Motivated, in part, by the new quot;rule of lawquot; paradigm in development economics, we examine the role of institutions, broadly defined, on the rate of mobile network build-out. We find that the quot;strictquot; rule of law (i.e., strong protection of private contract and property) does not...

We examine the effect on economic growth of mobile cellular phones in sub-Saharan Africa where a marked asymmetry is present between land-line penetration and mobile telecommunications expansion. This study extends previous ones along two important dimensions. First, we allow for the potential...