The dissertation compiles a series of essays which describes effects of various institutional variations randomized across a sample of 500 villages in Afghanistan in 2007. The first essay examines the institutional effects of the creation of democratically-elected, gender-balanced village development councils across 474 village councils. The creation of councils is found to have no effects on the structure and function of local governance or on how male villagers perceive local governance quality. However, council creation provokes increased local governance activity among paramilitary commanders – who experience broad-based improvements in public perceptions – and improves perceptions of local governance quality among women. The results indicate that externally-imposed de jure reforms do not substantially alter institutional outcomes, but may provoke countervailing responses by political authorities seeking to benefit from the institutional change. The second essay examines the effects of direct democracy on the alignment between public resource allocation decisions and citizen preferences. Using data from 250 villages, the study compares decision outcomes produced by secret-ballot referenda with outcomes produced by public meetings led by an elected village council. The results indicate that while elites do exert influence over outcomes produced by public meetings, their preferences do not determine the outcomes of referenda, which are influenced primarily by citizen preferences. Referenda are also found to improve citizen satisfaction, which is particularly low where elites exert undue influence over outcomes. The third essay examines whether the inclusion of villages in Afghanistan‘s largest development program affects counter-insurgency outcomes, such as individual perceptions of well-being, attitudes towards government, and the occurrence of violent incidents in surrounding areas. The program is found to affect all three measures, but only in areas with low levels of initial violence. The results indicate that development programs can limit the onset of insurgencies in relatively secure areas, but are not effective in improving attitudes to government and reducing violence where insurgents are already active. / Government

What explains public opinion toward economic globalization, and specifically, toward international trade? A wave of recent scholarship has shown that symbolic and identity-based factors--individual predispositions such as ethnocentrism, nationalism, prejudice, and cosmopolitanism--are highly correlated with attitudes toward trade. The nature of the relationship between symbolic attitudes and trade opinion, however, remains conspicuously unclear. This dissertation combines fresh empirical strategies with the theoretical tools of both economics and psychology to illuminate the role and effect of non-material factors in the formation of public opinion toward international trade. I present a new theoretical framework for the study of individual preferences in international political economy, and test the empirical implications of the theory using observational data, an original survey experiment, and systematic analysis of open-ended survey responses. Specifically, I show: (1) that symbolic attitudes such a prejudice have a causal effect on trade preferences, independent of economic considerations; (2) that the effect of economic self-interest on trade preferences is contingent upon the strength of symbolic attitudes; and (3) that the trade preferences of cosmopolitan individuals are susceptible to the effect of subjective beliefs about the impact of trade on foreigners, providing the first evidence of foreign-regarding motivations in the context of trade opinion. / Government

Cryptocurrencies and blockchains are increasingly used, implemented and adapted for numerous purposes; people and businesses are integrating these technologies into their practices and strategies, creating new political economies and spaces in and of everyday life. This thesis seeks to develop a foundation of geographic theory for the study of spatial production within and surrounding blockchain technologies focusing on acute studies of Bitcoin as cryptocurrency, Ethereum as digital marketplace, and their conditions of possibility as decentralized autonomous organizations. Utilizing concepts from Henri Lefebvre's Production of Space, this thesis situates blockchain technologies within the wider discussion about the political economy of modes of spatial production, dialectical material methods, code/space, and network society through an examination of human and machine relations within their unique and emergent spaces. Combining phenomenological and dialectical material methods with the methodological practice of discourse analysis and systems theory, this thesis explores an understanding of how systemic mechanisms and actant actions driving blockchain technologies are indications of new evolutions in our conceptions of space and place in everyday life of later informational capitalism.

The two decades preceding the global financial crisis of 2008 saw an increase in international migration flows. This development was accompanied by the relaxation of immigration entry controls for select categories of foreign workers across the developed world. The scale of labour immigration, and the categories of foreign workers granted entry, varied considerably across states. To some extent, these developments transcended the traditional classifications of comparative immigration politics. This thesis examines the reform process in two states with contrasting policy legacies that adopted liberal labour immigration selection and control policies during the abovementioned period. The instrumental role that immigration has played in the process of nation-building in Australia has led it to be classified as a 'traditional destination state' with a positive immigration policy legacy. By contrast, immigration has not been significant in the formation of national identity in the United Kingdom. It has a more negative immigration policy legacy and is generally regarded as a 'reluctant state'. Examining the reasons for liberal shifts in labour immigration policy in two states with different immigration politics allows insights to be gained into the processes of policy-making and the dynamics that underpin it. In Australia, labour immigration controls were relaxed incrementally and through a deliberative process. Reform was justified on the grounds that it fulfilled economic needs and objectives, and was consistent with an accepted definition of the national interest. In the UK, liberal shifts in labour immigration policy were the incidental consequence of the pursuit of objectives in other policy areas. Reform was implemented unilaterally, and in an uncoordinated manner characterised by an absence of consultation. The contrast in the manner in which reform was managed by the various actors, institutions and stakeholders involved in the process both reflected, and served to reinforce, the immigration policy legacies of the two states. Moreover, the Howard government used Australia's positive legacy to construct a coherent narrative to justify the implementation of liberal reform. This generated greater immediate and lasting support for its reforms among stakeholders and the broader community. By contrast, lacking a similarly positive legacy, the Blair government in the UK found it difficult to create such a narrative, which contributed to the unpopularity of its reforms. This thesis therefore argues that policy legacies had a significant impact on the processes and dynamics that shaped labour immigration selection and control decisions during the recent wave of international migration. The cases demonstrate that a nation's past immigration policy experiences shape its policy-making structures, as well as institutional and stakeholder policy preferences, which are core constituent components of a nation's immigration politics. The UK case shows that even when reluctant states implement liberal labour immigration policies, these characteristics tend to create feedback effects that make it difficult for reform to be durable. The relationship between immigration policy and politics thus becomes self-reinforcing. But this does not necessarily mean that states' immigration politics are rigid, since the institutions that help to make a nation's immigration policy and shape its politics will inevitably undergo a process of adaptation in response to changing contexts.

Using data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, this paper examines differences in entrepreneurial perceptions (fear of failure, opportunity perception, self-efficacy, public opinion) between CEE and non-CEE countries, before and after the 2008 recession, as well as the effects of these perceptions on entrepreneurial motivation and overall levels of activity. The results suggest that CEE countries have systematically more pessimistic outlooks in terms of fear of failure and opportunity perception, but no difference from non-CEE countries in self-efficacy and public opinion. Additionally, most of the difference in fear of failure and opportunity perception, along with an increase in necessity-motivated entrepreneurship, comes after the recession, suggesting less durability and resilience of optimistic entrepreneurial perceptions in CEE countries. Finally, there is evidence of a higher threshold for a perceived opportunity to become a business reality in these post-socialist CEE countries.

Socio-economic processes have long underlined the value of language and ethno-linguistic categories in Canada. The Quiet Revolution, widely considered to be one such process, has resulted in the production of Quebec's English-speaking minority. Although recent studies pertaining to Quebec's English-speaking minority have largely focused on the construction of identity, little research has explored the perceived value of language. While Quebec City’s English-speaking minority is increasingly bilingual, figures suggest that its youth continues to migrate. Through a critical perspective, this thesis explores how Quebec City’s English-speaking minority is navigating the uneven distribution and rising value of bilingualism. Using a qualitative approach, I conducted 15 interviews with participants who attended an English-language high school in Quebec City. Results revealed that participants mobilized ethnic and economic language ideologies as a means to negotiate the value of their linguistic practices and that these language ideologies structured mobility and enabled participants to reposition themselves within a new linguistic market.

The growth of the drug war and rates of narco-violence in Mexico has captured the attention of the international community, leading to international debates about the validity and effectiveness of the War on Drugs mantra. Since 2006, the Mexican government has been actively combating the cartels with armed troops, leading to high rates of human rights abuses as well as growing opposition to official prohibition policies. This thesis explores three movements advocating for alternatives to the Mexican drug war that have their foundation in civil society organizations: the movements for human rights protection, for drug policy liberalization and for the protection and restitution of victims of the drug war. These movements are analysed through a theoretical framework drawing on critical political economy theory, civil society and social movement theory, and political opportunity structures. This thesis concludes that, when aligned favourably, the interplay of agency and political opportunities converge to create openings for shifting dominant norms and policies. While hegemonic structures continue to limit agency potential, strong civil society advocacy strategies complemented by strong linkages with transnational civil society networks have the potential to achieve transformative changes in the War on Drugs in Mexico.

This thesis analyses the scope for the “self-help” model of rural development to succeed in its broadly stated aims of enabling rural women to advance their social status and enhance their own and/or their family’s livelihoods. The thesis is organised around two key sites of investigation. The first questions the potential for “self-help” to operate within existing social relations - expressed in access to land, other assets and resources (including credit), and in different forms, conditions, and relations of labour. The second questions its potential to intervene in, and potentially overturn, these relations. These questions are embedded in a wider analysis of the ways in which individual and collective attempts to advance living conditions (or at least defend them from deterioration) are defined by historically (re)produced social relations. Analysis is centred on the South Indian State of Andhra Pradesh, where the “self-help” policy approach, now widely replicated as a model for central and federal interventions, is most established. This is a mixed-methods study. It draws on statistical analysis of large-scale secondary survey data, analysis of primary fieldwork, and of government policy documents and other relevant documentation. The thesis engages directly with the philosophical issues this raises, to develop a foundation for the logically consistent assimilation of statistical and “qualitative” methods into mixed methods research. Fieldwork centred on two villages in southern Chittoor district and relied primarily on repeated in-depth interviews with members of four self help groups and, where applicable, their husbands (30 respondents in total). Local officials and programme staff and bank managers were also interviewed. In addition, multi-level logit regression analysis was conducted with two large-scale, complex secondary data sets; the All India National Survey Sample (round 61; schedule 10; 2004/05) and the Young Lives Project Survey (round two; 2005/2006). An innovative weighting procedure was applied to adjust for the latter’s non-random sampling procedure.The findings demonstrate the tensions invoked by state policy emphasising agential action in the absence of due regard for the structural relations within which actions not only take place, but in which the conditions for their possibility and articulation are generated, institutionalised, and reproduced. This situation is exacerbated by unfolding ecological crisis in the fieldwork village sites, problematising the land-based solutions traditionally advocated by the Indian Left. The thesis concludes that Andhra’s self-help programmes can perform a non-trivial ameliorative role in the short-term, but this is undermined by a wider tendency to reproduce and potentially exacerbate ongoing processes of rural differentiation.

Quelles sont les conséquences du système politique des pays sur leurs marchés financiers et les intermédiaires financiers? Pour répondre à cette question, cette thèse propose trois essais. Dans le premier essai, je montre comment les institutions du suffrage – une mesure clé de la répartition du pouvoir politique dans la société – affectent la dépendance relative des pays aux marchés boursiers et bancaires. Je démontre qu’au cours des deux derniers siècles les expansions graduelles du suffrage à différents segments de la population exercent un effet négatif sur le développement boursier – ce qui est en ligne avec l'idée selon laquelle les élites poursuivent leurs intérêts économiques en favorisant levé de capitaux sur les marchés boursiers. En revanche, j’identifie un effet positif du suffrage sur le développement bancaire – ce qui est en ligne avec l'idée selon laquelle le renforcement du pouvoir politique de la classe moyenne favorise un secteur bancaire qui partage son aversion pour le risque. Dans le deuxième essai, j’examine les déterminants politiques des réformes financières ayant eu lieux à travers le monde durant les trois dernières décennies. Je souligne en particulier le rôle prépondérant de la cohésion des gouvernements pour expliquer le rythme à laquelle ces réformes ont été prises ; constatant en effet que les gouvernements fragmentés sont moins enclins à dévier du statu quo. Dans le troisième essai, j’explore les répercussions des efforts de lobbying déployés par le secteur bancaire aux Etats-Unis ces quinze dernières années. Je montre que les banques font du lobbying pour obtenir un traitement préférentiel de la part du égulateur ; ce qui leur permet à leur tour de prendre des risques supplémentaires. / What are the consequences of countries’ political system on their financial markets and intermediaries? This dissertation proceeds in answering this question along three essays. The first essay focuses on the way suffrage institutions, a key measure of the distribution of political power, shape countries’ reliance on both stock market and bank finance. It provides evidence from the last two centuries that suffrage expansions adversely affect stock market development, consistent with the insight that small elites pursue economic opportunities by promoting capital raised on stock markets. In contrast, it shows a positive effect of suffrage on banking development, consistent with the idea that an empowered middle class favors banks as they share its aversion for risk. The second essay examines the political outcomes driving the pace and extent of financial reforms occurring in the last three decades around the world. It stresses the role of government cohesiveness in explaining patterns of financial liberalizations, finding that fragmented governments do breed stalemate. The third essay explores the incidence and drivers of lobbying efforts made by the U.S. banking industry. It shows that banks engage in lobbying to gain preferential treatment, and take in turn additional risks.

The purpose of this study is to assess American economic thought during the antebellum period. Antebellum political economy has been largely neglected by historians. They have ignored both the valuable contributions made by America’s first political economists to domestic intellectual culture, as well as the importance of American economic thought in the transatlantic discourse. A dynamic, sophisticated, and complex political economy marks the antebellum era, and when studied in its proper context provides insight into how Americans understood the transformative economic changes they experienced. This dissertation draws on an extensive body of primary and secondary literature. Special consideration is given to the more learned articulations of economic thought. However, recognizing the immature state of the science during the period under investigation works of various levels of theoretical erudition are referenced. In their attempts to fashion a distinctly American political economy domestic thinkers entertained a wide range of economic principles. Contrary to conventional wisdom the Americans were not absolutist in their dedication to British orthodoxy. Antebellum political economy manipulated British authorities to suit the immediate concerns of contemporaries, thus spoiling the essence of classical doctrine. This dissertation makes clear that few Americans accepted classical orthodoxy without important qualifications. Classical theory was confronted with its most systematic challenge by protectionists. Despite protectionism having shaped the course of American economic development, its theoretical underpinnings have been summarily discounted by historians and economists. Protectionists, however, afforded the quintessential expression of American antebellum political economy. This dissertation intends to rescue the protectionists from historical abandon and reclaim the position of relevance they enjoyed during their own time. The antebellum period also hosted a fiery set of intellectuals determined to upset the emerging free-market order, exhibiting a particular disdain for institutions of finance and the industrial ethos. Conservatives from the North and South aimed to slow America’s march into the modern economy. These elements did not operate on the fringes of intellectual society, rather they represent something central to the American discourse and are illustrative of the difficulty attendant to classifying antebellum thinkers according to traditional notions of economic ideology.