Interpersonal relationships have long been suspected of shaping agrarian institutions, probably because weak formal institutions must be supplemented by interpersonal trust. This is particularly true for informal risk sharing, a fundamental risk coping mechanism for the rural poor (e.g. Mark R....

This paper presents a pairwise matching model with two-sided information asymmetry to analyse the impact of information costs on endogenous network building and matching by information intermedairies. The framework innovates by examining the role of information costs on incentives for trade...

A two-sided, pair-wise matching model is developed to analyse the strategic interaction between two information intermediaries who compete in commission rates and network size, giving rise to a fragmented duopoly market structure. The model suggests that network competition between information...

This paper uses data on judicial citations to explore whether the diffusion and/or application of knowledge within an organisation is affected by worker connectivity. Developing a simple model of discretionary citations, we distinguish between two hypotheses: knowledge diffusion whereby...

Drawing insights from the literature on credit and labor markets and from the author`s own survey work on contractual practices among manufacturers and traders in Africa, this paper investigates the spontaneous emergence of markets in the presence of heterogeneous agents. Using a dynamic game...

Using a database of all published articles in economic journals over the last 30 years, we investigate the determinants of scientific co-authorship. We find that, controlling for pair-wise fixed effects and author productivity, a new collaboration emerges faster if the two authors are more...