Voters often dismantle constitutional checks and balances on the executive. If such checks and balances limit presidential abuses of power and rents, why do voters support their removal? We argue that by reducing politician rents, checks and balances also make it cheaper to bribe or influence...

Can elites with access to governing institutions be constitutionally constrained? Effective constitutional constraints must be self-enforcing. This represents a substantial barrier to economic development, especially when elites control governing institutions. This paper analyzes how late Middle...

In this paper we argue that authorities aid cooperation by means ofdirect coordination or the enforcement of re-commitment devices suchas contract laws.Credible threats of violence allow this role. In alocal interaction model, an authority forms if mutually connected individuals with sufficient...

If policy makers in developing countries pursue "bad" economic policies, policy conditionality may provide financial leverage which induces them not to choose these policies. When is such policy conditionality beneficial? We point out that whether conditionality has a beneficial short run impact...

This paper examines capital tax competition in the presence of an interstate transfer policy without federal commitment. Lack of commitment implies that tax policy is chosen prior to federal transfers. The paper s main result is that ex-post federal policy internalizes horizontal fiscal...

This paper examines the ability of a policy maker to control equilibrium outcomes in a global coordination game; applications include currency attacks, bank runs, and debt crises. A unique equilibrium is known to survive when the policy is exogenously fixed. We show that, by conveying...

We test the assumption that preferences are unchanged throughout a strategic game in the absence of feedback. To do so, we study the relationship between the strategic nature of a game and players' identification in social groups. We present evidence that the strategic nature of the game affects...

In this paper, we introduce the concept of payoff distortion in the standard prisoner’s dilemma game when strategies are driven by psychological behaviors. This concept enables to take account each player’s assessment of the other player’s behavior and the asymmetry of information. We...

Stag hunt and chicken games are canonical representations of two kinds of strategic interactions. In stag hunt, aggression feeds on itself, and mutual fear escalates into conflict. Chicken is a model of preemption and deterrence. With complete information, these games have multiple Nash...

Two decision-makers choose hawkish or dovish actions in a conflict game with incomplete information. The decision-making can be manipulated by "extremists" who send publicly observed cheap-talk messages. The power of extremists depends on the nature of the underlying conflict game. If actions...