This paper examines the Faustian dynamics of policy and power. We posit a general class of dynamic games in which current policies affect the future distribution of political power, resulting in the following "Faustian trade off": if the current ruler chooses his preferred policy, he then...

This paper studies the evolution of political institutions in the face of conflict. We examine institutional reform in a class of "pivotal mechanisms"-institutions that behave "as if" the resulting policy were determined by a "pivotal" decision maker drawn from the potential population of...

This paper describes a dynamic model in which the provision mechanism for a public project is itself the object of locational choice of individuals. Individuals in an ongoing society must choose between a Majority Rule mechanism and a Voluntary Contribution mechanism. Each mechanism determines a...

Authoritarian regimes often rely on targeting - unequal application of the law to isolate internal "enemies." At the same time, modern autocrats' methods of social control appear less draconian than those in the past. This study analyzes a dynamic model of authoritarian control. In the model, a...