Continuous violent conflict is a central cause of economic stagnation in many of the world's poorest countries. Given that attempts to achieve peace in these countries often remain elusive, it is important to identify mechanisms which reveal the sustainability of peace over time. We argue that...

While both errors of overoptimism and errors of overpessimism are possible in the face of imperfect information, the presence of option value from deferring a decision to exchange causes trader errors to be overpessimistically biased. This is problematic because unlike errors of overoptimism,...

Institutionally dependent payoffs determine the direction of entrepreneurial alertness and efforts. In order to understand the plight of developing countries, it is critical to understand that it is not a lack of entrepreneurship that is the problem, but rather the institutional context...

With the collapse of communism in the late 1980s the field of comparative political economy has undergone major revision. Socialism is no longer considered the viable alternative to capitalism it once was. We now recognize that the choice is between alternative institutional arrangements of...

The book reviewed here contends that production techniques - and in particular today, techniques embodying modern information technology - determine political attitudes and, hence, the structure and role of the state. The book's author, Jean-Jacques Rosa, is not successful in making a compelling...

In spite of the fact that the Constitution's fifth amendment states that “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation,” politicians systematically impose almost confiscatory land-use restrictions on citizens. Growth of regulation and property-rights...