Although market concentration is one of the main impediments to productivity growth globally, data constraints have limited its analysis to developed countries or cross-country studies based on definitions of market concentration across nations and industries. This paper takes advantage of a...

Does democratization promote economic competition? This paper documents that the disruption of political connections associated with Suharto's fall had a modest pro-competitive effect on Indonesian manufacturing industries in which his family had extensive business interests. Firms with...

This paper uses a unique firm-level data set for Mexico, with information never used for research before, to assess how use of information technology (IT henceforth) influences firm performance. Further, the paper explores if, in the context of increasing competition from China, this effect is...

The Russian Federation's regions not only have highly uneven degrees of development, they also have very uneven degrees of foreign orientation. Regions with the highest foreign orientation--exports of goods per capita or inbound foreign direct investment per capita?almost across the board have...

Ecuador is one of the least diversified countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, depending heavily on oil and agriculture. This policy paper examines how services and innovation can play a role in transforming the Ecuadorian economy from one based on natural resources to one based on...

Transport and logistics infrastructure is a critical determinant of the competitiveness of a country's producers and exporters. Well-functioning transport and logistics infrastructure relies not just on hardware, but critically on the operating environment that emerges from the interaction...

Special economic zones can be an effective instrument to promote industrialization if implemented properly in the right context. In China, starting in the 1980s, special economic zones were used as a testing ground for the country's transition from a planned to a market economy, and they are a...