This paper develops a political economy model of multiple unemployment equilibria to provide a theory of an endogenous natural rate of unemployment. This model is applied to the UK and the US interwar period which is remembered as the decade of mass unemployment. The theory here sees the natural...

This paper is a first attempt to garner the theory and evidence on the political economy of the first wave of financial liberalisation during the nineteenth and early twentieth century, and of its demise after World War I.  Not everyone gained from the process of globalisation (of trade,...

The recent theoretical literature on the determinants of trade agreements has stressed the importance of political gains, such as credibility, as a rationale for trade agreements. The empirical literature, however, has lagged behind in the estimation of the economic gains or losses associated...

This paper explores an oil discovery natural experiment to assess the role of natural resources in determining corruption. We argue that an anticipated oil boom may increase corruption by boosting the value attributed by an elite to being in power when the actual oil exploration begins. We test...

Vote buying is a frequent practice during election time in many parts of the world. But no research has been done to quantify its effects on voters` electoral behavior. To address this challenge, we have designed and conducted a randomized experiment during the presidential elections of July...

Immigration is one of the most hotly debated policy issues in the United States today. Despite marked divergence of opinions within political parties, several important immigration reforms were introduced in the post 1965 era. The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the drivers of...

This paper proposes a dynamic politico-economic theory of fiscal policy in a world comprising a set of small open economies, whose driving force is the intergenerational conflict over debt, taxes, and public goods. Subsequent generations of voters choose fiscal policy through repeated elections....