China's economic performance of the past two decades presents a puzzle for the economics of transition and development: Enormous private business incentives were unleashed that have fueled rapid economic growth despite the fact that China has had very weak "conventional institutions" (such as...

In the absence of constraints on the state based on rule of law, there is a dilemma facing the state: when the state has the incentives to enforce contracts, it also has the incentives for predation. We demonstrate that information available to the state can determine the outcome in such a...