This paper conducts the first analysis of the effect of armed conflict on progress in meeting the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals. We also examine the effect of conflict on economic growth. Conflict has clear detrimental effects on the reduction of poverty and hunger, on primary...

Summary This article tests the hypothesis that higher women's economic and social rights in foreign countries with which a country is connected via trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) spill-over into higher rights among the laggards--a phenomenon known as spatial dependence. Analyzing...

Summary Governments can significantly reduce earthquake mortality by enforcing quake-proof construction regulation. We examine why many governments do not. First, mortality is lower in countries with higher earthquake propensity, where the payoffs to investments in mortality prevention are...

This paper investigates the impact of legalized prostitution on human trafficking inflows. According to economic theory, there are two opposing effects of unknown magnitude. The scale effect of legalized prostitution leads to an expansion of the prostitution market, increasing human trafficking,...

We account for competition for export markets among donor countries of foreign aid by analyzing spatial dependence in aid allocation. Employing sector-specific aid data, we find that the five largest donors react to aid giving by other donors with whom they compete in terms of exporting goods...

Summary Famine mortality is preventable by government action and yet some famines kill. We develop a political theory of famine mortality based on the selectorate theory of Bueno de Mesquita et al. [Bueno de Mesquita, B. B., Morrow, J. M., Siverson, R. M., & Smith, A. (2002). Political...