The growth of institutional capacity in the developing world has become a central theme in twenty-first-century social science. Many studies have shown that pub

This book examines how Latin American countries and Spain tried to build modern and efficient state institutions for more than a century - without much success.

Neoliberalism is often studied as a political ideology, a government program, and even as a pattern of cultural identities. However, less attention is paid to t

What role does war play in political development? Our understanding of the rise of the nation-state is based heavily on the Western European experience of war.

This book analyzes how developmental states contributed to economic prosperity, sometimes with spectacular success, and sometimes with less brilliant results.