This paper examines the effects that windfalls from international commodity price booms have on net foreign assets in a panel of 145 countries during the period 1970-2007. The main finding is that windfalls from international commodity price booms lead to a significant increase in net foreign...

In this paper we examine the claim that natural resources invite civil conflict, and challenge the main stylized facts in this literature. We find that the conventional measure of resource dependence is endogenous with respect to conflict, and that instrumenting for dependence implies that it is...

We use three different measures of fractionalization (with varying potential for members of one fraction to “mendaciously” pass for a member of another) to revisit the correlation between natural resources and the onset of conflict. The combination of ethnic fractionalization and resource...

SinceWorld War II there have been about fifty episodes of large-scale mass killings of civilians and massive forced displacements. They were usually meticulously planned and independent of military goals. We provide a model where con?ict onset, con?ict intensity and the decision to commit mass...

We construct a dynamic theory of civil conict hinging on inter-ethnic trust and trade. The model economy is inhabitated by two ethnic groups. Inter-ethnic trade requires imperfectly observed bilateral investments and one group has to form beliefs on the average propensity to trade of the other...

We use new data to examine the effects of giant oilfield discoveries around the world since 1946. On average, these discoveries increase per capita oil production and oil exports by up to 50 percent. But these giant oilfield discoveries also have a dark side: they increase the incidence of...