While output declined in virtually all transition economies in the initial years, the speed and extent of the recovery that followed has varied widely across these countries. The contrast between the more and less successfull transitions, the latter largely in former Soviet Union, raises many...

The curse of natural resources is a well-documented phenomenon in developing countries: Economies that are richly endowed with natural resources tend to grow slowly. Among the transition economies of the former "Eastern Bloc", a similar pattern can be observed. In the first years of transition,...

"This paper investigates the relationship between the size of interest groups in terms of voter representation and the interest group's campaign contributions to politicians. We uncover a robust hump-shaped relationship between the voting share of an interest group and its contributions to a...