In many economic environments agents make costly and irreversible investments (in "guns") that may enhance their respective threat payoffs but also shrink the utility possibilities set. In such settings, with variable threats and a variable utility possibilities set, it becomes possible to rank...

To facilitate the study of contests in general equilibrium, we examine winner-take-all contests in which the prize is complemenatry to the effort of the contestants, as inputs are in production functions or final goods in utility functions. We focus on the effects of technological factors and...

To begin discussing the classical liberal and realist views we analyze a simple model that allows for possible insecurity as well as trade. We examine an economic environment in which two "small" countries dispute a resource that can be used in the production of tradeables. Claims on the...

Existing work on the costs of insecure property has largely focused on the overexploitation problem of common pool resources. We investigate other costs of insecure resources - uncertainty costs, the absence of exchange, and enforcement costs - within a simple general equilibrium setting.

In many economic environments agents make costly and irreversible investments that may enhance their respective threat payoffs but also shrink the utility possibilities set. In such settings, with variable threats and a variable utility possibilities set, it becomes possible to rank different...