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The number and size of nations revisited: Endogenous border formation with non-uniform population distributions

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  • Radax, Wolfgang

Abstract

The endogenous border formation model of Alesina and Spolaore (1997) has received a lot of attention in the economics community. One of its central messages is that in a democratic world in equilibrium there is an ineciently large number of nation states. However, this result is obtained under very specic assumptions like a uniform population distribution and no population mobility. In this paper, I generalize the model of Alesina and Spolaore allowing for population distributions other than the uniform distribution. Since this generalization is accompanied by the loss of tractability in closed form, I calculate the equilibria by means of numerical computation. It turns out that the above-mentioned central result is highly sensitive to the choice of population distribution and that the model shows four different regimes depending on the chosen distribution. Furthermore, the behaviour implied by the Alesina and Spolaore model with uniform population distribution is the exception, not the rule.

Suggested Citation

  • Radax, Wolfgang, 2009. "The number and size of nations revisited: Endogenous border formation with non-uniform population distributions," MPRA Paper 15783, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:15783
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Alberto Alesina & Enrico Spolaore, 1997. "On the Number and Size of Nations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1027-1056.
    2. William Easterly & Ross Levine, 1997. "Africa's Growth Tragedy: Policies and Ethnic Divisions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1203-1250.
    3. Bolton, Patrick & Roland, Gerard & Spolaore, Enrico, 1996. "Economic theories of the break-up and integration of nations," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(3-5), pages 697-705, April.
    4. Michele Ruta, 2005. "Economic Theories of Political (Dis)integration," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 19(1), pages 1-21, February.
    5. Patrick Bolton & Gérard Roland, 1997. "The Breakup of Nations: A Political Economy Analysis," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1057-1090.
    6. Alesina, Alberto & Devleeschauwer, Arnaud & Easterly, William & Kurlat, Sergio & Wacziarg, Romain, 2003. "Fractionalization," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 8(2), pages 155-194, June.
    7. Alessandra Casella & Jonathan S. Feinstein, 1990. "Public Goods in Trade: On the Formation of Markets and Political Jurisdictions," NBER Working Papers 3554, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Klaas Staal, 2004. "Country Size and Public Good Provision," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 04-026/1, Tinbergen Institute.
    9. Alberto Alesina & Ignazio Angeloni & Federico Etro, 2005. "International Unions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 602-615, June.
    10. Federico Etro, 2006. "Political geography," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 127(3), pages 321-343, June.
    11. Alesina, Alberto & Spolaore, Enrico, 2006. "Conflict, defense spending, and the number of nations," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 91-120, January.
    12. Alessandra Casella & Jonathan S. Feinstein, 2002. "Public Goods in Trade on the Formation of Markets and Jurisdictions," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 43(2), pages 437-462, May.
    13. K Staal, 2004. "Country size and public good provision," Econometric Society 2004 Australasian Meetings 156, Econometric Society.
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    Cited by:

    1. Vanschoonbeek, Jakob, 2020. "Regional (in)stability in Europe a quantitative model of state fragmentation," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 605-641.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Size of Nations; Endogenous Border Formation; Computational Economics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F50 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - General
    • H40 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - General

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