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on Africa |
| By: | Congdon Fors, Heather (Department of Economics, School of Economics and Commercial Law, Göteborg University); Olsson, Ola (Department of Economics, School of Economics and Commercial Law, Göteborg University) |
| Abstract: | A key event in economic history was the independence of nearly ninety former colonies after World War II. On the basis of qualitative and quantitative evidence, we argue that independence often constituted an institutional disequilibrium that the new regimes reacted to in very different ways. We present a model of endogenous changes in property rights institutions where an autocratic post-colonial ruler faces a basic trade-off between stronger property rights, which increases his dividends from the modern sector, and weaker property rights that increases his ability to appropriate resource rents. The model predicts that revenuemaximizing regimes in control of an abundance of resource rents and with insignificant interests in the modern sector will rationally install weak institutions of private property, a prediction which we argue is well in line with actual developments in for instance DR Congo, Ghana, and Zambia. <p> |
| Keywords: | institutions; property rights; independence; resource rents; rent seeking |
| JEL: | O17 O57 P14 |
| Date: | 2005–03–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0163&r=afr |
| By: | Peter Nunnenkamp |
| Abstract: | Die meisten afrikanischen Länder laufen Gefahr, die Millennium Development Goals weit zu verfehlen. Die Vereinten Nationen fordern deshalb, die Entwicklungshilfe massiv aufzustocken, und der Afrika-Aktionsplan der G8 verspricht eine Konzentration der Hilfe auf Afrika. Vor diesem Hintergrund stellt sich zum einen die Frage, in welchem Maß die lokalen Voraussetzungen für eine produktive Verwendung der Entwicklungshilfe in den afrikanischen Empfängerländern gegeben sind. Zum anderen ist die Versicherung der Geber zu hinterfragen, dass sich die Verteilung der Hilfe für Afrika an Effizienzkriterien orientiert. In beiderlei Hinsicht klaffen zwischen Worten und Taten immer noch erhebliche Lücken. Insbesondere zeigt sich, dass die Vergabepraxis bisher kaum durch veränderte wirtschaftspolitische und institutionelle Rahmenbedingungen in den afrikanischen Empfängerländern geprägt worden ist. |
| Keywords: | Millennium Development Goals, Afrika, Entwicklungshilfe, Selektivität, Armutsorientierung, wirtschaftspolitische und institutionelle Rahmenbedingungen |
| JEL: | F35 |
| Date: | 2005–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kie:kieliw:1239&r=afr |
| By: | Daron Acemoglu; Simon Johnson; James Robinson; Pierre Yared |
| Abstract: | We revisit one of the central empirical findings of the political economy literature that higher income per capita causes democracy. Existing studies establish a strong cross-country correlation between income and democracy, but do not typically control for factors that simultaneously affect both variables. We show that controlling for such factors by including country fixed effects removes the statistical association between income per capita and various measures of democracy. We also present instrumental-variables using two different strategies. These estimates also show no causal effect of income on democracy. Furthermore, we reconcile the positive cross-country correlation between income and democracy with the absence of a causal effect of income on democracy by showing that the long-run evolution of income and democracy is related to historical factors. Consistent with this, the positive correlation between income and democracy disappears, even without fixed effects, when we control for the historical determinants of economic and political development in a sample of former European colonies. |
| JEL: | P16 O10 |
| Date: | 2005–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11205&r=afr |