A legitimate and effective democracy is essential for sustainable economic and social development. This updated and expanded edition of "Democracies in Development: Politics and Reform in Latin America" analyzes the effects of institutions on the democratic process, identifies regional trends in...

This report examines the quality of public policies in Latin America and the Caribbean after more than a decade of political and economic reform. A wide variety of examples and case studies are presented in an analytical framework to help explain why policies that work in certain institutional...

This paper explores, both formally and empirically, the political accountability mechanisms that lie behind the varying levels of public corruption and of effective governance taking place across nations. The first section develops a principal-agent model in which good governance is a function...

Intended as a contribution to the discussion of the relevance of social capital and social cohesion to Latin American development, this paper treats the two as assets for development and the creation of welfare. The paper defines the concepts, including their uses and limitations, and analyzes...

This paper discusses the need for a Bank subnational development strategy. The subnational development strategy provides the Bank with a comprehensive framework to support borrowing member countries in their efforts to promote socioeconomic development through the devolution of responsibilities...

This report moves beyond the conventional scope of economics to examine three entrenched structural factors -demography, geography and institutions- that are closely connected to economic and social development. Historical in nature and slow to evolve, these variables are not always in the...

The Venezuelan experience in the 1980s is a particularly fertile ground for the analysis of negative shocks. Two large shocks took place under very different control regimes, thus highlighting the role the institutional setting plays in determining the response. Moreover, the experience can shed...

In this paper, social mobility is measured by looking at the extent to which family background determines socioeconomic success. Roughly speaking, social mobility can be measure by means of two distinct types of correlations: intergenerational correlations and sibling correlations.

This paper examines the impact of the availability of fiscal revenues from nonrenewable resources on other revenues of Latin American and Caribbean resource-exporting countries. It compares the performance of nonresource revenues in these countries to that in other countries in the region. The...

This paper studies the effect of government-backed partial credit guarantees on firms' performance. These guarantees are automatically granted to firms without enough collateral in order to lift their credit constraints. We put together a panel, covering the period 1997-2007, that combines data...