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During Britain's industrialization, Parliament operated a forum where rights to land and resources could be reorganized. This venue enabled landholders and communities to exploit economic opportunities that could not be accommodated by the inflexible rights regime inherited from the past. In...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10008610965
Adaptable property-rights institutions, we argue, foster economic development. The British example illustrates this point. Around 1700, Parliament established a forum where rights to land and resources could be reorganized. This venue enabled landholders and communities to take advantage of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005720679
A new database demonstrates that between 1600 and 1830, Parliament passed thousands of acts restructuring rights to real and equitable estates. These estate acts enabled individuals and families to sell, mortgage, lease, exchange, and improve land previously bound by landholding and inheritance...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005722975
Following the death of Mao in 1976, abandonment of collective farming lifted millions from poverty and heralded sweeping pro-market policies. How did China's excess in male births respond to rural land reform? In newly-available data from over 1,000 counties, a second child following a daughter...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010950798
In generating fast economic growth, China is also generating growing concern about its environmental record. Using 2000-2009 data, we find that, while spending on environmental infrastructure has visible positive environmental impact, city spending is strongly tilted towards transportation...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010950924
The "loans for shares" scheme of 1995-6--in which a handful of well-connected businessmen bought stakes in major Russian companies--is widely considered a scandal that slowed subsequent Russian economic growth. Fifteen years later, I reexamine the details of the program. In light of evidence...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10008601668
We present a model of a peaceful transition from autocracy to democracy using federal governance as a constitutional … Africa's transition from white, elite rule under apartheid to a multi-racial democracy. We calibrate our model to the South … preferences and rate of time preference ('impatience') of the new majority during the early years of the new democracy. The future …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005575696
When Russia launched mass privatization, it was widely believed that it would create a powerful constituency for the rule of law. That didn't happen. We present a dynamic equilibrium model of the political demand for the rule of law and show that beneficiaries of mass privatization may fail to...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005580346
We find anecdotal evidence suggesting that governments in poor countries have a more left wing rhetoric than those in OECD countries. Thus, it appears that capitalist rhetoric doesn't flow to poor countries. A possible explanation is that corruption, which is more widespread in poor countries,...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005828497
This paper responds to findings by Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson (2000) that suggest weak institutions, but not physical geography and correlates like disease burden, explain current variation in levels of economic development across former colonies. Using similar data and expanding the sample...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005828949