NGO aid is still widely believed to be superior to official aid (ODA). However, the incentives of NGOs to excel and target aid to the poor and deserving are increasingly disputed. We contribute to the emerging literature on the allocation of NGO aid by performing panel Tobit estimations for...

This paper provides a rationale for group support for political violence in situations where violence does not provide a material benefit. Rabin’s (1993) theory of fairness is adopted to demonstrate that although group violence may not be the equilibrium of a material game it may be a fairness...

The Chinese government frequently threatens that meetings between its trading partners’ officials and the Dalai Lama will be met with animosity and ultimately harm trade ties with China. We run a gravity model of exports to China from 159 partner countries between 1991 and 2008 to test to...

Housing markets are subject to many interrelated sources of instability on both a microeconomic and macroeconomic scale. Housing decisions of different individuals will be interdependent, generating non-linearities, discontinuities and feedback effects. This paper focuses in on some behavioural...

Electricity distribution networks are capital intensive systems and timely investments are crucial for long-term reliability of their service. In coming years, in the UK, and elsewhere in Europe, many networks are in need of extensive investments in their aging assets. Also, aspects of energy...

The paper examines correlations between daily returns of month-ahead baseload electricity, fuel input and carbon emission allowance (EU-ETS) prices for Great Britain. The perspective of a CCGT plant operator is assumed, producing baseload electricity with natural gas and emission allowances and...

We develop a stochastic two-stage optimisation model that captures the multistage nature of electricity transmission planning under uncertainty and apply it to a stylised representation of the Great Britain (GB) network. In our model, a proactive transmission planner makes investment decisions...

In this paper we look at the role of pre-payment (in the context of prepayment metering) for household electricity consumption. Using a matching approach, we find that households paying their electricity up-front tend to consume no less electricity than households paying ex post. This is despite...

How important are national macroeconomic indicators for people’s satisfaction with democracy? This paper empirically explores the link from macroeconomic variables to support for established democratic systems. We combine country-level data on growth, inflation, and unemployment from the OECD...

A revival of trade unions was widely expected when Blair’s New Labour government took over from the Conservatives in Britain in 1997. This did not occur. Collective bargaining continued to retreat. The paper discusses the implications of the changing economic context for the government’s...