This paper presents a macroeconomic model where governments are motivated both by their ideological preference for alternative fiscal policies that vary in their short run and long run consequences and by their reelection prospects. I prove that a sequential equilibrium exists in which moderate...

We develop a model to explore the inter-relationships between conflict and economic activity. We construct a simple two-period model where consumption and investment decisions are made in the presence of governments who consider initiating diversionary conflict to raise their chances of...