Tax incentives can be a useful tool to stimulate investment in developing countries. However, in these countries interest groups often are able to exert considerable influence in its management, if not its design. From a power-based approach to the political economy of tax reform we find how...

The role and influence of the finance minister within the cabinet are discussed with increasing prominence in the theoretical literature on the political economy of budget deficits. It is generally assumed that the spending ministers can enhance their reputation purely with new or more extensive...

Property taxes are generally considered by economists to be good taxes, and many countries are being advised to increase and improve their property taxes. In practice, however, property tax reforms have often proved to be difficult to carry out successfully. This paper discusses why property...

This paper analyses the Policy-Making Process (PMP) of transport infrastructure projects in Colombia for the period 2002-10. It aims to identify the main bottlenecks to improve the implementation of public policies in the main phases of the transport infrastructure policy cycle, namely planning,...

Tax incentives can be a useful tool to stimulate investment in developing countries. However, in these countries interest groups often are able to exert considerable influence in its management, if not its design. From a power-based approach to the political economy of tax reform we find how...

This paper studies the interaction between different actors in the policy-making process of fiscal transfer reform in Colombia. To analyse this reform, we use the “life cycle of reform” framework. In that context, we follow critical phases in the reform process: planning, dialogue and...

This paper contributes to literature on the process of reform in Latin America. We study political economy aspects and the policy making process of reforms in what we identify as the five critical steps through the "life cycle" of a policy reform: the Planning, Dialogue, Adoption,...

What drives governments with similar revenues to provide very different amounts of goods with private sector substitutes? Education is a prime example. I use exogenous shocks to Brazilian municipalities' revenue during 1995–2008 generated by non-linearities in federal transfer laws to...

This chapter surveys research on the demand for protectionism as well as theoretical and empirical work on the (i) electoral mechanisms, the (ii) lobbying institutions, and the (iii) legislative bargaining that affect its supply. A recent trend is mutual feedbacks between commercial policy on...