Do public agents undertake socially inefficient activities to protect themselves? In politically contestable markets, part of the lack of flexibility in the design and implementation of the public procurement process reflects public agents' risk adaptations to limit the political hazards from...

This paper studies whether political budget cycles occur in public procurement in the European Union. Using project- level data from Tenders Electronic Daily (2008-2018), I analyze different steps along the procurement process, namely the publication of the contract notice, the awarding of the...

This paper studies whether political budget cycles occur in public procurement in the European Union. Using project- level data from Tenders Electronic Daily (2008-2018), I analyze different steps along the procurement process, namely the publication of the contract notice, the awarding of the...

Exploiting a unique institutional setting in Korea, this paper documents how politicians can increase the amount of government resources allocated through their social networks to the benefit of private firms connected to these networks. After winning the election, the new president appoints...

This paper provides novel evidence that corporate political influence operates through renegotiations of existing government contracts. Using detailed data on contractual terms and renegotiations around sudden deaths and resignations of local politicians, the estimates show that politically...

We study the efficiency and distributional consequences of establishing and abolishing the draft in a dynamic model with overlapping generations, taking into account endogenous human capital formation as well as government budget constraints. The introduction of the draft initially benefits the...

International organizations promote privatization as precondition for economic development. But is there really too little privatization? This political economy model asks for the incentives of governments to privatize or restructure a state-owned firm. Different government types are compared to...

Traditional political economy has paid primary attention to the structuring of the principal-agent relationship between citizens and politicians and the role of competition and institutions in disciplining political agents. However, as the electoral control of politicians and the credibility of...

We often use delegation as a commitment device if a government faces problems of timeinconsistency. McCallum (1995, AER P&P) challenged this practice, claiming that delegation merely relocates the commitment problem but does not solve it. In a model where delegation and specific policies are...

This article examines whether the judges of the French Constitutional Court demonstrated partisanship when ruling on the validity of the elections to the lower house of the French Parliament between 1958 and 2005. It uses a new dataset on the decisions of the Constitutional Court which takes...