This paper investigates the empirical role of violent conflicts for the causal effect of democracy on economic growth. Exploiting within-country variation to identify the effect of democratization during the "Third Wave", we find evidence that the effect of democratization is weaker than...

Critics of trade liberalization argue that globalization increases countries' vulnerability to economic shocks and hence may exacerbate domestic social conflict. Such social conflict may also be transformed into armed conflict. Others argue that globalization promotes economic growth and reduces...

Modern economics has largely ignored the issue of outright conflict as an alternative way of allocating goods, assuming instead the existence of well-defined property rights enforced by an undefined third party. And yet even in ostensibly peaceful market transactions, conflict exists as an...