Periodic elections are the main instrument through which voters can hold politicians accountable. From this perspective term limits, which restrict voters' ability to reward politicians with re-election, appear counterproductive. We show that despite the disciplining effect of elections, term...

We study the effect of decentralization on corruption in a political agency model from the perspective of a region. In a model where corruption opportunities are lower under centralization at each period of time, decentralization makes it easier for citizens to detect corrupt incumbents. As a...

This paper analyzes political agency with endogenous information collection and revelation by third-party auditors. While increasing incentives for auditors to provide information straightforwardly improves political control, a small amount of pro-incumbent bias can also be useful for...

Institutional economics is one of the most developing fields of economics. However, many its issues still need to be solved. For instance the theory does not give exact answer to why particular institutions (formal and informal norms) occur, change and cease to exist. The paper tries to solve...

Social institutions were often founded by the elite to avoid social upheavals. Institutions helped mitigate the threat of violent social responses to labor-saving innovations. But their organizational forms were influenced by preexisting cultural and social factors. The differences in Chinese...