We investigate the dynamics of political systems in a framework where transitions are driven by reforms and revolts, and where political systems are a priori unconstrained, ranging continuously from single-man dictatorships to full-scale democracies. The dynamics are governed by the likelihood...

This paper exploits data on the pattern of violence across regions and over time to estimate the impact of the peace process in Northern Ireland on house prices. We begin with a linear model that estimates the average treatment effect of a conflictrelated killing on house prices - showing a...

We investigate the dynamics of political systems in a framework where transitions are driven by reforms and revolts, and where political systems are a priori unconstrained, ranging continuously from single-man dictatorships to full-scale democracies. The dynamics are governed by the likelihood...

This paper explores the effect of conflict on GDP in Northern Ireland. A synthetic control region constructed as a weighted average of other UK regions provides an estimate of counterfactual ‘no-conflict’ GDP. Comparing this with actual per capita GDP suggests a negative impact of up to 10%....

The majority of labor transactions throughout much of history and a significant fraction of such transactions in many developing countries today are "coercive", in the sense that force or the threat of force plays a central role in convincing workers to accept employment or its terms. We propose...

Persistent protests might endanger the stability of young democracies because the economic legacies of the old autocratic regimes tend to outlive their political structures. This paper seeks to explore the micro-level predictors of protest potential in South Africa before and after the end of...

Borrowing from public choice literature, while aristocratic civil wars can be regarded as anarchy, and the monopoly of violence by the state as Leviathan, duel of honor is an orderly anarchy. The sudden or gradual withering of duel of honor as an institution marks the transition to the monopoly...

The scale, duration and intensity of conflicts over mineral resources vary greatly. However, they always involve, in varying proportions, the triad stakeholder model—corporation, state, community—each element of which is internally heterogeneous. Increasingly, new players are entering the...

This paper shows how a world price shock can increase the likelihood that democratization must be used to resolve the threat of revolution. Initially, a ruling elite may be able to use trade policy to maintain political stability. But a world price shock can push the country into a situation...

This paper examines the relevance of price competition in the protection market in order to explain the different modes of empire-building. Our approach unravels the economic rationale of merchant empires which is not explicable with existing theoretical frameworks systematically eluding price...