The largest fresh meat brand names in Spain are analyzed here to study how quality is signaled in agribusiness and how the underlying quality -assurance organizations work. Results show, first, that organizational form varies according to the specialization of the brand name. Publicly-controlled...

Competitividad comparada del sector granívoro español en el marco de la Unión Europea. Referencia específica a Cataluña. El sector granívoro, y especialmente el porcino, ha sido un recurso de intensificación en regiones con escasez de SAU y que poseen suelos pobres para el cultivo....

This chapter proposes two hypotheses on the publicity requirement and the limitations of possession to provide information for legal titling. It then tests these hypotheses by examining how legal systems deal with possession in movable and immovable property, and comparing actual and documentary...

Adopting a simplistic view of Coase (1960), most economic analyses of property rights disregard both the key advantage that legal property rights (that is, in rem rights) provide to rightholders in terms of enhanced enforcement, and the difficulties they pose to acquirers in terms of information...

Governments and international development agencies often fail in their efforts to build and reform property and company registries. They implement misguided policies rooted in a poor understanding of the role that registries play in the modern economy. This work aims to remedy this situation by...

Most economic interactions happen in a context of sequential exchange in which innocent third parties suffer information asymmetry with respect to previous "originative" contracts. The law reduces transaction costs by protecting these third parties but preserves some element of consent by...

Registering originative business contracts allows entrepreneurs and creditors to choose, and courts to enforce market-friendly “contract” rules that protect innocent third parties when adjudicating disputes on subsequent contracts. This reduces information asymmetry for third parties, which...

Simplifying business formalization and eliminating outdated formalities is often a good way of improving the institutional environment for firms. Unfortunately, the World Bank’s "Doing Business" project is harming such policies by promoting a reform agenda that gives them priority even in...

Over recent years, both governments and international aid organizations have been devoting large amounts of resources to “simplifying” the procedures for setting up and formalizing firms. Many of these actions have focused on reducing the initial costs of setting up the firm, disregarding...

This note tries to clarify some remaining issues in the debate on the effect of income shocks on civil conflict. Section 1 discusses the discrepant findings on the effect of rainfall shocks on civil conflict in Miguel and Satyanath (2010, 2011) and Ciccone (2011). Section 2 develops an...