This paper considers the effect of corruption on the effciency of capital investment. Using firm-level level data from the World Bank enterprise surveys, covering 90 developing and transition economies, we consider whether the cost of informal bribe payments distorts the efficient allocation of...

Does repression of opposition elites prevent resistance against foreign-imposed regimes? On the one hand, elimination of elites can undermine the opposition's capacity for antiregime resistance. Yet killing opposition elites deprives the new regime of useful human capital. Co-optation of elites...

We survey selected parts of the growing literature on the microeconomics of violent conflict, identifying where academic research has started to establish stylized facts and where methodological and knowledge gaps remain. We focus our review on the role of civilian agency in conflict; on wartime...

This paper studies the legacies of wartime institutions, measured as rebelocracy, on the ability of households to cope with negative income shocks. Rebelocracy is the social order established by non-state armed actors in the communities they control. By providing public goods and a predictable...

In conflict zones around the world, both state and non-state actors deliver governance at local levels. This paper explores the long-term impact of individual exposure to 'wartime governance' on social and political behaviour. We operationalize wartime governance as the local policy choices and...

This paper investigates how armed groups affect the organization of local communities during armed conflict in Colombia. We estimate the effect of communities' exposure to armed groups with an econometric specification that takes into account individual and municipality-year fixed effects and an...

This paper identifies eight political economy factors that influenced governments' policy choices during the most recent global food price crisis. To explain the variety of responses and the policy failures, a framework is proposed that locates policies along the twin dimensions of unitary vs....

Governments do not have perfect information regarding constituent priorities and needs. This lack of knowledge opens the door for groups to lobby in order to affect the government's taxation levels. We examine the political economy of decentralized revenue-raising authority in light of social...

Malaysia provides for interesting paradoxes. Poverty was reduced by adopting a horizontal perspective to policy planning through affirmative action targeting one ethnic group lagging economically in society. However, outcomes of affirmative action include growing wealth and income disparities, a...

Rebels, militias, and criminal groups all govern civilians. Governing strategies adopted by armed groups during civil war likely influence citizens' post-conflict political participation, with consequences for democratic politics. We theorize that an armed group's position relative to the state...