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Oxford Review of Economic Policy 2009 25(2):257-270; doi:10.1093/oxrep/grp016
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© The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press. For permissions please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

This article appears in the following Oxford Review of Economic Policy issue: THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF DEVELOPMENT [View the issue table of contents]

Legal institutions, political economy, and development

Gani Aldashev*
* University of Namur (FUNDP) and CRED, e-mail: gani.aldashev{at}fundp.ac.be


  Abstract

This article reviews some of the recent literature on the relationship between the legal system and economic development. We also look at the historical, socio-cultural, and political factors that explain the differences in the characteristics of legal systems across countries and thus affect the link between the legal environment and economic outcomes. Although the field of law and economics of developing countries is still in its youth, it is growing rapidly and is a fertile ground for exciting new findings, both theoretical and empirical. Further progress in this field is likely to come from the studies of the elements of the legal system other than the substantive law (enforcement and dispute resolution) and should move beyond specific analyses of the impact of particular success or failure stories towards more general analyses of the determinants and outcomes of successful legal institutions.

Key Words: legal system • development • enforcement • legal reform • informal law

The author thanks two anonymous referees, the editors of the special issue (Christopher Adam and Stefan Dercon), and Jean-Philippe Platteau for highly useful comments.

1 Some recent research (e.g. Lamoreaux and Rosenthal, 2005) brings into question the advantage of the English common law system over the French civil law in facilitating economic activity. These authors find that during the nineteenth century the US businesses had a more limited menu of organizational choices and a lower ability to adapt the basic forms to meet their needs than French businesses.


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