The study investigates the role of local democracies on deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. It is argued that the political left in Brazil, who have formed alliances with various workers' groups, are more likely to defend the environment and the indigenous people. This is because protecting...

This paper uses the roll out of different modes of public transport, especially new metro and train connections, in São Paulo Metropolitan Region (SPMR), one of the most crime-prone cities of the world and examine their impact on wide-ranging crime indices. We document that initial crime in...

Compulsory schooling laws (CSL) are often advocated for fighting crime. While this has generally worked for the US/Europe, it may not necessarily be the case. Exploiting the large exogenous variation in compulsory high schooling of 15-17 year olds introduced by the 2009 Brazilian Constitutional...

We examine if compulsory schooling laws (CSL) necessarily lower crimes. We focus on violent youth crime (homicides by assault and guns) among 15-19 years age group in all Brazilian municipalities over 2000-13, taking advantage of the 2009 Brazilian Constitutional Amendment that required...

We examine if compulsory schooling laws (CSL) necessarily lower crimes. We focus on violent youth crime (homicides by assault and guns) among 15-19 years age group in all Brazilian municipalities over 2000-13, taking advantage of the 2009 Brazilian Constitutional Amendment that required...

We examine if compulsory schooling laws (CSL) necessarily lower crimes. We focus on violent youth crime (homicides by assault and guns) among 15-19 years age group in all Brazilian municipalities over 2000-13, taking advantage of the 2009 Brazilian Constitutional Amendment that required...

We evaluate the success of Brazil's Corregedoria-Geral da União's (CGU) anti-corruption program in fostering better outcomes in the health sector using panel data from 5560 Brazilian municipalities over the period from 2000 to 2011. Since 2003, the program has randomly selected municipalities...