There are still a number of UN arms embargoes in place to prevent the flow of arms and military material into conflict zones. Although the UN Security Council is not generally deadlocked on this issue, it has only taken relevant decisions to re-design the embargoes in a few cases over the last...

We examine two factors that help explain the prevalence of conflict in low-income countries: that adversaries cannot enforce long-term contracts in arms, and that open conflict alters the future strategic positions of the adversaries differently than does peace. Using an infinite horizon model,...

Donor reactions to recent settlements of internal conflicts have been highly diverse, in terms of both overall aid and its sectoral composition. The allocation of post-conflict aid tends to be needs-based by favoring particularly poor countries. There is no conclusive evidence, however, that the...

Recent research undertaken by the Bank and others, suggest that developing countries face substantially higher risks of violent conflict, and poor governance if highly dependent on primary commodities. Revenues from the legal, or illegal exploitation of natural resources have financed...

Does development aid attract FDI in post-conflict countries? This paper contributes to the growing literature on effects of aid and on determinants of FDI by explaining how development aid in low-information environments is a signal that can attract investment. Before investing abroad, firms...

Aid is still an important feature of the development landscape. Fragile states, in particular, have the greatest development needs but due to their poor governance they are the least likely countries to use aid effectively to meet their development challenges. In this paper, we explore which...

Air pollution has become an increasingly prominent and essential global challenge over the decades. However, the domestic political effects of air pollution have often been neglected. This study empirically tests the causal relationship and deep-seated mechanisms between air pollution and...