This paper proposes an analysis of the emergence and evolution of institutional frameworks. It explains the causes, process, and outcome of institutional evolution. We first describe the institutional framework as a multilevel system at the bottom of which several “local and flexible”...

There is a growing literature on the implications of natural resources and foreign aid for economic development. Different stakeholders have different views regarding the usefulness of these windfall gains. To some, it would enhance investment and productivity in the economy while to others, it...

While the visible structures of cities may be designed, the invisible structures of how land, buildings, enterprises and money are owned and controlled are accepted as a given. This paper argues that to sustain humanity on the planet, the invisible structures of society need to follow the...

Impersonal exchange has been a major driver of economic development. But transactors with no stake in maintaining an ongoing relationship have little incentive to honor deals. Therefore, all economies have developed institutions to support honest trade and realize the gains of impersonal...

Conventional arguments suggest that republics ought to grow faster than monarchies and experience lower transitional costs following reforms. We employ a panel of 27 countries observed from 1820 to 2000 to estimate these differences. Results show no significant growth differences between the two...

In the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith argues that a country's national income depends on its labor productivity, which in turn hinges on the division of labor. But why are some countries able to take advantage of the division of labor and become rich, while others fail to do so and remain poor?...

This study is a section from the Sustainability Impact Assessment (SIA), commissioned by the European Commission, on the impacts of the Investment Chapter in the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). The Investment Chapter in CETA could encourage economic benefits...

By an Act of Parliament of the Republic of Ghana, CSIR Act 521 of 1996, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, CSIR, Ghana’s main R&D Organisation was re-established with a new mandate to conduct market-oriented, demand-driven research and also to commercialise the research...

Using cross-country data, we find evidence for a significant negative interaction effect between democracy and inequality in determining the quality of growth-promoting institutions like rule of law. Democracy is associated with institutions of higher quality when inequality is lower.