulatory, adjudicatory, and moral advocacy, each of which has a traditional and a modern manifestation. While the first two modes are familiar in comparative context, the latter two are likely to merit further analysis cross‐nationally.
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