This paper presents a framework for the integration of values (internalized norms) in a positive analysis of institutions and institutional change. Informal, norm-based institutions and formal – legal, economic, and political – institutions are co-determined as an equilibrium in the relations among economic and political actors. The paper discusses various ways that formal institutions influenc...

This paper develops a rigorous concept of institutions to investigate the interrelationships between institutional and economic change from the perspective of economic geography. We view institutions neither as behavioural regularities nor as organisations or rules, but conceive institutions as stabilisations of mutual expectations and correlated interaction. The paper discusses how economic in...

scholars have long been interested in the role of population and its impact on the economy of various countries, hence the theories on the subject. while malthus’ population theory presents a very pessimistic view and is formulated in a context which does not correspond to the conditions of the modern world, it occupies the minds of a majority of economists. it is interesting to know, while mal...

In this paper, we construct a simple model of simultaneous change and persistence in institutions. The model consists of landowning elites and workers, and the key economic decision concerns the form of economic institutions regulating the transaction of labor (e.g., competitive markets versus labor repression). The main idea is that equilibrium economic institutions are a result of the exercis...

This paper develops the empirical and theoretical case that differences in economic institutions are the fundamental cause of differences in economic development. We first document the empirical importance of institutions by focusing on two "quasi-natural experiments" in history, the division of Korea into two parts with very different economic institutions and the colonization of much of the w...

The idea that economic institutions are determinants of long-run economic performance is largely associated with the work of Douglass North and several other economists in the post-War period. Although the importance of institutions has been recognized by many authors since at least Adam Smith (1776), much of post-War economics research ignored the importance of institutions for economic growth...

There has recently been a resurgence of interest in how institutions affect economic performance. A review of this literature reveals that the concept of an "institution" means different things to different scholars, both within economics and across the social sciences. We discuss what factors unify the different definitions of institutions, and develop a concept of institutions useful for the ...

this paper explores the effects of general and agricultural trade openness on economic freedom and alongside with the quality of institutions, on income and poverty. recent cross-country data for over 200 nations in global regions were used to estimate equations for income, poverty and economic freedom. economic freedom appears to have positive impacts on income levels, which together with good...

There has recently been a resurgence of interest in how institutions affect economic performance. A review of this literature reveals that the concept of an “institution” means different things to different scholars, both within economics and across the social sciences. We discuss what factors unify the different definitions of institutions, and develop a concept of institutions useful for the ...