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Ghana Accra Protests In February 1948, two thousand former soldiers who served in the Gold Coast Regiment in World War II (WWII) marched against the government they had defended three years ago. The veterans were incredibly well organized, coming from different regions of the country. They demanded “independence, a good living, and good pay.” When the British … Continue reading World War II Colonial Soldiers and the Demand for Independence

Network science presents researchers with an alternative framework for analyzing societies and their economies. By recognizing that societies have the properties of multilevel systems, and that as systems, their structural designs evolve through the interdependence of the micro and macro levels, it is possible to map patterns and explain how the large sudden shocks to … Continue reading Disruptive Innovation in the Economic Organization of China and the West

Why is state capacity weaker in the Global South than in the West? In my new book Pawned States: State Building in the Era of International Finance (Princeton University Press 2022) I argue that early access to external public credit in the first globalization of international capital derailed state capacity building in the Global South. … Continue reading Foreign Loans and State Weakening

In most modern states, public administrations are organized in a pyramidal structure. National territories are divided into provinces, regions, or states, which are themselves subdivided into smaller and smaller administrative units, as in a game of nesting dolls. At these lower levels of administration, citizens can often expect to obtain all types of public services … Continue reading How Radical Administrative Reforms Unfold: Evidence from France’s “Rotating Capitals”