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Drawing on the implications suggested by several recent studies in comparative public policy, this article examines the impact of the structure of intergovernmental relations on the patterns of distribution of educational funds. The fundamental hypothesis underlying this analysis is that differences in this structure, and in particular the distinction between federal and unitary systems of government, are systematically related to differences in distribution across and within nations. The variations in total educational allocations among eighteen nations in Europe and North America are considered in order to discover whether the aggregate funding of education, relative to a nation's wealth, is related to the structure of intergovernmental relations. Then, in a more intensive analysis, the international patterns of distribution are compared in four federal and four unitary systems. This analysis suggests that there is a significant difference between the two types of system in the degree to which educational policy outputs equalize the territorial disparities in wealth and effect a redistribution of funds within the nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several simple theories of government coalition formation are described and tested. A statistical method is presented for comparing the theories and evaluating each of them relative to a certain null hypothesis. The statistical tests are based upon the formation of 132 government coalitions in twelve countries of Western Europe during 1945-71. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies of European party systems have not taken into account fully the complexity and richness of party life on the continent. We need more multi-level, multi-dimensional analyses within a cross-national framework in order to obtain a more comprehensive picture of the relationships between parties, social structure and regimes. The discussion of some of the lacunae in the existing literature and of various ways of looking at political parties-emphasizes that because of the large number of alternative approaches available to the political sociologist, there is no single source of data, unit or level of analysis suitable for considering all facets of the subject. By crossing back and forth between levels or units of analysis, we may well gain in precision and detail what might be lost in methodological purity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the European Consortium for Political Research, which is centered on the establishment of infrastructures. Examples include summer schools, workshops and information exchanges. A comparison between the state of political research in the U.S. and Europe is described. For instance, in the U.S., a there is a wide spectrum of territory-wide professional journals, while in Europe, there is not a single journal cutting across the national boundaries. A newsletter, the "European Political Data" was published and organized into two sections, one for information on data and the other section is for developments in computing.