Polarization measures that are used in examining the empirical relationship between ethnic divisions and violent conflict, heavily rely on mechanisms of group identification and often use somewhat arbitrary divisions of a society into ethnic groups. In this paper we construct two new measures of...

This paper presents a model of nations where agents vote on the optimal level of public spending. Larger nations benefit from increasing returns in the provision of public goods, but bear the costs of greater cultural heterogeneity. This tradeoff induces agents' preferences over different...

We examine patterns of acquiring non-native languages in a model with two linguistic communities with heterogeneous learning skills, where every individual faces the choice of self-learning the foreign language or acquiring it at a profit-maximizing linguistic school. We consider a one-school...

In this paper we present a result on the existence of pure strategies Nash equilibrium which covers a large class of games with local and global social interactions. The result highlights common features of well-known games analyzed in the literature.

We examine patterns of acquiring non-native languages in a model with two linguistic communities with heterogeneous learning skills, where every individual faces the choice of self-learning the foreign language or acquiring it at a profit-maximizing linguistic school. We consider a one-school...

The paper considers a model of federation with two heterogeneous regions that try to attract the capital by competing in capital income taxes and public investment that enhance the productivity of capital. Regions' choices determine allocation of capital across the regions and their revenues...

We introduce the notion of language disenfranchisement which arises if the number of EU working languages is reduced. We use the data on language proficiency in EU and show that, in spite of the widespread knowledge of English, the retention of French and German as working languages in essential...