In this discussion draft, linking research findings with concrete operational challenges, we review key issues in worldwide governance, and present recent empirical evidence. Focusing on defining and unbundling key governance components, such as rule of law, voice and accountability, corruption...

This paper develops a proxy measure of the inequality of influence on the basis of survey evidence from 2002 Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS) conducted among 6,500 firms in 27 transition countries. We refer to the resulting inequality as crony bias in the political...

Based on the Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS) of firms in transition countries, which unbundles corruption to measure different types of corrupt transactions and provide detailed information on the characteristics and performance of firms, we find that: i)...

This paper looks at the history of money and its modern form from a scientific and mathematical point of view. The approach here is to emphasize simplicity. A straightforward model and algebraic formula for a large economy analogous to the ideal gas law of thermodynamics is proposed. It may be...

Recent studies have focussed on the characteristics and policies of the state to explain the extent and causes of corruption, with little attention paid to the role played by firms. Consequently, the links between corporate governance and national governance have been unexplored. This paper...

The Coasean way to deal with the cooperation failure that is implicit in Pareto inefficiency is to remove or lessen the obstacles to cooperation through the attribution of property rights and the elimination or reduction of transaction costs. The relevance of this approach is however undermined...

Open source software development has organizational characteristics that are out of the ordinary (e.g., flatter hierarchy, self-organization, self-regulation, and no ownership structure). The study suggests that this organization of work can be explained by combining the recently developed...

The Soviet Union and the nations of Eastern Europe are undergoing a historically unprecedented restructuring as they move inexorably from centrally planned economies toward market economies. This historic transition must be guided by a coherent set of stabilization policies to reduce the threat...

This paper examines the question of whether a communist nation, characterized by state ownership of the means of production and a centrally planned command system of allocation can be transformed into an efficient market oriented economy without fully compromising the socialist ideals of an...

A search of the accounting, trade and ethics literature failed to find a single article that discussed the role that accountants play in assisting in the data gathering process of a trade investigation. Yet there are serious ethical issues that need to be addressed. Certain aspects of trade...