Conflict, Co-operation and Economic Governance
(a) Research in this area targets the micro economic analysis of conflict especially in the presence of abundant natural resources and the effectiveness of positive and negative economic (trade) sanctions.
It also explores interactions between the framing of environmental and natural resource extraction policies, rent-seeking and corruption and deals with institutions (autocracy versus democracy) and new forms of conflict and cooperation such as mass protest, sectarian violence, civilizational conflict, diplomacy by NGOs (including businesses) and regional economic integration in Africa.
(b) At the macro level the research targets the determinants of successes and failures of economic sanctions, shifts in geoeconomic and geopolitical gravity and their impact on economic governance and the conflict mitigating effects of trade and fiscal decentralization.
It looks at what specific types of natural resource abundance and trade dependence retards growth and examines applications of the Liberal Peace; that is the idea that commerce and common polity lower the frequency of conflict.
