Journal ArticleDOI
Africa's Growth Tragedy: Policies and Ethnic Divisions
William Easterly,Ross Levine +1 more
TLDR
This article showed that ethnic diversity helps explain cross-country differences in public policies and other economic indicators in Sub-Saharan Africa, and that high ethnic fragmentation explains a significant part of most of these characteristics.Abstract:
Explaining cross-country differences in growth rates requires not only an understanding of the link between growth and public policies, but also an understanding of why countries choose different public policies. This paper shows that ethnic diversity helps explain cross-country differences in public policies and other economic indicators. In the case of Sub-Saharan Africa, economic growth is associated with low schooling, political instability, underdeveloped financial systems, distorted foreign exchange markets, high government deficits, and insufficient infrastructure. Africa's high ethnic fragmentation explains a significant part of most of these characteristics.read more
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Posted Content
Growth, History, or Institutions? What Explains State Fragility in Sub-Saharan Africa
TL;DR: This article explored the determinants of state fragility in sub-Saharan Africa and found that institutions, and in particular the civil liberties index and the number of revolutions, are the main determinants.
Journal ArticleDOI
Does conflict disrupt growth? Evidence of the relationship between political instability and national economic performance
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors draw on conflict variables from the Correlates of War (COW) project to ask a critical question: how do different types of conflict affect country growth rates?
Journal ArticleDOI
Crime induced poverty traps
TL;DR: In this article, the authors study the linkages between poverty and crime in a model of modern sector job creation and show that high poverty makes thieves and high crime makes hamper economic growth.
Journal ArticleDOI
Judicial Checks and Balances
Rafael La Porta,Rafael La Porta,Florencio Lopez de Silanes,Florencio Lopez de Silanes,Cristian Pop-Eleches,Andrei Shleifer,Andrei Shleifer +6 more
TL;DR: This paper found strong support for the proposition that both judicial independence and constitutional review are associated with greater freedom, consistent with theory, and argued that judicial independence accounts for some of the positive effect of common law legal origin on measures of economic freedom.
Book ChapterDOI
Managing Economic Volatility and Crises: Managing Macroeconomic Crises: Policy Lessons
Jeffrey Frankel,Shang-Jin Wei +1 more
TL;DR: Wei et al. as mentioned in this paper reviewed the last decade of the last eight years of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and found that these policies can always be reversed later, as history has shown.
References
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The mechanics of economic development
Abstract: This paper considers the prospects for constructing a neoclassical theory of growth and international trade that is consistent with some of the main features of economic development. Three models are considered and compared to evidence: a model emphasizing physical capital accumulation and technological change, a model emphasizing human capital accumulation through schooling, and a model emphasizing specialized human capital accumulation through learning-by-doing.
Journal ArticleDOI
On the mechanics of economic development
TL;DR: In this article, the authors consider the prospects for constructing a neoclassical theory of growth and international trade that is consistent with some of the main features of economic development, and compare three models and compared to evidence.
Posted Content
Law and Finance
Rafael La Porta,Rafael La Porta,Florencio Lopez de Silanes,Florencio Lopez de Silanes,Andrei Shleifer,Andrei Shleifer,Robert W. Vishny,Robert W. Vishny +7 more
TL;DR: This paper examined legal rules covering protection of corporate shareholders and creditors, the origin of these rules, and the quality of their enforcement in 49 countries and found that common law countries generally have the best, and French civil law countries the worst, legal protections of investors.
ReportDOI
Economic Growth in a Cross Section of Countries
TL;DR: For 98 countries in the period 1960-1985, the growth rate of real per capita GDP is positively related to initial human capital (proxied by 1960 school-enrollment rates) and negatively related to the initial (1960) level as mentioned in this paper.
Journal ArticleDOI
Finance and Growth: Schumpeter Might Be Right
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined a cross-section of about 80 countries for the period 1960-89 and found that various measures of financial development are strongly associated with both current and later rates of economic growth.