This article provides a survey of a growing body of empirical evidence that points toward the
important long-term effects that historic events can have on economic development. The …

We investigate the role of deeply rooted pre‐colonial ethnic institutions in shaping
comparative regional development within African countries. We combine information on the …

Mine-related transport infrastructure typically connects mines directly to the coast, a pattern
that is most clearly seen in Africa. We estimate the effect of such infrastructure on the pattern …

We investigate jointly the importance of contemporary country-level institutional structures
and local ethnic-specific pre-colonial institutions in shaping comparative regional …

Institutions, and more specifically private property rights, have come to be seen as a major
determinant of long‐run economic development. We evaluate the case for property rights as …

Institutional reforms in developing countries often involve copying institutions from
developed countries. Such institutional copying is likely to fail, if formal institutions alone are …

Little is known of why institutional transfers have been largely disappointing. Berkowitz et
al.(2001) have argued that because of what they call the transplant effect, imported law lacks …

Neo-colonialism is widely viewed by many writers as the survival of the colonial system in an
ex-colony. It is one of the issues that have blighted sustainable development in Nigeria. In …

This paper introduces a new measure of Roman roads that has been constructed for the
Italian territory. The measure computes the length in kilometers of Roman roads at different …

This study argues that European colonial policies and former colonies' genetic variation
(genetic distance to Europeans and genetic diversity) were interlinked. Over a prolonged …