IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/sus/susewp/08916.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Resource Discovery and the Politics of Fiscal Decentralization

Author

Listed:
  • Sambit Bhattacharyya

    (Department of Economics, University of Sussex)

  • Louis Conradie

    (Department of Economics, University of Sussex)

  • Rabah Arezki

    (Research Department, IMF)

Abstract

If the central government is a revenue maximizing Leviathan then resource discovery and democratization should have a discernible impact on the degree of fiscal decentralization. We systematically explore this effect by exploiting exogenous variation in giant oil and mineral discoveries and permanent democratization. Using a global dataset of 77 countries over the period 1970 to 2012 we find that resource discovery has very little effect on revenue decentralization but induces expenditure centralization. Oil discovery appears to be the main driver of centralization and not minerals. Resource discovery leads to centralization in locations which have not experienced permanent democratization. Tax and intergovernmental transfers respond most to resource discovery shocks and democratization whereas own source revenue, property tax, educational expenditure, and health expenditure do not seem to be affected. Higher resource rent leads to more centralization and the effect is moderated by democratization.

Suggested Citation

  • Sambit Bhattacharyya & Louis Conradie & Rabah Arezki, 2016. "Resource Discovery and the Politics of Fiscal Decentralization," Working Paper Series 08916, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    • Handle: RePEc:sus:susewp:08916
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/economics/documents/wps-89-2016.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lei, Yu-Hsiang & Michaels, Guy, 2014. "Do giant oilfield discoveries fuel internal armed conflicts?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 139-157.
    2. 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.
    3. Halvor Mehlum & Karl Moene & Ragnar Torvik, 2006. "Institutions and the Resource Curse," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 116(508), pages 1-20, January.
    4. Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Hodler, Roland, 2010. "Natural resources, democracy and corruption," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(4), pages 608-621, May.
    5. Giavazzi, Francesco & Tabellini, Guido, 2005. "Economic and political liberalizations," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(7), pages 1297-1330, October.
    6. Paul J. Burke & Andrew Leigh, 2010. "Do Output Contractions Trigger Democratic Change?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(4), pages 124-157, October.
    7. Brennan, Geoffrey & Buchanan, James M., 1977. "Towards a tax constitution for Leviathan," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 255-273, December.
    8. Hodler, Roland, 2006. "The curse of natural resources in fractionalized countries," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(6), pages 1367-1386, August.
    9. Olivier Blanchard & Andrei Shleifer, 2001. "Federalism With and Without Political Centralization: China Versus Russia," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 48(4), pages 1-8.
    10. Enikolopov, Ruben & Zhuravskaya, Ekaterina, 2007. "Decentralization and political institutions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(11-12), pages 2261-2290, December.
    11. Kevin K. Tsui, 2011. "More Oil, Less Democracy: Evidence from Worldwide Crude Oil Discoveries," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(551), pages 89-115, March.
    12. Sambit Bhattacharyya & Paul Collier, 2014. "Public capital in resource rich economies: is there a curse?," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 66(1), pages 1-24, January.
    13. Davoodi, Hamid & Zou, Heng-fu, 1998. "Fiscal Decentralization and Economic Growth: A Cross-Country Study," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 244-257, March.
    14. Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Hodler, Roland, 2015. "Media freedom and democracy in the fight against corruption," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 13-24.
    15. Bhattacharyya, Sambit, 2013. "Political origins of financial structure," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 979-994.
    16. Rabah Arezki & Valerie A. Ramey & Liugang Sheng, 2017. "News Shocks in Open Economies: Evidence from Giant Oil Discoveries," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(1), pages 103-155.
    17. Frederick van der Ploeg, 2011. "Natural Resources: Curse or Blessing?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(2), pages 366-420, June.
    18. Wallace E. Oates & Wallace E. Oates, 2004. "An Essay on Fiscal Federalism," Chapters, in: Environmental Policy and Fiscal Federalism, chapter 22, pages 384-414, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Besley, Timothy & Coate, Stephen, 2003. "Centralized versus decentralized provision of local public goods: a political economy approach," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(12), pages 2611-2637, December.
    20. Anca M. Cotet & Kevin K. Tsui, 2013. "Oil and Conflict: What Does the Cross Country Evidence Really Show?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 49-80, January.
    21. Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Hodler, Roland, 2014. "Do Natural Resource Revenues Hinder Financial Development? The Role of Political Institutions," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 101-113.
    22. Jonathan Isham & Michael Woolcock & Lant Pritchett & Gwen Busby, 2005. "The Varieties of Resource Experience: Natural Resource Export Structures and the Political Economy of Economic Growth," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 19(2), pages 141-174.
    23. Timothy G. Conley & Christian B. Hansen & Peter E. Rossi, 2012. "Plausibly Exogenous," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(1), pages 260-272, February.
    24. Zhang, Tao & Zou, Heng-fu, 1998. "Fiscal decentralization, public spending, and economic growth in China," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 221-240, February.
    25. Lockwood, Ben, 2005. "Fiscal Decentralization: A Political Economy Perspective," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 721, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    26. Mulligan, Casey B. & Tsui, Kevin K., 2015. "Political entry, public policies, and the economy," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 377-397.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sambit Bhattacharyya & Michael Keller, 2021. "Resource Discovery and the Political Fortunes of National Leaders," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(349), pages 129-166, January.
    2. Mamo, Nemera & Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Moradi, Alexander, 2019. "Intensive and extensive margins of mining and development: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 28-49.
    3. Keisuke Okada & Sovannroeun Samreth, 2021. "Oil bonanza and the composition of government expenditure," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 23-46, March.
    4. Nemera Mamo & Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2018. "Natural Resources and Political Patronage in Africa: An Ethnicity Level Analysis," Working Paper Series 0418, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    5. Zuo, Na & Zhong, Hua, 2020. "Can resource policy reverse the resource curse? Evidence from China," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    6. Maria Cadaval Sampedro & Ana Herrero Alcalde & Santiago Lago-Peñas & Jorge Martinez-Vazquez, 2022. "Extreme events and the resilience of decentralized governance," Working Papers. Collection A: Public economics, governance and decentralization 2212, Universidade de Vigo, GEN - Governance and Economics research Network.
    7. Chachu, Daniel Ofoe, 2020. "Domestic revenue displacement in resource-rich countries: What’s oil money got to do with it?," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    8. Lin, Boqiang & Zhou, Yicheng, 2021. "Does fiscal decentralization improve energy and environmental performance? New perspective on vertical fiscal imbalance," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 302(C).
    9. Shahbaz, Muhammad & Destek, Mehmet Akif & Okumus, Ilyas & Sinha, Avik, 2019. "An empirical note on comparison between resource abundance and resource dependence in resource abundant countries," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 47-55.
    10. Christopher A. Hartwell & Roman Horvath & Eva Horvathova & Olga Popova, 2019. "Democratic Institutions, Natural Resources, and Income Inequality," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 61(4), pages 531-550, December.
    11. Abdelwahed, Loujaina, 2020. "More oil, more or less taxes? New evidence on the impact of resource revenue on domestic tax revenue," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    12. Keller, Michael, 2020. "Wasted windfalls: Inefficiencies in health care spending in oil rich countries," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    13. Nouf Alsharif & Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2022. "Oil Discovery, Boom-Bust Cycle and Manufacturing Slowdown: Evidence from a Large Industry Level Dataset," Working Paper Series 0222, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    14. Francisco J. Delgado & Maria J. Presno, 2023. "Evolution of Fiscal Decentralisation in OECD Countries: A Club Convergence Analysis," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 25(63), pages 558-558, April.
    15. Arrouna Keita & Camelia Turcu, 2020. "Natural Resource Discoveries and Fiscal Discipline," Working Papers 2020.07, International Network for Economic Research - INFER.
    16. Nemera Gebeyehu Mamo, 2018. "Essays on natural resources in Africa: local economic development, multi-ethnic coalitions and armed conflict," Economics PhD Theses 0518, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mamo, Nemera & Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Moradi, Alexander, 2019. "Intensive and extensive margins of mining and development: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 28-49.
    2. Badeeb, Ramez Abubakr & Lean, Hooi Hooi & Clark, Jeremy, 2017. "The evolution of the natural resource curse thesis: A critical literature survey," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 123-134.
    3. Sambit Bhattacharyya & Michael Keller, 2021. "Resource Discovery and the Political Fortunes of National Leaders," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(349), pages 129-166, January.
    4. Nemera Mamo & Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2018. "Natural Resources and Political Patronage in Africa: An Ethnicity Level Analysis," Working Paper Series 0418, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    5. Rabah Arezki & Sambit Bhattacharyya & Nemera Mamo, 2015. "Resource Discovery and Conflict in Africa: What do the data show?," OxCarre Working Papers 159, Oxford Centre for the Analysis of Resource Rich Economies, University of Oxford.
    6. Cockx, Lara & Francken, Nathalie, 2016. "Natural resources: A curse on education spending?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 394-408.
    7. Nemera Gebeyehu Mamo, 2018. "Essays on natural resources in Africa: local economic development, multi-ethnic coalitions and armed conflict," Economics PhD Theses 0518, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    8. Keller, Michael, 2020. "Wasted windfalls: Inefficiencies in health care spending in oil rich countries," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    9. Chi-Swian Wong, 2021. "Science Mapping: A Scientometric Review on Resource Curses, Dutch Diseases, and Conflict Resources during 1993–2020," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-48, July.
    10. Nouf Alsharif & Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2022. "Oil Discovery, Boom-Bust Cycle and Manufacturing Slowdown: Evidence from a Large Industry Level Dataset," Working Paper Series 0222, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    11. Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Hodler, Roland, 2014. "Do Natural Resource Revenues Hinder Financial Development? The Role of Political Institutions," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 101-113.
    12. Cockx, Lara & Francken, Nathalie, 2014. "Extending the concept of the resource curse: Natural resources and public spending on health," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 136-149.
    13. Sambit Bhattacharyya & Jeffrey Williamson, 2013. "Distributional Impact of Commodity Price Shocks: Australia over a Century," CEH Discussion Papers 019, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    14. Rian Hilmawan & Jeremy Clark, 2021. "Resource dependence and the causes of local economic growth: An empirical investigation," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 65(3), pages 596-626, July.
    15. Mavisakalyan, Astghik & Tarverdi, Yashar, 2019. "Oil and women: A re-examination," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 191-200.
    16. Nouf Alsharif & Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2019. "Oil Discovery, Political Institutions and Economic Diversification," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 66(3), pages 459-488, July.
    17. Dong-Hyeon Kim & Shu-Chin Lin, 2017. "Natural Resources and Economic Development: New Panel Evidence," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 66(2), pages 363-391, February.
    18. Konte, Maty & Vincent, Rose Camille, 2021. "Mining and quality of public services: The role of local governance and decentralization," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    19. Hilmawan, Rian & Clark, Jeremy, 2019. "An investigation of the resource curse in Indonesia," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Resource discovery; Resource rent; Democratization; Fiscal decentralization;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • H70 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - General
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sus:susewp:08916. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: University of Sussex Business School Communications Team (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecsusuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.