Thesis advisor: Vladimir Bandera / The purpose of this dissertation is to analyze the balance-of-payments problems of a particular debtor country by focusing on the effects of rapid external debt accumulation and of expanding debt servicing obligations on external balance. Brazil from 1948 to 1963 Is a logical choice for a study of this type since severe debt servicing problems were experienced throughout this period, particularly between 1955 and 1963. The Intention is not to portray Brazil as a typical debtor country since its problems were more intense and more immediate than related problems in most other debtor countries in the process of development. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 1967. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

The impact of external debt on economic growth is a debatable issue between scholars since the onset of the debt crisis in 1980’s. This thesis examines whether external debt affects the economic growth of selected heavily indebted poor African countries through the debt overhang and debt crowding out effect. This is carried out by using data for eight heavily indebted poor African countries between 1991 to 2010.The result from estimation shows that external debt affects economic growth by the debt crowding out effect rather than debt overhang. Moreover, in an attempt to mark out debt servicing history, the thesis found the selected countries are not paying (servicing) more than 95% of their accumulated debt.

Le lien de causalité est une condition centrale du droit de la responsabilité administrative. Entre la faute et le préjudice, l’examen du lien de causalité est un impératif de justice et une inévitable exigence intellectuelle. Il permet de donner un ordre à la fois rationnel et juste aux faits. Réputé impénétrable, suspect d’arbitraire, acculé à un prétendu déclin par le développement de la logique assurantielle, le lien de causalité n’a pas fait l’objet d’une étude d’ensemble en droit public. L’analyse de la notion de lien de causalité permet pourtant de tromper cette image. Elle révèle, d’abord, qu’il faut distinguer le problème -métaphysique- de la causalité, de la question -pragmatique- de l’explication causale. La nature des problèmes posés par ces deux questions est différente ; celle qui se pose au juge est modeste : donner une explication rationnelle aux faits, sans quête de la vérité. Elle permet, ensuite, d’observer que le lien de causalité, s’il ne relève pas d’un constat objectif des faits, n’est toutefois pas empreint d’une subjectivité singulière par rapport à d’autres notions indéterminées en droit. L’étude de la pratique du lien de causalité en atteste. Le juge administratif a une approche ordonnée du lien de causalité fondée sur un équilibre entre attachement à la matérialité des faits et finalité de l’explication causale. Dans l’identification d’une cause, la hiérarchisation d’une pluralité de causes ou la circonscription du dommage, la jurisprudence administrative se caractérise par cette liberté, fidèle à l’arrêt Blanco, dans la détermination d’une politique jurisprudentielle, que le lien de causalité permet, parfois, mais suit seulement, le plus souvent. / Causal relationship is a central term in the law of administrative responsibility. Between fault and prejudice, the examination of causal relationship is an essential element of justice and constitutes an unavoidable intellectual requirement. It allows the judge to give an order which is both rational and just to facts. Reputed to be impenetrable, suspected of arbitrariness, driven into alleged decline by the development of the logic of insurance, causal relationship has never formed the object of a full-fledged study in public law. The analysis of the notion of causal relationship allows us to correct the image above. It first reveals that we have to distinguish the metaphysical problem of causality from the pragmatic question of causal explanation. The nature of the problem posed by these two questions is different. The question that is put to the judge is modest : give a rational explanation to facts without looking for the truth. It secondly allows to observe that the causal relationship, if it does not come close to being an objective observation of facts, does not bear the imprint of a specific subjectivity with regard to other indeterminate notions in law. The study of the practice of causal relationship bears witness to this. The administrative judge has an ordered approach of the causal relationship founded on a balance between attachment to the materiality of facts and the finality of causal explanation. In the identification of a cause, in the prioritization of multiple causes or in fixing damages, administrative jurisprudence is characterized by this freedom, which is in conformity with the Blanco ruling, in the determination of a jurisprudential policy that causal relationship sometimes renders possible, but which it only follows most often.