|
on Central and Western Asia |
| By: | Oguz Atuk; Mustafa Utku Ozmen |
| Date: | 2009 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tcb:wpaper:0903&r=cwa |
| By: | Duvvuri Subbarao |
| Abstract: | The main question that the Governor is asking to the RBI staff is "how can I do my job better so that I can make a positive difference to the country?" |
| Keywords: | RBI, researve bank of India, histor, pre-independence, china, economic growth, poverty reduction, banking network |
| Date: | 2009 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ess:wpaper:id:1885&r=cwa |
| By: | Fletcher, Erin (University of Colorado, Boulder); Iyigun, Murat (University of Colorado, Boulder) |
| Abstract: | Ethnic and religious fractionalization have important effects on economic growth and development, but their role in internal violent conflicts has been found to be negligible and statistically insignificant. These findings have been invoked in refutation of the Huntington hypothesis, according to which differences of ethnic, religious and cultural identities are the ultimate determinants of conflict. However, fractionalization in all its demographic forms is endogenous in the long run. In this paper, we empirically investigate the impact of violent conflicts on ethno-religious fractionalization. The data involve 953 conflicts that took place in 52 countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East between 1400 CE and 1900 CE. Besides a variety of violent confrontations ranging from riots, revolts and power wars between secular sovereigns, the data cover religiously motivated confrontations. We document that countries in which Muslim on Christian wars unfolded more frequently are significantly more religiously homogenous today. In contrast, those places where Protestant versus Catholic confrontations occurred or Jewish pogroms took place are more fractionalized, both ethnically and religiously. And the longer were the duration of all such conflicts and violence, the less fractionalized countries are today. These results reveal that the demographic structure of countries in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa still bear the traces of a multitude of ecclesiastical and cultural clashes that occurred throughout the course of history. They also suggest that endogeneity could render the relationship between fractionalization and the propensity of internal conflict statistically insignificant. Finally, instrumenting for conflicts with some geographic attributes and accounting for the endogeneity of fractionalization with respect to ecclesiastical conflicts shows that religous fractionalization likely has negative effects on economic growth. |
| Keywords: | conflict, religion, institutions, economic development |
| JEL: | C72 D74 N33 N43 O10 |
| Date: | 2009–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp4116&r=cwa |
| By: | Fatma El-Hamidi |
| Abstract: | . . . |
| Date: | 2009–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pit:wpaper:380&r=cwa |
| By: | Mohammadi, Hassan; Jahan-Parvar, Mohammad R. |
| Abstract: | The paper studies the long-run relation and short-run dynamics between real oil prices and real exchange rates in a sample of fourteen oil-exporting countries to examine the possibility of Dutch disease in these countries. The results, based on threshold and momentum-threshold autoregressive (TAR and M-TAR) tests of cointegration, are mixed. Support for Dutch disease is found in five countries. For these countries, we also find evidence of (a) long-run uni-directional causality from oil prices to exchange rates; (b) faster adjustments in exchange rates to positive deviations from the equilibrium; and (c) short-run unidirectional causality from oil prices to exchange rates in two countries, unidirectional causality from exchange rates to oil prices in one country, and bi-directional causality between oil prices and exchange rates in one country. |
| Keywords: | Asymmetry; Cointegration; Dutch Disease; Error Correction; Oil Prices; Real Exchange Rates; Threshold and Momentum Threshold Autoregressive Models |
| JEL: | F37 C32 C52 F47 F31 |
| Date: | 2009–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:14578&r=cwa |
| By: | Jean-Paul Carvalho |
| Abstract: | There has been a dramatic surge in Islamic participation and values since the 1970s. We propose a theory of the contemporary Islamic revival based upon two forms of relative deprivation - envy and unfulfilled aspirations. To analyze these motivations, a behavioral model of religion is developed in which agents have reference-dependent preferences. We demonstrate that raised aspirations, low social mobility, high income inequality and poverty are intimately related, not separate causes of a religious revival. As such, the origins of the Islamic revival are traced to a combination of two developments: (1) a growth reversal which raised aspirations and led subsequently to a decline in social mobility which left aspirations unfulfilled among the educated middle class, (2) increasing income inequality impoverishment of the lower-middle class. The sexual revolution in the West and rapid urbanization in Muslim societies intensified this process of religious revival. |
| Keywords: | Islamic revival, Economics of religion, Endogenous preferences, Reference-dependent preferences, Inequality, Relative deprivation |
| JEL: | Z12 J22 |
| Date: | 2009 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oxf:wpaper:424&r=cwa |