James Raymond Vreeland

The Effect of IMF Programs on Economic Growth

Using a bivariate, dynamic version of the Heckman selection model, we estimate the effect of participation in International Monetary Fund (IMF) programs on economic growth. We find evidence that governments enter into agreements with the IMF under the pressures of a foreign reserves crisis but they also bring in the Fund to shield themselves from the political costs of adjustment policies. Program participation lowers growth rates for as long as countries remain under a program. Once countries leave the program, they grow faster than if they had remained, but not faster than they would have without participation.

Democracy and Transparency

Are democracies more transparent than other types of political regimes? Many people believe that the presence of elections alone is not sufficient for a country to be considered democratic and that transparency must be included as part of the definition of political regime. We agree that contestability of elections and transparency of policymaking are analytically distinct concepts. Adopting minimalist approaches to democracy and transparency, we ask a basic question: do electoral politics provide incentives for governments to disseminate data? We thus investigate theoretically the relationship between regime type and the willingness of policy makers to provide credible announcements on policy-relevant variables. And we demonstrate empirically that the availability (or absence) of policy-relevant data is correlated with regime type, even after controlling for GDP per capita, IMF participation, country fixed-effects, and time trends1. Democracies are indeed more transparent.

The costs of favoritism: Is politically-driven aid less effective?

Governments provide foreign aid for both political and economic reasons, as is now well documented. Conventional wisdom holds that political motivations lower the effectiveness of aid in promoting developmental objectives. We test this claim by focusing on a setting in which we observe “effectiveness” with some precision, using the ex post performance ratings of World Bank projects. Our measures of “political importance” are plausibly exogenous: temporary membership on the UN Security Council or the World Bank Executive Board. We find that political motivations have a detrimental effect for Security Council members only when the country already faces excessive short-term debt or debt service. This finding suggests that political influence in aid allocation may impair aid’s effectiveness only when the recipient country faces a weak macroeconomic position.

Extreme Bounds of Democracy

What determines the emergence and survival of democracy? The authors apply extreme bounds analysis to test the robustness of fifty-nine factors proposed in the literature, evaluating over three million regressions with data from 165 countries from 1976 to 2002. The most robust determinants of the transition to democracy are gross domestic product (GDP) growth (a negative effect), past transitions (a positive effect), and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development membership (a positive effect). There is some evidence that fuel exporters and Muslim countries are less likely to see democracy emerge, although the latter finding is driven entirely by oil-producing Muslim countries. Regarding the survival of democracy, the most robust determinants are GDP per capita (a positive effect) and past transitions (a negative effect). There is some evidence that having a former military leader as the chief executive has a negative effect, while having other democracies as neighbors has a reinforcing effect.

The Effect of IMF Programs on Labor

Abstract Previous studies find that IMF programs have negative effects on income distribution [The International Monetary Fund and Latin America: Economic Stabilization and Class Conflict, Westview Press, Boulder, 1987a; World Dev. 15 (1987b) 365; World Dev. 28 (2000) 1031]. No study, however, has used parametric methods to control for nonrandom selection. Using a dynamic version of the Heckman selection model, I study the effect of IMF programs on the labor share of income from manufacturing. My conclusions are supported by 2,095 observations of 110 countries during 1961–93.

Why do governments and the IMF enter into agreements? Statistically selected cases

Why do governments and the International Monetary Fund (imf) enter into agreements? Conventional wisdom holds that governments turn to the Fund for a straightforward reason: they need an imf loan. An alternative argument is that governments want imf conditions to be imposed to help push through unpopular economic reforms. To illustrate how the desire for imf conditions can play a role in the decision to enter into an agreement, this article considers two analytically significant cases. Drawing upon a data set of 7011 country-year observations of 199 countries from 1952 (or year of independence) to 2000, two outliers are selected: the country observed with the least need for an imf loan participating in an imf program (Uruguay in 1990) and the country with the strongest need for an imf loan not participating in an imf program (Tanzania in 1983).

Globalization and the nation state : the impact of the IMF and the World Bank

Globalization and the nation state: the impact of the IMF and the World Bank , Globalization and the nation state: the impact of the IMF and the World Bank , کتابخانه دیجیتال و فن آوری اطلاعات دانشگاه امام صادق(ع)

Transparency, Protest, and Autocratic Instability

The collapse of autocratic regimes is often brought about through large-scale mobilization and collective action by elements of the populace. The willingness of any given member of the public to participate in actions such as strikes and protests is contingent upon her beliefs about others’ willingness to similarly mobilize. In this article, we examine the effect of a specific form of transparency—the disclosure of economic data by the government—on citizen belief formation, and consequently on collective mobilization. We present a theoretical model in which, under autocratic rule, transparency increases the frequency of protests, and increases the extent to which protest is correlated with incumbent performance. We find empirical support for these claims. Transparency destabilizes autocracies via mass protest.

Regional Organizations and International Politics: Japanese Influence Over the Asian Development Bank and the UN Security Council

Do regional hegemons use their power in regional organizations to advance foreign policy objectives? The authors investigate whether Japan leverages its privileged position at the Asian Development Bank (aDb) to facilitate project loans for the elected Asian members of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), a platform from which it seeks to shape global affairs. Analyzing panel data of aDb loan disbursements to twenty-four developing member-countries from 1968 to 2009, the authors find that temporary uNsc membership increases aDb loans, particularly during the post-1985 period, when Japan asserted greater influence in multilateral organizations. They estimate an average increase of over 30 percent. Because of Japan’s checkered history of imperialism, the aDb provides a convenient mechanism by which the government can obfuscate favors for politically important countries. Acting through this regional organization enables Japan to reconcile a low-key approach to foreign affairs with the contradictory goal of global activism-leading without appearing unilateralist.

Does membership on the UN security council influence IMF conditionality

We investigate whether elected members of the United Nations Security Council receive favorable treatment from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), analyzing panel data on the level of conditionality attached to (a maximum of) 314 IMF arrangements with 101 countries over the period of 1992 to 2008. We find a negative relationship: Security Council members receive about 30 percent fewer conditions attached to the loans that they receive from the IMF. We conclude that conditionality is softer for these countries because the major shareholders of the IMF desire influence over the Security Council.