Existing research maintains that socioeconomically disadvantaged individuals are reluctant to seek information that might help mitigate risk. We challenge this convention by proposing that perceptions of risks associated with global economic shocks can incentivize some disadvantaged individuals to… read more about this publication »
This article proposes a framework to analyze realignment processes in countries that transition from industrial to knowledge societies. It characterizes the electorate in terms of two traits that are main predictors for attitudes in a two-dimensional policy space of economic and noneconomic issues… read more about this publication »
A large body of game-theoretic work examines the process by which uncertainty can lead to inefficient war. In a typical crisis bargaining model, players negotiate according to a pre-specified game form and no player has the ability to change the rules of the game. However, when one of the parties… read more about this publication »
Dr. Harold Black has made a career of investigating the effects of different rules and institutional arrangements on the extent to which market participants in finance can exercise a taste for discrimination. This paper considers the nature of Black's contributions, and reviews some particulars of… read more about this publication »
In any racialized social system, a dominant racial ideology will emerge to uphold it, but it is always contested by and in dialog with others. This article leverages conversations around Black Lives Matter, All Lives Matter, and Blue Lives Matter as a site of racetalk. By moving beyond narrow… read more about this publication »
Duncan Black, like Adam Smith before him, was trained at, and taught at, the University of Glasgow. Like Smith, Black followed the Enlightenment in appreciating the importance of theory and of its empirical applications. Black sought to apply the ideas of a schedule of preferences and a conception… read more about this publication »
BackgroundWhen countries reach the middle-income threshold, many multilateral donors, including Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance (Gavi), begin to withdraw their official development assistance (ODA), known as graduation. We hypothesised that bilateral donors might follow Gavi's lead, except in countries… read more about this publication »
Using data from the National Family Health Survey-5 (2019–21), it is found that younger individuals (20–40 years) have made impressive gains in education. The average young Indian has a high school education—much better than their mother’s generation that went to school for only three years. Gender… read more about this publication »
Is it possible to stimulate women's income-generating activities by relaxing their financial and human capital constraints? Does involving husbands help or hinder the effort? We examine these questions using a three-arm randomized-controlled trial with 2000 women in Tunisia. Women in the two… read more about this publication »
Political discourse is the soul of democracy, but misunderstanding and conflict can fester in divisive conversations. The widespread shift to online discourse exacerbates many of these problems and corrodes the capacity of diverse societies to cooperate in solving social problems. Scholars and… read more about this publication »
Despite strong theoretical foundations, randomized evaluations demonstrate that subnational performance assessments have a mixed record in improving governance. We suggest that a key factor influencing this disappointing result has been the omission of facilitation—working with bureaucrats on how… read more about this publication »
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was intended to reduce inequalities in access to healthcare resources. However, a 2012 Supreme Court decision allowed states to opt out of a key component of the policy, leading to even greater variation in Medicaid's implementation. Using this variation, we estimate… read more about this publication »
Do anonymous online conversations between people with different political views exacerbate or mitigate partisan polarization? We created a mobile chat platform to study the impact of such discussions. Our study recruited Republicans and Democrats in the United States to complete a survey about… read more about this publication »
ImportanceThe COVID-19 pandemic has been notable for the widespread dissemination of misinformation regarding the virus and appropriate treatment.ObjectiveTo quantify the prevalence of non-evidence-based treatment for COVID-19 in the US and the association between such treatment and endorsement of… read more about this publication »
Armed conflict increases food insecurity leading to malnutrition especially in women, but can peace operations mitigate the increased prevalence of malnutrition in conflict zones? This study uses women’s nutrition outcomes—key indicators of societal health and peace potential in a community—as a… read more about this publication »
In recent years, an array of initiatives has sought to bridge widely recognized gaps separating international studies scholars from policymakers and the public. While such gaps persist, changes in society, the media, and academia have altered the context for scholars seeking to make their research… read more about this publication »
This article proposes a framework for understanding why slum residents are particularly vulnerable to economic downturns. We centre evidence from Bihar’s capital city, Patna, to examine how downturns are experienced more severely in some cities and slums than others. We argue slums are zones of… read more about this publication »
BackgroundWe aimed to characterize the prevalence of social disconnection and thoughts of suicide among older adults in the United States, and examine the association between them in a large naturalistic study.MethodsWe analyzed data from 6 waves of a fifty-state non-probability survey among US… read more about this publication »
Women have less influence than men in a variety of settings. Does this result from stereotypes that depict women as less capable, or biased interpretations of gender differences in behavior? We present a field experiment that-unbeknownst to the participants-randomized the gender of avatars assigned… read more about this publication »
In early 2021, members of Congress cast a series of high-profile roll call votes forcing them to choose between condoning or opposing Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Substantial majorities of House Republicans supported Trump, first by opposing the certification… read more about this publication »
We conceptualize broad purges, which extend far below top powerholders in authoritarian regimes and operate according to a logic fundamentally different from coup-proofing purges that target rivals to the supreme leader. Broad purges induce risk reduction in decision making because they grossly… read more about this publication »
Why are some states open to talking while fighting while others are not? We argue that a state considering opening negotiations is concerned not only with the adverse inference that the opposing state will draw, but also the actions that the opposing state might take in response to that inference.… read more about this publication »
The constitutional political economy (CPE) approach as developed by James Buchanan places emphasis on supermajority rules—in particular, a unanimity requirement for constitutional change. Critics argue that this approach “privileges the status quo” in two problematic ways: (1) alternatives are… read more about this publication »
Daily cognitive fatigue is widespread, yet we are still learning about its influence on political behavior. Existing research suggests fatigue will reduce consumption of politics at the margin. Moreover, when fatigued individuals do engage with political material, they should be more likely to… read more about this publication »