Argentina is the only country in the world that was "developed" in 1900 and "developing" in 2000. The various competing explanations highlight, mainly, the roles of trade openness, political institutions, financial integration, financial development, and macroeconomic instability. Yet no study...

This paper examines the relationship between differences in civil society development under communism and the political, economic and institutional change and transformation after 1989. We collected a unique dataset on nature and intensity of dissident activities in 27 former communist countries...

The literature on the growth effects of European integration remains inconclusive. This is due to severe methodological difficulties mostly driven by country heterogeneity. This paper addresses these concerns using the synthetic control method. It constructs counterfactuals for countries that...

One of the strongest stylized facts of the transition is also one of the most unexpected: after 1989 Central and Eastern European and Former Soviet Union countries diverged massively. Institutions are a main reason. The EU anchor thesis posits that the prospect of membership in the European...