Regional economic decline is argued to be a major factor behind the recent rise of far-right support in liberal democracies. We generalize this finding using a unique county-level panel covering the fall (1949-1972) and rise (1972-today) of far-right voting in West Germany. Our results show that regional economic ascent predicts the initial fall of the far-right just as economic decline predicts its rise. We then combine the county-level panel with individual-level survey data to -- for the first time -- test the relative importance of regional (places) and individual (people) economic conditions for far-right support. Local growth and individual income shocks have a differential relation to far-right preferences. While individual income decline relates to stronger far-right party identification, local decline predicts heightened worries about immigration. People, it therefore seems, matter for far-right support more than places.

We investigate the role of state capacity and political violence in favoring regime changes. Specifically, we examine the role of road networks in the spread of Fascist violence in early 1920s Italy. Using novel and comprehensive data on Fascist violence, along with digitized maps of the Italian road network, we investigate the impact of road accessibility on the location and intensity of political violence, addressing endogeneity issues by means of an instrumental variable approach based on the least-cost paths virtual network among major municipalities as an instrument for the actual historical road network. We find that road accessibility played an important role in the spread of early Fascist violence. Our conclusions suggest that incumbents might have a strategic incentive to limit the development of state capacity in order to maintain political power.

This paper analyzes the effect of political instability in African countries on the volatility of commodity prices. A synthetic index is constructed from a set of political instability variables, and four types of commodities are considered: energy, agricultural, mineral, and precious metals. Using data from a sample of 37 countries spanning the period 1984-2016, a panel data model is estimated using the system generalized method of moments. Two main results are obtained: (i) political instability in African countries negatively affects the volatility of commodity prices overall, and (ii) this instability particularly affects energy, mineral, and mining commodities. Strengthening political deficiencies in different African countries experiencing instability is necessary to mitigate the volatility of the various commodity prices on which they depend.

Political agency models predict that electoral concerns induce politicians to put effort into making policies that benefit citizens. We exploit the introduction of mayoral term limits in Portugal to investigate how electoral incentives affect incumbents’ efforts to obtain EU grants. We focus on EU grants because getting them requires effort. Moreover, by obtaining EU grants, mayors can do more for their citizens. We focus on Portugal because it provides a quasi-natural experimental setting to determine the causal effect of electoral incentives on effort. We find that term-limited mayors receive about 30% less EU money than mayors eligible for reelection.