Suchergebnisse

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 decentralization as an institutional arrangement for rent-sharing and political codetermination of regions within a country may limit the destructive effect of the natural-resource rents on internal stability. Using cross-country and panel data covering the period 1984-2004 from more than 90 countries, we find evidence that natural-resource rents indeed increase the risk of internal conflict, but this relationship is significantly mitigated by decentralization.

This study examines how the quality of political institutions affects the distribution of the government budget in Iran. We first introduce a mechanism through which democracy can shift government expenditure from national defense (military) to productivity-enhancing public spending (e.g., education). Using impulse response functions (IRF) and a variance decomposition analysis (VDC) on the basis of a vector autoregressive (VAR) model, our results imply that the response of military spending to an improvement (a deterioration) of democratic institutions is negative (positive) and statistically significant, whereas that of education spending is positive (negative) and significant. Our results are robust to other indicators of political institutions, different orderings of variables in the VAR and alternative specifications of government spending categories.

This study examines how quality of political institutions affects the distribution of government budget in Iran. We first introduce a mechanism through which this can shift government expenditure from patronage to more constructive public spending. Using impulse response functions (IRF) and variance decomposition analysis (VDC) on the basis of Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model, our results imply that a positive shock towards more democratic institutions leads to negative and statistically significant response of military spending and positive and statistically significant response of education expenditures. Our results are robust to different political institutional quality indicators, ordering of variables in the VAR and different specifications of government spending categories.

This study examines how quality of political institutions affects the distribution of government budget in Iran. We first introduce a mechanism through which this can shift government expenditure from patronage to more constructive public spending. Using impulse response functions (IRF) and variance decomposition analysis (VDC) on the basis of Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model, our results imply that a positive shock towards more democratic institutions leads to negative and statistically significant response of military spending and positive and statistically significant response of education expenditures. Our results are robust to different political institutional quality indicators, ordering of variables in the VAR and different specifications of government spending categories.