Alienation to politics weakens political competition and can undermine the acceptance and legitimacy of democracy as a political system. Governance and representation problems at the local level cause part of citizens' lack of power and political alienation. Citizens have local power if they can...

We explore how the vertical structure of direct democracy in a federal context affects expenditure decisions of sub-central governments. In so doing we revisit previous research on the effect of direct democratic institution on public policies. Particularly, the effect of upper-level (state)...

This paper empirically investigates the underlying determinants of expenditure decentralization, based on the predictions of a new political economy model of partial decentralization. The analysis is based on an agency model, in which two levels of government are involved in the provision of a...

We propose a theory of tax centralization in politico-economic equilibrium. Taxation has dynamic general equilibrium implications which are rationally internalized at the federal, but not at the regional level. The political support for taxation therefore differs across levels of government....

Using data on federal highway grants from the Department of Transportation's Federal Highway Administration, this paper investigates several questions regarding the political economy of highway funding. We investigate the period 1994 - 2008 and examine whether political alignment and political...

The recent uprisings in the Middle East have cast doubt on the degree to which existing theories of autocracy can correctly identify which groups threaten the autocrats rule at any given time. As a result, these theories are unable to predict fundamental upheavals in established autocracies. Who...