Oil Is Not a Curse: Ownership Structure and Institutions in Soviet Successor States (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics)
"Do oil booms inevitably lead countries down a path of rentierism, authoritarianism, and laggard economic growth? Read this fascinating book about the Soviet successor states and find out why the effects of oil vary based on who owns it-the state, or the private sector."-Stephen Haber, Stanford University"Pauline Jones Luong and Erika Weinthal have made a valuable contribution to the resource curse literature. Their book's focus on the significance of ownership structure in determining whether resource abundance is a boon or a curse is novel, well-argued and supported empirically by a nice natural experiment. In addition, the book provides an accessible review of the oil and gas sector in the energy-rich Soviet successor states over the two decades since independence."-Richard Pomfret, University of Adelaide; Johns Hopkins University Bologna Center"A fundamental premise of political economy is that the consequences of factor endowments for policy and prosperity are conditional on the nature of the political equilibrium in society. Using parsimonious theory, case studies, and econometric tests, this book brilliantly uses this perspective to demolish the confusions of the resource curse literature, showing how politics shapes the ownership structure of the oil sector which in turn determines the impact of oil."-James Robinson, Harvard University