Geography

Updated May 2006. Thanks to Will Masters for his initial work in putting together some of these references.

General reading

Acemoglu, Daron; Johnson, Simon and Robinson, James A. (2002). Reversal of Fortune: Geography and Institutions in the Making of the Modern World Income Distribution. Quarterly Journal of Economics, November, 117(4), 1231-94.

Attfield, C. L. F., et al (2000). Economic Growth and Geographic Proximity. Economics Letters, July, 68(1), 109-12.

Davis, Donald R. and Weinstein, David E. (2002). Bones, Bombs, and Break Points: The Geography of Economic Activity. American Economic Review, December, 92(5), 1269-89.

Gallup, John Luke, Jeffrey D. Sachs, and Andrew Mellinger (1999). Geography and Economic Development. International Regional Science Review 22(2), August, 179-232. Reprinted from Annual World Bank Conference on Development Economics 1998, Boris Pleskovic and Joseph E. Stiglitz (eds.) Washington, DC: The World Bank.

Masters, William A. and Margaret S. McMillan (2001). Climate and Scale
in Economic Growth. Journal of Economic Growth, 6(3), September, 167-186.

Maurseth, Per Botolf (2003). Geography and Growth-Some Empirical Evidence. Nordic Journal of Political Economy, 29(1), 25-46.

Rappaport, Jordan and Sachs, Jeffrey D. (2003). The United States as a Coastal Nation. Journal of Economic Growth, March, 8(1), 5-46.

Sachs, Jeffrey D. (2001). Tropical Underdevelopment. NBER working paper no. 8119
(February).

Shiue, Carol H. (2002). Transport Costs and the Geography of Arbitrage in Eighteenth-Century China. American Economic Review, December, 92(5), 1406-19.

Theil, Henri and Donglin Chen (1995). The Equatorial Grand
Canyon. De Economist 143(3), 317-27.

Wei, Shang-Jin (2000). Natural Openness and Good Government. NBER working paper no. 7765
(June).

Further reading: geography effects through disease

Bloom, David E. and Jeffrey Sachs (1998). Geography, Demography, and Economic Growth in Africa. Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, 2, 207-295.

Gallup, John Luke and Jeffrey D. Sachs (2000). The Economic Burden of Malaria. CID Working Paper No. 52
(July).

McArthur, John W. and Jeffrey D. Sachs (2001). Institutions and Geography: Comment on Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson (2000). NBER working paper no. 8114.

McCarthy, Desmond, Holger Wolf and Yi Wu (2000). The Growth Costs of Malaria. NBER working paper no. 7541

Further reading: geography effects through agriculture

Four papers from an ASSA meetings panel held in January 2000:

Gallup, J.L. and J.D. Sachs (2000). Agriculture, Climate and
Technology: Why are the Tropics Falling Behind? American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 82(3), August.

Masters, W.A. and M.S. McMillan (2000). Understanding
the Political Economy of Agriculture in the Tropics. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 82(3), August, 738-42.

Johnson, D.K.N. and R.E. Evenson (2000). How Far Away is Africa? Technological Spillovers to Agriculture and Productivity. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 82(3), August, 743-49.

Arndt, C. and M. Bacou (2000). Economy-wide Effects of Climate Variability and Climate Prediction in Mozambique. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 82(3), August, 750-54.

Further reading: geography effects through policy

McMillan, Margaret S. and William A. Masters (2001). An African Growth
Trap: A Political-Economy Model of Taxation, R&D and Investment. Review of Development Economics, forthcoming.

Further reading: books

Kamarck, Andrew M. (1976). The Tropics and Economic Development: A Provocative Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins.

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