Present public policy in Britain towards the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) funding is unusual if not exceptional; first because the funding is earmarked and second because no other area of medicine receives such high levels of resources. This paper examines the cause of AIDS and the likely trend of new cases and hence future resource demands upon the NHS. This paper offers four explanations for massive ‘ring-fenced’ AIDS expenditure of public revenue. The distribution to and allocation of those monies by Regional Health Authorities is analysed. It concludes that there is very little rationale for this, especially when alternative uses of funds are considered. Furthermore the politics of incrementalism indicates that what has already become a major misuse of public funds is likely to continue in the foreseeable future.

Since day-to-day implementation of exchange-rate policy has been neglected in the literature on international monetary relations, U.S. and Japanese intervention policies in the post-Bretton Woods period are analyzed. The determinants of Japanese intervention policy are clearly identified: international coordination and U.S. intervention increase the amount of Japanese intervention. A strong tendency to ‘lean against the wind’ and some indication of ‘beggar-thy-neighbour’ policy exist as well. On the other hand, U.S. intervention policy is more elusive. There is some evidence, however, that Japanese and German intervention as well as the Louvre Accord and Democratic administrations led to larger amounts of U.S. intervention. Some interpretations are offered as to why it is difficult to unravel U.S. policy.

The analysis of European integration has tended to use a toolkit drawn from international relations. But since the revival of integration in the mid-1980s, the governance of the European Community and European Union has increasingly come to resemble that of a multi-tiered state. Accordingly, this article analyzes the governance of the European Union from a comparative public policy perspective. Using new or historical institutionalism, three levels are considered. In the first part, attention is focused on the EU's institutions and the available instruments of governance. The second part examines the analysis of governance at the policy-specific or sub-system level, and puts forward an approach based on governance regimes. The final part considers the institutional roots of the persistent, regulatory character of governance in the European Union.

Securing the personal safety of citizens has traditionally been a state monopoly. However, increased fear of crime and victimization has produced individual and community actions to secure personal safety. This paper discusses the emergence and development of the community-initiated ‘Civil Guard’ in Israel, a sweeping movement which emerged in 1974 from a growing fear of terrorism. This grass roots initiative has raised government's concern over its ability to monitor, inspect and control the volunteers. The national police has co-opted the entire movement in three phases. In the first, a spontaneous emergence of self-help initiatives covered the country. Next, the movement was transformed into a national body of volunteers with a clear legal status, albeit under the complicated and joint auspices of the national police and local government. Finally the national police force co-opted the ‘Civil Guard’ into auxiliary units. What began as a neighborhood-based, self-help initiative was molded into a quasi-governmental, police-oriented voluntary organization.