An earlier paper showed that an economy could be trapped in an equilibrium state in which the absence of the rule of law led to asset-stripping, and the prevalence of asset-stripping led to the absence of a demand for the rule of law, highlighting a coordination failure. This paper looks more...

If the only solution tried for customs corruption and evasion in a developing country is to outsource certain customs functions to a pre-shipment inspection (PSI) company, PSI will prove more of a fiscal burden than a panacea. PSI works best in countries where the customs service already...

The author presents some evidence of improved corporate performance in Lithuania for the period 1995-97. His question: Were these improvements in any way caused by privatization and changes in the environment in which enterprises operate? He presents evidence of correlation between ownership and...

This paper examines the extent to which dispute resolvers in customary law systems provide widely understandable justifications for their decisions. The paper first examines the liberal-democratic reasons for the importance of publicity, understood to be wide accessibility of legal...

Using a newly compiled database of women's property rights and legal capacity covering 100 countries over 50 years, this paper analyzes the triggers and barriers to reform. The database documents gender gaps in the ability to access and own assets, to sign legal documents in one's own name, and...

Collective action by women's networks has been a strong driver of legislative change in many countries across the world. Women's groups in Botswana have used advocacy tools such as testing the implementation of gender equality principles in the national court system. In 1992, women's legal...

The authors use disaggregated export data to explore the relationship between economic discovery and economic development. They find that discoveries, or episodes, when countries begin exporting a new product are not limited to so-called"dynamic"industries. Rather, they also occur in traditional...

Because protection of property rights cannot be appropriated by any individual, it is widely recognized as being the state's responsibility. Moreover, recent empirical evidence suggests that protection of property rights leads to higher investment levels and faster growth. The extent of property...

In analyzing the turning point in Korea's transition in the early 1960s from a strategy of import substitution to one of export-oriented industrial growth, the authors examine not just the economics of change but the politics of economic policy and reform - the incentives facing state and...

Building on the pioneering work of Barro (1991) and Mauro (1995) to include the most recent years for which data are available (for Bangladesh in the 1990s), the authors investigate the relationships between corruption, and growth, and, between corruption and investment, both domestic and...