This paper reports on the 2009 update of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) research project, covering 212 countries and territories and measuring six dimensions of governance between 1996 and 2008: Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism,...

The literature on the theory of the firm is rich in theoretical and practical insights. The key messages in this overview are the following: (a) the modern theory of the firm provides many insights into political organization, for political jurisdictions can be viewed as pseudo-firms that...

Defining vigilance as retrospective voting - where voters evaluate incumbents on their performance during their entire term in office - the author compares voter behavior in local and national elections to make inferences about whether voters are more vigilant in monitoring government at the...

This report presents a methodological framework for reviewing the financial performance of government agencies responsible for transport. The framework is applied in a detailed case study in Tanzania (the transport infrastructure of which is seriously run down) and on desk studies in 14 other...

The authors investigate the theoretical effects of lobbying and pressure group activities on both economic efficiency and on equity. Looking at lobbying as a political activity that takes place alongside production, they find that lobbies may generate economic inefficiency as part of the process...

Theeffects of tax evasion on tax rates and government revenues have focused fresh attention on the question of tax administration. Because of the difficulties of measuring the consequences of good or bad administration, policymakers cannot rely on a wide range of specific information on this...

The authors describe Bosnia's current arrangements in fiscal federalism, outline the unique challenges that the Dayton system proposed, and draw lessons for the design of fiscal federal systems in ethnically diverse economies. Traditional economic models of federalism suggest a government...

Why does a country's legal origin influence its firms'access to finance? Using data from over 4,000 firms in 38 countries, the authors show that firms in countries with French legal origin face significantly higher obstacles in accessing external finance than firms in common law countries. Next,...

The authors develop a simple analytical framework that shows how the composition of public spending affects economic growth. Distinguishing between productive and unproductive government spending (that which complements private sector productivity and that which does not), they show that...

Drawing on Northern European experience - where three Scandinavian countries have practiced integrated supervision for the past 10 years - the authors address three policy-related issues associated with the integrated model: a) Under what conditions should (or should not) a country consider...