This paper analyzes the determinants of rural poverty in India, contrasting the situation of the Scheduled Caste (SC) and Schedule Tribe (ST) households with the non-scheduled population. The incidence of poverty among SC and ST households is significantly higher than non-scheduled households....

Does exposure to international trade have a pro-competitive effect on domestic pricing? This paper attends to this question in two stages: first, by developing a simple methodology to test the above proposition by linking domestic pricing behaviour to external competition via a simple mark-up...

Affirmative action has been at the heart of public policies towards the socially disadvantaged in India. Compensatory discrimination policies which have been adopted for the Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) since independence were recommended for Other Backward Classes (OBC) by...

This paper analyzes the determinants of rural poverty in India, contrasting the situation of scheduled caste (SC) and scheduled tribe (ST) households with the non-scheduled population. The incidence of poverty in SC and ST households is much higher than among non-scheduled households. By...

Episodes of economic growth that lead to reductions in poverty and inequality are relatively rare in developing countries. In this paper, we examine the institutional foundations of such growth episodes. We argue that the institutional factors that lead to accelerations in economic growth will...

This comprehensive two-volume collection brings together seminal contributions by leading scholars on institutions and governance in developing countries.

Summary We examine the role of informal and formal institutions behind the growth of private sector in Vietnam since the official recognition of private enterprises in the early 1990s. We show that firms have increasingly taken on risks in their transactions in spite of weak formal institutions....

Empirical studies on total factor productivity growth (TFPG) in developing countries highlight trade open-ness, research and development and market structure as being the most important determinants of TFPG. The role of institutions remains overlooked in the literature on the determinants of...

This paper analyses the productivity performance of the Indian manufacturing sector using unit level data, which is aggregated at four-digit industry level for the period 1994-95 to 2004-05 for 15 major states. The study focuses on both the organized and unorganized segments of the manufacturing...

It is commonly argued that a better investment climate reform – that is, lower distortions in the institutional, policy and regulatory environment in which firms operate - lead to discernible improvements in firm performance. In this paper, we argue that effective state business relations...