The relationship between economic and political liberalization has received a great deal of attention lately, yet the possibility of a non-linear relationship and the role of reversals remain largely neglected. Focusing on democratization and financial reform, this paper offers evidence for a...

President Putin's reassertion of state control over more and more of the economy combined with his radical reversal of many of the country's political reforms is ominous. Correcting for some of the political and economic excesses of the original reforms is all to the good, but unless he can do...

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...

President Putin’s reassertion of state control over more and more of the economy combined with his radical reversal of many of the country’s political reforms is ominous. Correcting for some of the political and economic excesses of the original reforms is all to the good, but unless he can do...

International capital flows from rich to poor countries can be regarded as either too small (the Lucas paradox in a one-sector model) or too large (when compared with the logic of factor price equalization in a two-sector model). To resolve the paradoxes, we introduce a non-neo-classical model...

It is often argued that countries with a high population share of children and young workers should attract large capital inflows from aging industrialized economies. However, many of these countries deter foreign investors by a high risk of creeping or outright expropriation. In this paper we...

This paper develops a unified framework to analyze the dynamics of firm investment in countries with poor legal enforcement. The firm's technology edge over the government generates endogenous property rights. Industry variation in the technology gap predicts a sectoral pecking-order of...