The present paper analyses how resource rents may affect political outcomes in a polarized society, where groups hold conflicting views on economic policy. A politically dominant group decides whether or not to include the opposition in the national political process. The weaker group chooses...

Empirical evidence shows that countries richly endowed with natural resources like oil and gas tend to have slower economic growth than resource poor countries. The present paper focuses on rentseeking as a source of the “resource curse,” using Iran as a case in point. Iran is an interesting...