We show that drought-induced changes in the intensity of riots lead to moves towards democracy in sub-Saharan Africa, and that these changes are often a result of concessions made as a result of the riots. This provides evidence that low-intensity conflict can have a substantial short-run impact...

Africa’s interior-to-coast roads are well suited to export natural resources, but not to support regional trade. Are they the optimal response to geography and comparative advantage, or the result of suboptimal political distortions? We investigate the political determinants of road paving in...

Indian country in the United States is incredibly poor. Indian nations desperately need to develop reservation economic activities. Most tribal governments, however, are primarily focused on developing tribally owned businesses. This article argues for Indian peoples and governments to revive...

The U.S. Supreme Court used to regularly police the line between political and economic spheres and the line between Church and State. The Court in 2014 abandoned both posts. As evidenced by McCutcheon v. FEC, the Supreme Court is not protecting democracy from creeping oligarchy served up one...

Focusing on Low-Income Countries, we investigate the behavior of fiscal variables during and after elections. The results indicate that during election years, government consumption significantly increases and leads to higher fiscal deficits. During the two years following elections, the fiscal...

This study examines whether governments in the Caribbean systematically attempt to alter voter preferences through the use of fiscal and monetary policy tools during election periods. It also investigates whether governments reverse their pre-election excesses in the year after a general...

The comparison of Mexico’s 2009 A/H1N1 outbreak with the U.S. H1N1 outbreak of 1976 provides notable observations — based on the strengths and weaknesses of each country’s response — that can be used as a starting point of discussion for the design of effective Emerging Infectious...