Aid beneficiaries know very little about development interventions in their own communities. This lack of transparency and information is likely to reduce beneficiaries' ability and willingness to become active in local development. It may also dampen intended aid effects on beneficiaries'...

Scholars and policy makers believe that democracy will bring prosperity through integration into the global economy via increased international trade. This study tests two theories as to why democracies might trade more. First, political freedom may be correlated with economic freedom, thus...

This paper exploits five waves of the Vietnam Access to Resources Household Survey (VARHS) to investigate issues of social and political capital in rural Viet Nam. I analyse membership of the Communist Party, 'mass organizations' (Farmers' Union, Women's Union, etc.) and other voluntary...

The article explores the various co-ordination mechanisms between the state and the business community in Ghana, and the implications for economic growth in the country. We focus on three periods in the economic history of state-business relations: the immediate post-independence period and the...

The overall goal of this paper is to analyse the political economy of food price policies in China during the global food crisis. The results show that given China's unique economic and political context and the nature of its agricultural markets, the government's reaction to the crisis was...

The food crisis of 2008 in Nigeria was influenced by price changes in the world market and the escalation of the price of imported fuel into Nigeria which led to sharp increases in the prices of agricultural inputs and transportation cost. The soaring prices of food staples benefited the...

This study reviews the political economy issues surrounding the 2008 food crisis in Nigeria; the lessons learned from management of the crisis; analyses the performance of policies aimed at stabilizing prices; and proffers policy measures for preventing future occurrence. The study finds that the...

We propose a general taxonomy of the political economy challenges to wind power development and integration, highlighting the implications in terms of actors, interests, and risks. Applying this framework to three functions in China's electricity sector - planning and project approval, generator...

To predict economic success and failure, academics and policymakers alike are interested in the differences in institutional structures across natural resource-based economies. This paper uses a political economy framework to examine the effect of institutional variables on per capita...

Political scientists have generally seen two key features of African political economies - a relatively small or absent middle class, and a middle class that is unusually embedded in the state - as key explanations of the troubled political and economic trajectories of many African societies....