This paper shows theoretically and empirically that beta- and volatility-based low risk anomalies are driven by return skewness. The empirical patterns con- cisely match the predictions of our model which generates skewness of stock returns via default risk. With increasing downside risk, the...

Unlike China and Russia, India is a democratic country, which could act as an important partner in international democracy promotion. Despite increasing requests from the United States and European governments, the promotion of democracy has not so far had a high priority in India’s foreign...

We were asked by the Independent Evaluation Office to outline political science methods for assessing the chances of reform implementation in an ex-ante fashion. We agreed to illustrate how these tools 'work' by using Pakistan as a case study. The recent literature on IMF-sponsored reforms...