Can governments still use trade to reward and punish partner countries? While WTO rules and the pressures of globalization restrict states' capacity to manipulate trade policies, politicization of trade is likely to occur where governments intervene in markets. We examine state ownership of...

This article investigates whether China's foreign aid is particularly prone to capture by political leaders of aid-receiving countries. We examine whether more Chinese aid is allocated to the birth regions of political leaders and regions populated by the ethnic groups to which leaders belong,...

Over 300 government members have had the main responsibility for international development cooperation in 23 member countries of the OECD's Development Assistance Committee since the organization started reporting detailed Official Development Assistance (ODA) data in 1967. Understanding their...

Development assistance has been criticized for a lack of coordination between aid donors. This paper argues that competition for export markets and political support prevents donor countries from closer coordination of aid activities. To test these hypotheses, we perform logit and fractional...

Chinese “aid” is a lightning rod for criticism. Policymakers, journalists, and public intellectuals claim that Beijing is using its largesse to cement alliances with political leaders, secure access to natural resources, and create exclusive commercial opportunities for Chinese firms — all...

This article investigates whether China's foreign aid is particularly prone to political capture by political leaders of aid-receiving countries. Specifically, we examine whether more Chinese aid is allocated to the political leaders' birth regions and regions populated by the ethnic group to...

Credit rating agencies are frequently criticized for producing biased sovereign ratings. This article discusses how the home country of rating agencies could affect rating decisions as a result of political economy influences and cultural distance. Using data from nine agencies based in six...

China's provision of development finance to other countries is sizable but reliable information is scarce. We introduce a new open source methodology for collecting project-level development finance information and create a database of Chinese official finance to Africa from 2000-2011. We find...

Does the proliferation of aid donors lead to visible changes in the world of foreign assistance? Aid provided by low- and middle-income countries, autocratic regimes and donors operating outside the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the OECD is gaining in importance. This article uses...

One goal of China's Go Out policy is to create goodwill in countries around the world. At the same time, China's growing economic engagement has provoked much criticism. This paper is the first to study whether these activities change the attitudes of individuals in developing countries towards...