We study how natural-resource rents a ffect the risk of internal conflict within countries and how the federal structure of countries influences this relationship. Natural-resource abundance may induce excessive rent-seeking and thus increase the risk of internal conflict. Fiscal and political...

This article studies the impact of decentralization on the shadow economy. We argue that decentralization may decrease the size of the shadow economy mainly through two transmission channels: (1) decentralization enhancing public sector efficiency (<italic>efficiency effect</italic>), and (2) decentralization...

This paper examines whether the degree of fiscal decentralization in aid-receiving countries matters in explaining aid effectiveness. The decentralization theorem predicts that the devolution of powers should increase aid effectiveness, since local decision-makers are better informed about local...

Summary The majority of theoretical and empirical studies on the relationship between decentralization and corruption argue that the devolution of power might be a feasible instrument for use in keeping corruption at bay. We argue that this result crucially depends on the effectiveness of...

This paper empirically studies the impact of decentralization and inter-jurisdictional competition on foreign aid effectiveness. For this purpose we examine a commonly used empirical growth model, considering different measures of fiscal decentralization. Our panel estimations reveal that...

This article studies the impact of decentralization on the shadow economy. We argue that decentralization may decrease the size of the shadow economy mainly through two transmission channels: (1) decentralization enhancing public sector efficiency ( efficiency effect ), and (2) decentralization...

We study how natural-resource rents affect the risk of internal conflict within countries and how the federal structure of countries influences this relationship. Natural-resource abundance may induce excessive rent-seeking and thus increase the risk of internal conflict. Fiscal and political...