We develop an agency model of organized crime accounting for the main trade-offs involved by the introduction of an accomplice-witness program. We characterize the optimal policy and identify its main determinants in a framework where public officials can be dishonest. Our predictions are tested...

We develop a theory of the emergence of merchant guilds as an efficient mechanism to foster cooperation between merchants and rulers, building on the natural complementarity between merchants’ market trading and mutual monitoring. Unlike existing models, we focus on local merchant guilds,...

We analyze how uncertainty regarding future climate conditions affects the design of concession contracts, organizational forms and technological choices in a principal-agent context with dynamic moral hazard, limited liability and irreversibility constraints. The prospect of future, uncertain...

This paper discusses the feasibility and performances of simple mechanisms to implement international environmental agreements in the multilateral externalities context of global warming. Asymmetric information and voluntary participation by sovereign and heterogenous countries are key...