The Arc of Institutional Change in the Long Shadow of Elites: Essays on Institutions, Human Capital and Ethnicity in Developing Countries
Biniam Bedasso, Maastricht Graduate School of Governance
This dissertation aims to investigate the link between the level and distribution of human capital and institutional change in societies where elites have a privileged access to political and economic organizations. In order to understand why elites maintain such privileges in certain societies in the first place, I also study the social and institutional fundamentals that may contribute to elite domination in a given society. Specifically, I seek to analyze the tendency of elites’ influence to persist longer in ethnocentric societies by examining the impact of early institutions on the political salience of ethnicity. The dissertation is composed of three essays attempting to address those questions from different angles using a range of theoretical and empirical approaches.
Venue: Minderbroedersberg 4-6, Maastricht, the Netherlands
Date: 10 October 2013
Time: 12:00 - 13:30 CET
