Recent studies have claimed that states with initiatives systems of legislation use this more direct from of democracy to improve productive resource allocation. This paper compares the economic performance of states with initiatives to states that do not have initiatives. We first construct a...

This paper presents a general equilibrium model of conflict based on a world populated by representative democracies. At the individual state level, when information regarding a leader's ability to defend the state against unavoidable conflict is va luable to voters, an incumbent leader seeking...

This paper presents a general equilibrium model of conflict based on a world populated by representative democracies. At the individual state level, when information regarding a leader?s ability to defend the state against unavoidable conflict is valuable to voters, an incumbent leader seeking...

This paper investigates the implications of how states with initiative systems of legislation can use this more direct form of democracy to improve productive resource alloction by their governments. We construct a simple growth model whereby we can identify this channel through which...

We present a general equilibrium model of conflict to investigate whether the prevalence of democracy is sufficient to foster the perpetual peace hypothesized by Immanuel Kant and whether the world would necessarily become more peaceful as more countries adopt democratic institutions. Our...

Recent studies have claimed that states with initiative systems of legislation use this more direct form of democracy to improve productive resource allocation. This paper compares the economic performance of states with initiatives to states that do not have initiatives. We first construct a...

This paper presents a general equilibrium model of conflict based on a world populated by representative democracies. At the individual state level, when information regarding a leader's ability to defend the state against unavoidable conflict is valuable to voters, an incumbent leader seeking...