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While nationalism remains a vital element in the production of the political and economic landscape, it is often treated as a static container for other processes or neglected altogether. Rather, it must itself be treated as a process--a nationalizing project--emerging from a constellation of often contradictory social forces. One such process of nationalization is the development of large-scale transportation infrastructure, such as railroads. These projects produce both new spheres of circulation and new understandings critical to navigating these novel environments, which together radically transform the relation between people, government, and territory. In early twentieth century China, the complicated contest over railroad rights produced and was produced by a fractured political economic geography. Understandings of both identity and space remained fragmented, cohering only partially into a singular entity, thus demonstrating the intimate interrelation between state power, political identity, and territories both real and imagined.

This study examined the relationship between CARICOM governments and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The study focused on three research questions: (1) What do the CARICOM leadership and other stakeholders believe are the major reasons why they continue to rely on the financial assistance and intervention of the IMF? (2) Under which paradigm of development do these leaders and stake holders perceive their relationships with the IMF? (3) How do younger and older CARICOM citizens perceive the future growth of their countries, under the leadership of the IMF? Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used in this study to analyze the research questions; therefore, this study used a mixed-methods design. Research question one was analyzed using a qualitative design, while the second and third research questions used a quantitative analysis in the form of descriptive statistics. The analysis, which was limited to six interviews, contained 13 questions. Thematic analysis explored themes such as unique crafting of policies to meet challenges; rationale to undergo IMF programs; ability to meet domestic and international payment obligations; and most applicable economic paradigm to CARICOM. This study also examined the economic paradigms undergirding CARICOM leaders’ decision to use the International Monetary Fund in addressing the socioeconomic and political development issue of the region. The sample consisted of 49 participants. The study concluded that the IMF policies are uniquely crafted to suit the specific CARICOM countries’ needs. These countries tend to invite the IMF interventions out of a sheer necessity and often are reluctant to do so. Yet, doing so provides access to additional funding and other resources that would likely have been otherwise unavailable. While the intent of the IMF programs is to eliminate the inefficient use of resources in these states, sometimes government spending can be impacted by its political nature and yield unintended consequences.

Rapid economic growth in emerging economies since the end of the Cold War has driven debate on American 'relative decline'; the relative diminution of US material capabilities with respect to other states. Such relative decline poses potential constraints on US power and has thus manifested itself in arguments over the economic merits of the United States' expansive military commitments. Contributing to this literature, my thesis answers the following question: does American military strategy generate economic benefits? I argue that that there is significant evidence to suggest that US military strategy has influenced international economic relationships in ways beneficial to US national interests. Principally, my analysis shows American military strategy acts as a 'underwriter' for the extant international economic system. I explore two logics associated with this. Firstly, a general 'status quo' logic which sees military power as both a guarantor and promoter of specific structural configurations of the international political economy. And secondly, a more specific 'utility' logic operating on other states either bilaterally or multilaterally. This pathway assumes that US military strategy, particularly its security guarantees, may alter the utility of other states decisions in America's favour. This thesis also shows that specific results often prove far more tentative and circumstantial than commonly articulated by scholars in the literature. Nearly all specific and 'utility' pathways through which the United States is hypothesized to derive economic benefit suffer from foundational generalisability issues, irrespective of methodology. This suggests that specific avenues and instances of US military strategy influencing international economic relationships are not likely to be a reliable or prudent source of future policy making. Rather, the principal political-economic influence to consider is the role US military power plays in underwriting the contemporary American centred international order, which is the prerequisite for other specific pathways to emerge.

<p>This thesis consists of three papers in dynamic political economy:</p><p>"Ideology and the Determination of Public Policy Over Time" investigates how public policy responds to persistent ideological shocks in dynamic politico-economic equilibrium. We develop a tractable model to analyse the dynamic interactions among ideology, public policy and individuals' intertemporal choice. Analytical solutions are obtained to characterize the Markov perfect equilibrium. Our main finding is that the relationship between ideology and the size of government turns out to be non-monotonic. In particular, a right-leaning ideological wave may lead to higher taxation, which makes the size of government much less distinctive under different political regimes. Incorporating ideological uncertainty per se has its theoretical relevance. Sufficient ideological uncertainty helps pin down a unique equilibrium. This is in contrast with recent works on dynamic political economy which feature multiple equilibria and have no sharp empirical predictions.</p><p>"Dynamic Inequality and Social Security" analyses the dynamic politico-economic equilibrium of a model where the repeated voting on social security and the evolution of household characteristics are mutually affected over time. Political decision-making is represented by probabilistic voting a la Lindbeck and Weibull (1987). We analytically characterize the unique Markov perfect equilibrium. The equilibrium social security tax rate are shown to be increasing in wealth inequality. The dynamic interaction between inequality and social security leads to growing social security programmes. The predictions of our model are broadly consistent with empirical evidence. We also perform some normative analysis, showing that the politico-economic mechanism tends to induce too large social security transfers in the long run.</p><p>"A Markovian Social Contract of Social Security" analyses the sustainability and evolution of the pay-as-you-go social security system in a majority voting framework with intra-cohort heterogeneity. We find that there exists a Markovian social contract through which the self-interested middle-aged median voter has incentives to support the system. This is in contrast with the approaches in the existing literature, which either resorts to the imperfect temporal separation of contributions and benefits, or builds the expectation of future social security benefits on variables that are payoff-irrelevant for future policymakers. Correspondingly, our model has a number of distinctive empirical implications. First, the social security tax rate converges along an increasing path to the steady state. Second, the growth of social security is negatively correlated with income inequality. Third, the impact of income inequality on the equilibrium social contract induces a non-monotonic relationship between income inequality and social security. These predictions are broadly consistent with the data from the OECD countries.</p>

This thesis consists of three papers in dynamic political economy: "Ideology and the Determination of Public Policy Over Time" investigates how public policy responds to persistent ideological shocks in dynamic politico-economic equilibrium. We develop a tractable model to analyse the dynamic interactions among ideology, public policy and individuals' intertemporal choice. Analytical solutions are obtained to characterize the Markov perfect equilibrium. Our main finding is that the relationship between ideology and the size of government turns out to be non-monotonic. In particular, a right-leaning ideological wave may lead to higher taxation, which makes the size of government much less distinctive under different political regimes. Incorporating ideological uncertainty per se has its theoretical relevance. Sufficient ideological uncertainty helps pin down a unique equilibrium. This is in contrast with recent works on dynamic political economy which feature multiple equilibria and have no sharp empirical predictions. "Dynamic Inequality and Social Security" analyses the dynamic politico-economic equilibrium of a model where the repeated voting on social security and the evolution of household characteristics are mutually affected over time. Political decision-making is represented by probabilistic voting a la Lindbeck and Weibull (1987). We analytically characterize the unique Markov perfect equilibrium. The equilibrium social security tax rate are shown to be increasing in wealth inequality. The dynamic interaction between inequality and social security leads to growing social security programmes. The predictions of our model are broadly consistent with empirical evidence. We also perform some normative analysis, showing that the politico-economic mechanism tends to induce too large social security transfers in the long run. "A Markovian Social Contract of Social Security" analyses the sustainability and evolution of the pay-as-you-go social security system in a majority voting framework with intra-cohort heterogeneity. We find that there exists a Markovian social contract through which the self-interested middle-aged median voter has incentives to support the system. This is in contrast with the approaches in the existing literature, which either resorts to the imperfect temporal separation of contributions and benefits, or builds the expectation of future social security benefits on variables that are payoff-irrelevant for future policymakers. Correspondingly, our model has a number of distinctive empirical implications. First, the social security tax rate converges along an increasing path to the steady state. Second, the growth of social security is negatively correlated with income inequality. Third, the impact of income inequality on the equilibrium social contract induces a non-monotonic relationship between income inequality and social security. These predictions are broadly consistent with the data from the OECD countries.

On May tenth, 2004 Monsanto announced that it would discontinue breeding and field level research of transgenic Roundup Ready (RR) wheat. This decision was heavily influenced by the widespread rejection of RR wheat by Canadian prairie producers who voiced their opposition through a diverse coalition of rural and urban organizations. With six of the nine member organizations representing rural and farm groups, this research departs from the most common representation of anti-GM movements as being urban and European-centred. This dissertation contrasts the general acceptance of Monsanto’s Roundup Ready canola just five years earlier (in the mid 90s) with the widespread opposition amongst prairie producers to RR wheat. It uses an updated version of the agrarian question and the production of nature thesis to show how capitalist relations are differentiated across place and commodities. The research finds that producer resistance to RR wheat hinged on the specificities of local histories and institutions, cultural conceptions of worth and economic fair treatment, and the character of wheat as a commodity with particular biophysical properties. The research is also concerned with the ways in which producers articulated their resistance with and through discourses of consumption, while at the same time rejecting the attempts made by proponents of RR wheat to relegate them to consuming subjects, who would best register their dissent by voting with their dollars on the market. For many prairie farm organizations, the fate of the family farm is tied up with the future of wheat farming and the capacity of farmers to collectively market their wheat in international markets. Monsanto’s vision for the future of prairie wheat crossed moral and cultural boundaries for producers and organizations that understood themselves as active subjects.

This thesis groups three papers in applied microeconomic theory that focus on political economy and the economics of organisations. The first chapter studies the equilibrium outcomes of a dynamic game of electoral competition between two policy-motivated parties. I model incumbent policy persistence: parties commit to implement a policy for their full tenure in office, and hence in any election only the opposition party is free to choose a new platform. The model gives rise to novel equilibrium policy dynamics: governments alternate in power; parties compromise, that is, starting from differentiated ideological positions, they gradually move towards proposing platforms which resemble one another; however, they never capitulate, that is, party labels matter and parties maintain distinct policy goals. The second chapter studies a directed search model of competition between sellers that control the quality of buyers' private information about goods. As better informed buyers extract more informational rents from trade, sellers may try to attract buyers by offering better information. First, I establish how the characteristics of exogenously fixed sale mechanisms determine equilibrium information provision. Information provision is higher under competition than under monopoly, yet partial information is provided for many sale mechanisms. Second, when sellers commit to both information provision and mechanisms, I identify simple conditions under which every equilibrium has full information. In these equilibria, sellers capture the efficiency gains of information provision and compete only over non-distortionary rents offered to buyers. Retaining the option to develop a currently inactive project often requires maintaining specialised stocks of knowledge. However, standard models of experimentation treat the choice of one project over another as entailing only an implicit opportunity cost. In the third chapter, I characterise the optimal experimentation policy in a model in which undeveloped projects have explicit maintenance costs and can be irreversibly discarded. Projects which in the absence of maintenance costs would be developed only after more promising projects fail are sometimes developed first and then discarded early. Maintenance costs alter optimal project development by providing incentives to bring the option value of less promising projects forward.