Marta Reynal is an Affiliated Professor at the Barcelona Graduate School of Economics. Reynal delivered an in-depth analysis about the role dynastic leaders play in securing growth and prosperity in developing countries. By gathering an extensive data about the different characteristics of political leaders, she suggests that the success of dynasties in terms of economic performance will depend on the strength of the executive constraints. Reynal concludes that dynastic leaders tend to perform better than non-dynastic ones when there are weak constraints and not very strong institution...
Pamplona. March 4th, 2013.
Manuel Villoria is a Professor of Political Science and a member of Transparency International. He proposed a conceptual framework to understand corruption in the Weekly Seminar presentation. Villoria described the endemic corruption and inefficient government institutions in developed and undeveloping countries. Throughout his presentation, he explained some current measures that are used by governments to fight corruption. However, Villoria highlighted the weaknesses of these measures and argued their validity as a way to reduce corruption.
Pamplona. February 25th, 2013.
Eoin McGuirk is a Ph.D. candidate from Trinity College Dublin. While at the NCID, he discussed the causes of teachers’ absenteeism. According to McGuirk, one potential explanation for this phenomenon is the impact of ethnic divisions. By using a nationally representative series of random, unannounced school visits in Uganda; and a large opinion survey of citizens in 16 sub-Saharan African countries, he was able to present robust evidence of a link between ethnic divisions and teacher absenteeism. McGuirk concluded that this study has a sig...