At least since 1750 when Baron de Montesquieu declared peace is the natural effect of trade, a number of economists and political scientists espoused the notion that trade among nations leads to peace. Employing resources wisely to produce one commodity rather than employing them inefficiently...

We review the main economic models of war and conflict. These models vary in details, but their implications are qualitatively consistent, highlighting key commonalities across a variety of conflict settings. Recent empirical literature, employing both laboratory and field data, in many cases...

In administrating the 2016 federal budget, a single adjustment was made in November. Under the Law on the 2016 Federal Budget, allocations on the “National Defense” section of the budget expenditures were initially set at RUB 3,149 trillion, or RUB 32bn (1%) less than actual expenditures a...

After Myanmar ended military rule in 2011, significant foreign investment arrived to facilitate a profitable transition to an integrated regional economy, and under the promise that foreign actors can help facilitate peaceful long-term development. However, these firms have also tacitly...

We examine the impact of terrorism on social capital by exploiting variation in the 2014 European Social Survey administration dates coupled with the 2015 Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris, France. Using the difference-in-differences estimator, we find that the attack had a positive, causal impact...

In an interconnected world, economic and political interests inevitably reach beyond national borders. Since policy choices generate external economic and political costs, foreign state and non-state actors have an interest in inflencing policy actions in other sovereign countries to their...

We analyze how trade openness matters for interstate conflict over productive resources. Our analysis features a terms-of-trade channel that makes security policies trade-regime dependent. Specifically, trade between two adversaries reduces each one’s incentive to arm given the opponent’s...

In this paper I attempt to highlight the financial aspects of the Islamic State (ISIS) phenomenon. A ‘sui generis' State Scale Entity, from an Al-Qaeda branch, evolved according to David Cohen the US Treasury Undersecretary to ‘the best funded terrorist organization we've confronted'....

A crisis begins when a potential aggressor makes a threat of attack against a target state, creating a stalemate. The potential aggressor's military technology improves over time, but its true military capability or intention is unknown. I show that the more sensitive the target state is to the...