Peasant livestock producers are particularly disadvantaged internationally and within their national systems because their political participation tends to be mediated through patron-client ties. The consequence is that poor producers most often trade their collective interests for very modest...

We consider a moral hazard economy in banks and production to study how incentives for risk taking are affected by the quality of supervision. We show that low interest rates may generate excessive risk taking. Because of a pecuniary externality, the market equilibrium may not be optimal and...

This empirical study uses 100 years of annual data on II agricultural commodities from Belgium to measure the impact of structural changes coinciding with economic development and changes in political institutions on agricultural protection. The analysis shows that changes in agricultural...

The paper tests a political economy theory of simultaneous government decision-making on income redistribution through commodity policies and on public research investment in agriculture. We use data from 37 countries on agricultural protection and public agricultural research expenditures...

Within the last two decades, 40% of rangelands in Uzbekistan have been taken out of use due to non-functioning water facilities and pasture degradation. A retrospective study of rangeland production system development in the former Soviet Union (FSU) shows that the pasture land was used more...

The paper analyses the 1996 EU food aid reform and addresses the question of its impact on improving EU food aid allocation in terms of reaching those countries which are most vulnerable to food insecurity. Using a two-stage regression model the analysis finds that EU food aid in kind is...

If property rights in land are so beneficial, why are they not adopted more widely? I propose a theory based on the idea that limited property rights over peasants' plots may be supported by elite landowners (who depend on peasants for labour) to achieve two goals. First, like other distortions...

When economic actors are also allowed to become politically active, perhaps to influence a government price policy, they face decision problems with essentially simultaneous political and economic features. If, in addition, two groups struggle to pull the administered price level in opposite...

Governments often establish economic policy in response to political pressure by interest groups. Since these groups' political activities may alter prices, economies so affected cannot be characterized by perfect competition. We develop a model of a "lobbying economy" in which consumers' choice...

This paper reviews two recent books on Political Economy by Allan Drazen and Torsten Persson and Guido Tabellini. It discusses some problems of the recent Political Economy literature.