This paper discusses fiscal responsibility laws in Latin America, with special attention to their provisions for fiscal discipline by subnational governments. It discusses why and when such laws might be useful-to help resolve the coordination problem in getting diverse governments to avoid...

The authors consider the malaise with the present set-up of fiscal federalism in Mexico from the points of view of the main players-the federal government, the states, the municipalities, and the citizen voters-in order to identify the areas of potential common interest as well as the direct...

In shifting to decentralized public finances, a country's central government faces certain fiscal management problems. First, during and soon after the transition, unless it reduces pending or increases its own tax resources, the central government tends to have higher deficits as it shifts...

Turkey's adjustment experience was a tremendous success in terms of structurally reorienting the economy. The share of output for export rose from 5 percent in 1979 to 23 percent in 1989, and real output roughly doubled. The financial markets opened and have developed depth and sophistication....

Colombia's political geography contrasts sharply with its economy. Physical characteristics and guerilla war fragment the country geographically, yet it has a long tradition of political centrism and macroeconomic stability. Recently, with political and economic decentralization, there has been...

The traditional theory of fiscal federalism assigns the role of macroeconomic stabilization to the federal government. In addition to this long-standing theoretical result, there is empirical observation that federal governments in developing countries typically have cheaper and more stable...