This paper looks at public sector debt in developing countries, being concerned specifically with the relationship between aid inflows and the public sector borrowing requirement net of aid loans. After examining the public sector budget constraint and various conditions under which aid might...

This paper models transnational terrorism as a three-way strategic interaction involving a government that faces armed opposition at home, which may spill over in the form of acts of terrorism by the state’s opponents against the government’s external sponsor. The external sponsor also...

This paper examines consumer preferences for the attributes of alternative sources of water supply in Chennai, based on a household survey where respondents were given the description of a set of options. Their decision to choose one of the options is examined using discrete choice models....

In poor societies, asset accumulation serves as insurance. It also opens the door to wider inequality. Many societies prohibit certain types of accumulation, such as land sales or indenture contracts. This paper investigates the theoretical relationship between risk sharing, asset accumulation,...

The paper examines two issues associated with aid and fiscal policy. First, how best the conditionality behind foreign aid, sometimes non-economic, is complied with in a principal-agent framework. In a multiple task and multiple principal framework, principals are better off cooperating and...

The objective of this paper is to review a number of issues related to poverty, while taking stock of the ongoing research. Most of the remaining unresolved issues in poverty analysis are related directly or indirectly to the dynamics of poverty. Before the development community can become more...

In this paper I analyze the economic incentives that govern the strategic relationship between the government and the independent media using a consistent analytical framework. The analysis focuses on the extent to which the ‘free’ press can act as a deterrent to corruption in governance. I...

This paper reviews recent research dealing with the relationships between economic growth, income distribution, and poverty. This generally fails to find any systematic pattern of change in income distribution during recent decades. Neither does it find any systematic link from fast growth to...

Contemporary civil wars are rooted in a partial or complete breakdown of the social contract, often involving disputes over public spending, resource revenues, and taxation. A feasible social contract gives potential rebels something akin to a transfer. When this is improbable, and the potential...

This paper analyzes the ‘Silicon Valley model’ as a novel economic institution in the domain of technological product system innovation such as computers. We focus on the information structural relationship as well as governance relationships between venture capitalists and a cluster of...