This paper examines theoretically and empirically the role of political risk guarantees, which bilateral investment treaties serve, in debt accumulation in low and middle income countries. The paper empirically finds that signed bilateral investment treaties with OECD countries have a positive...

The World Bank (2013) argues that social cohesion shapes the context in which entrepreneurs make investment decisions and therefore job creation. In this paper, we focus on FDI as one link of primary importance in this argument, and empirically examine the relationship between social cohesion...

International Monetary Fund lending continues to be criticized for possibly generating moral hazard in international financial markets. The empirical examination of this issue has focused exclusively on the potential distortions in the pricing of credit, in the form of lower spreads. To date no...

Contract enforcement and institutional stability play an important role in determining the level and maturity of international debt. Contract enforcement is modeled as a fixed cost that investors incur to obtain the contracted, gross returns on international investments. Institutional stability...