Effective property rights protection plays a fundamental role in promoting economic performance. Yet measurement problems make the relationship between property rights and entrepreneurship an ambiguous issue. As an advancement on previous research in this paper we propose a new approach to the...

The transition paths from plan to market have varied markedly across countries. Central and Eastern European and the Baltic countries, which opted for a fast and profound transformation of their institutions, rapidly narrowed the productivity gap with advanced economies. In contrast, in...

For much of the second half of the twentieth century, labour productivity grew rapidly in most OECD economies, fuelled by the adoption of a large stock of unexploited existing technologies. However, the slowdown in productivity growth over the past decade underscores the idea that as economies...

This paper develops and applies a simple “conditional growth” framework to make long-term GDP projections for the world economy, taking as a starting point recent empirical evidence about the importance of total factor productivity and human capital in explaining current cross-country...

Following Fukuyama's (2001) postulation for future research in economic development, this paper examines the cultural hypothesis regarding national economic prosperity. Culture is found to affect economic performance through two channels; cultural traits that stimulate individual motivation, and...

The role of institutions in economic growth has recently begun to receive greater attention in academic circles. Although the impact of institutions has been acknowledged by most, definitive conclusions still remain a question, particularly given the problem of endogeneity. We use panel least...

We present a tractable stochastic endogenous growth model that explains how social capital influences economic development. In our model, social capital increases citizens' awareness of government activity. Hence, it alleviates the electoral incentives to under-invest in education, whose returns...

This paper provides a survey of the economic literature relevant to social instability in China and moulds it into an argument. The objective is to offer a fresh view of economic policy and performance through the lens of the threat posed by social instability. This is a concept that economists...

China's economic reforms have resulted in spectacular growth and poverty reduction. However, China's institutions look ill-suited to achieve such a result, and they indeed suffer from serious shortcomings. To solve the "China puzzle," this paper analyzes China's institution—a regionally...

A behavioral political economy framework is built on the basis of prospect theory to explain the induced and imposed institutional changes during China's market reform, giving special attention to the integrated effects of economic and political institutions. According to prospect theory, how...