The research aims to investigate the relationship between economic freedom, political freedom and economic growth. The Arab Spring placed renewed interest on the topic of freedom, yet current economic conditions seemingly contradicted the established theory. The largest free economies were being outperformed by those with less political and economic freedom.Three objectives were specified to answer the research question. The first objective aimed to determine the association between economic freedom, political freedom and economic growth, for which Spearman’s correlation was used. The second objective aimed to investigate causal relationships between the variables, for which Granger’s causality was employed. The third objective aimed to examine complex relationships between the variables, for which vector autoregression was used.Economic growth was weakly correlated with the independent variables. Civil liberties, political rights and economic freedom, however, had strong correlations with each other. Economic freedom and economic growth had bi-directional Granger-causality. Political rights Granger-caused economic freedom whilst civil liberties Granger-caused political rights and economic freedom. Using vector autoregression, the model consisting of economic growth, economic freedom and civil liberties had the greatest explanatory power towards economic growth. Existing theory therefore remains valid: political freedom enhances economic freedom, which, in turn, enhances economic growth.The relationship between economic freedom, political freedom and economic growth / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

During the last 20 years there has been a rapid increase of Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in Africa. Through examination of published research, we discover that Chinese FDI does not appear to clearly follow traditional assumptions of FDI. Especially in relation to economic freedom. This uncertainty, combined with lacking empirical research and limited available data in the region, led us to the aim of this work. We have set out to examine whether economic freedom is a determinant of Chinese FDI in Africa. For this purpose, a biennial panel data study for the years 2009 to 2019 was constructed. Fixed effects models using indices for economic freedom and relevant control variables are employed. The results show that economic freedom as defined by the Fraser Institute has a negative effect on Chinese FDI. Further, high levels of regulation reduces Chinese FDI. These findings stand in contrast to traditional theory on FDI determinants.

Thesis (LLM.) -- University of Limpopo, 2021 / Although the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996 does not specifically make reference to the phrase “separation of powers”, the constitutional scheme, however, subscribes to the doctrine of separation of powers. The manner in which the Constitution allocates powers and functions to the different organs of the state is indicative of the application of the doctrine of separation of powers. This study was aimed at investigating whether the separation of powers principle was not trampled upon in the light of the decision in EFF2. The study finds that there was judicial overreach in EEF2. The majority judgment encroached into the exclusive domain of Parliament. The court, in exercising its checks and balances role, failed to observe its own constitutional limits by dictating how Parliament should run its affairs. The study recommends that courts must respect the duties and functions of other organs of the state. Courts must understand that each organ of the state has a duty to perform. Only when an organ of the state has performed a duty or function in a manner that offends or violates the Constitution can the court intervene.

Firms use former government officials (FGOs) on the board of directors to create external linkage with the government. I examine investors’ perception of FGOs on the board of directors and how institutional environments affect it. Using a large sample of 23,444 hand-collected observations from 31 non-U.S. countries, I show that political directors (PDs) are associated with improved investors’ perception. Drawing from political science literature, I theorize and show that former senior bureaucrats (SBDs), but not former ministers (MDs) or government advisors (ADs), drive the improved investors’ perception. Furthermore, I show that stronger institutional environments, measured by economic freedom, lead to less improved investors’ perception of PDs. Here too SBDs drives my results associated with and economic freedom, but not MDs or ADs, lending support to my initial findings.

Sustainable economic growth is vital to reduce poverty and a challenge to development. To aim and maintain a greater level of economic growth that will assist African countries in reducing poverty, they must investigate the specific determinants of economic growth. In this paper, we determine the impact of economic freedom, political freedom, and foreign direct investment on the gross domestic product. The gross domestic product was observed over a nine year-time period on a sample of 38 low-income and upper-income countries in Africa.

Economic preferences are crucial in decision making. While some preferences remain stable, changes in economic preferences have been linked to institutional and policy changes. We conduct three studies to explore the ways in which decision making might be impacted by economic preferences and underlying or changing policies. Our studies span the domains of preventative healthcare, strategic interactions, and education. Chapter 2 examines the relationship between cooperative decision making and changes in societal level institutions through a meta-meta analysis, incorporating experimental data from various previously conducted meta-analyses. We study the relationship between country or region level policy changes, as measured by economic freedom indices to experimental measures of prosocial and selfish behavior. Our results indicate a relationship between macro-level institutional changes and measures of co-operative behavior that varies based on the starting levels of economic freedom variables. This establishes a relationship between macro policies and individual behavior that suggests that governments should consider the consequences of policies on individual decision making. Chapter 3, using vignette experiments, explores how emotion reappraisal messaging interventions affect betrayal aversion and vaccine hesitancy. The measure of betrayal aversion in our study involves hesitancy in risking being betrayed in situations involving trust related to vaccines. We find that betrayal aversion is prevalent in about a third of our study participants and that two of our messaging interventions substantially reduce betrayal aversion involving vaccination decisions. Our results suggests a targeted messaging strategy for addressing a recently discovered new component of vaccine hesitancy, an important current topic in preventative healthcare. Chapter 4, introduces an active learning intervention in the form of a field experiment involving a health intervention nudge and explores its impact on class engagement and education outcomes of students. In addition, we look at the impact of the nudge on vaccination uptake among students. We find improved class engagement as well as improvement in test scores for students who had the opportunity and chose to participate in the nudge experiment. In addition, we find greater uptake of influenza vaccination, as targeted by the nudge treatment. Our results show that this effect is driven by men, with women having higher vaccination rates irrespective of the nudge treatment. JEL codes: C91, H1, 01, P5, I12, D91, A22, C93 / Doctor of Philosophy / This dissertation explores how policy changes in our environment, interact with our preferences and affect decision making in social decision making, healthcare and education domains. We explore macro policies designed to create country-level institutional changes, involving the legal system, monetary policy, trade and labor policy, as well as examining two individual-level interventions including targeted messaging to improve vaccination uptake, and course performance in introductory economics. These wide variety of policy interventions give us a wide spectrum of decisions to study across different domains. Chapter 2 examines the relationship between policy changes at the macro-institutional level and aggregate cooperative decision making. In this study, we establish a relationship between baseline institutional structure and changes in cooperative behavior corresponding to changes in societal level institutions. Our results suggests that current and historic societal level institutional structures should be kept in mind when designing policies. Chapter 3 explores the effect of messaging treatments targeting emotions on uptake of vaccination using a vignette experiment. Here, we study the effects on a particular emotion, betrayal aversion, which in our study, involves hesitancy related to the risk of getting betrayed in the context of vaccination. Our results suggest that a targeted messaging strategy, might prove to be effective in designing policies to improve vaccination uptake. Chapter 4 explores the impact of an active learning approach on class engagement and education outcomes of students in introductory economics. Providing students the chance to participate in a field experiment designed as a vaccination nudge, we incorporate the active learning component of the course and study the impact of participation in this active learning module. Our results suggest improved engagement and education outcomes among students who had the opportunity to participate in the experiment. Our results also suggest that proximity nudges might prove to be effective in improving vaccination uptake. We demonstrate the importance of designing context-specific policies for them to be instrumental in bringing about targeted change. At the aggregate country level, we find that similar type of policy interventions when introduced in countries with differing baseline institutional structures might lead to different results. At the individual level, we find evidence that targeted interventions does shape decisions. We find that targeted health communications messaging can lead to improvement in health behavior. We also find that introducing active learning modules improves learning outcomes among students. Taken together, the findings in this dissertation demonstrates how both economic preferences and underlying policies are important factors in decision making.

This dissertation explores the determining effects of non-economic factors on economic growth of developed versus developing nations. While earlier economic theories have traditionally focused on land, labor, capital and technology as the principle determining factors of economic growth, latter-day normative theorists demonstrated the importance of cultural forces and human capital variables on economic growth of nations. This dissertation is an extension of this emphasis put on economic growth by the latter-day normative theorists. Economic activities for developed and developing nations have been used as a proxy stock variable (for economic growth) for three points in time ? 1980, 1990 and 2000. The data for economic activities has been obtained from Jerry Dwyer?s dataset while the independent variables such as economic freedom has been obtained from the Fraser Institute and that of social capital variables have been obtained from the World Values Survey for the years 1980, 1990 and 2000. The central focus of the research has been to observe the correlations between the several components of economic freedom and social capital variables (such as trust and membership) among developed and developing nations followed by multiple regression analyses of the economic freedom and social capital variables on economic growth of developed and developing nations. The findings of this research suggest that physical capital and economic freedom and unequivocally significant determinants of economic growth in both the developed and developing nations. Trust on the other hand has been understood to be a limited variable in the way it is conceptualized in the World Values Survey. Within this limitation, ?personal trust? has been found to be declining over the years for all the nations, has very little association with membership categories over the years and is negatively correlated with economic activities/economic growth or output per worker. The impact of membership or belongingness on economic activities is very different in developed versus developing countries. Overall, this research has helped to broaden the boundaries of economic growth with the extension of sociological variables (such as trust and membership) into the field of Economics. The research has broad-based implications on the public policies of government across nations.

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This thesis tries to determine some of the driving force behind Swedish foreign direct in-vestments into the Baltic counties. The analysis is performed in three steps, first we analyze global FDI into transitional economies, and afterwards we look at Swedish FDI and com-pare it with German FDI. The determinants examined are index of economic freedom, R&D intensity, trade balance, wage level and proximity. The analyzed period is form 1995 to 2005. The analysis use data on the following transition countries Latvia, Lithuania, Esto-nia, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria. The results show that the determinants vary across the countries. The motives of Swedish and German investors differ. Thus, for Swedish investors R&D, economical free-dom and trade balance are the influencing factors, but for Germany only trade balance and wage level are important. The conclusion is that different determinants triggers foreign di-rect investment in transitional economies in different ways.

<p>This thesis tries to determine some of the driving force behind Swedish foreign direct in-vestments into the Baltic counties. The analysis is performed in three steps, first we analyze global FDI into transitional economies, and afterwards we look at Swedish FDI and com-pare it with German FDI. The determinants examined are index of economic freedom, R&D intensity, trade balance, wage level and proximity. The analyzed period is form 1995 to 2005. The analysis use data on the following transition countries Latvia, Lithuania, Esto-nia, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria. The results show that the determinants vary across the countries. The motives of Swedish and German investors differ. Thus, for Swedish investors R&D, economical free-dom and trade balance are the influencing factors, but for Germany only trade balance and wage level are important. The conclusion is that different determinants triggers foreign di-rect investment in transitional economies in different ways.</p>