The political-science literature is divided on the relationship between resource rents and politics. This may be related to its narrow focus on democracy and on the domestic influences upon governance outcomes. This paper argues that rents are in fact damaging, on balance, but that we need to...

It has long been argued that big government leads to freedom lost. Guess what: The author, after careful analysis, shows that it is often the opposite. Higher taxes, in particular, mostly lead to more freedom, even according to conservative indices of freedom.

Judging from historical precedents, it is possible that new social programs, namely non-contributory social protection and conditional transfers, could underwrite a new period of political incorporation in Latin America, cementing political loyalties and institutional channels of popular...

When scholars extend their models and hypotheses to encompass additional cases, they commonly need to adapt their analytic categories to fit the new contexts. Giovanni Sartori's work on conceptual "traveling" and conceptual "stretching" provides helpful guidance in addressing this fundamental...

This paper explores the relationship between government size and economic freedom, relating these patterns to theories of fiscal politics. In order to address current political controversies, it uses data on pre-1990 OECD members (minus Norway) for central government tax revenues and spending,...