The Geoeconomics of Contract Enforcement (with Elena Paltseva and Marta Troya-Martinez)
Abstract. Historically, international contract enforcement relied on military power. In the late 1960s, Western Great Powers—US, UK, France—reduced military interventions, increasing expropriation risk in developing countries. Using microdata from the petroleum industry, we show that this geopolitical shift led to a 2–4-year delay in production (“backloading”) in developing countries by multinationals headquartered in Western Great Powers, matching the extent of backloading exhibited by multinationals based in other advanced economies. Resource-rich developing economies experienced annual revenue losses of $1 billion per country, offset by higher government rent shares. These patterns are consistent with the emergence of self-enforcing agreements.
Media: VoxEU.org, FREE Network
Learning with Economists in Petro-Rich Economies: Climate Change Policies in Russia (with Anton Suvorov)
Abstract. We study how to communicate climate policy in fossil-fuel-dependent economies. For international comparability,we build on the survey of Dechezlepr.tre et al. (2025) inRussia, adapting it to the local context and adding novel elements: (i) treatments referencing the national Climate Doctrine (presidential decree) and (ii) measures of trust in scientists from different fields. Russians’ climate beliefs and knowledge broadly mirror those in other countries, though skepticism is higher in fossil-fuel-rich regions. Physics-based videos raise factual understanding, while economically framed messages reduce policy support, consistent with cost salience and low trust in economists. Political authority cues, by contrast, raise support.
Working Paper December 2025, [ssrn]
Fuelling Development (with Hosny Zoabi)
Fuelling Autocracies (with Jonas Hveding Hamang and Torfinn Harding and J. Juel Andersen)
Rules vs. Courts in Procurement (with Marta Troya-Martinez and Dzhamilya (Jamila) Nigmatulina)
8. Enemies of the People Working Paper (last version)
American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 2025 17 (1) 310-342 (with Pierre-Louis Vézina)
Media: The Economist, A Correction Podcast, ABC Radio Australia, VoxEU.org, FREE Network, Novaya Gazeta, Presentation at AEA 2021, Presentation at Economics of Migration Seminar (in English), Presentation at Memorial (in Russian)
7. Job displacement costs of phasing out coal Working Paper (last version)
Journal of Public Economics (short communication), 236, 2024, 105167 (with Michael Simmons, Fernando Aragon and Juan Pablo Rud)
Media: FREE Network
6. Handbook Chapter: FDI and wage inequality (with Marcio Cruz, Gaurav Nayyar, and Pierre-Louis Vézina)
Handbook of Labor, Human Resources and Population Economics (2023), edited by Klaus F. Zimmermann.
5. Resource discoveries, FDI bonanzas and local multipliers: An illustration from Mozambique Working Paper (last version)
Review of Economics and Statistics 104 (5), 2022, pp. 1046–1058 (with Pierre-Louis Vézina)
Media: VoxDev, The Conversation, IGC blog, IGC Working Paper, RES Media Briefing, Voaportugese-Mozambique, WB-Report, Global Development Blog, FREE Network
4. Handbook Chapter: Inflated Expectations and Commodity Prices: Evidence from Kazakhstan (with Victoire Girard and Alma Kudebayeva)
Handbook on the Sustainable Politics and Economics of Natural Resources (2021), edited by Stella Tsani and Indra Overland.
Media: FREE Network
3. Boom goes the price: Giant resource discoveries and real exchange rate appreciation Working Paper (last version)
The Economic Journal 130, 2020, pp. 1715-1728 (with Torfinn Harding and Radek Stefanski)
Media: VoxEU.org
2. Resource shocks, employment, and gender: evidence from the collapse of the UK coal industry Working Paper (last version)
Labour Economics 52, 2018, pp. 54-67 (with Fernando Aragon and Juan Pablo Rud)
The Relationship Between Oil Price and Costs in the Oil Industry Working Paper (last version)
The Energy Journal 36, 2015, pp. 237-254 (with Alexander Naumov) Special Issue: Papers in Honor of M.A. Adelman