"An exploration of the association between fuel subsidies and fuel riots", World Development
In recent years, dozens of countries have been rocked by riots, often associated with popular demand for fuel. A paper, published today in World Development, by The Policy Practice Director Neil McCulloch (and co-authors Davide Natalini, Noami Hossain and Patricia Justino) uses a new international dataset on fuel riots to explore the effects of fuel prices and price regimes on fuel riots. Unsurprisingly, we find that large domestic fuel price shocks - often linked to international price shocks - are a key driver of riots. But we also show that fuel riots are closely associated with domestic price regimes. Countries that maintain fixed price regimes – often net energy exporters - tend to have large fuel subsidies. When such subsidies become unsustainable, domestic price adjustments are large, often leading to riots.
The full article is available Open Access here.
Online library of USAID political economy documents
We have created a new USAID section on The Policy Practice online library to make accessible the most helpful USAID materials on political economy analysis and thinking&working politically. These documents and blogs used to be open access but are sadly no longer available since USAID was abolished.
New Swiss Thinking and Working Politically Network
The Policy Practice is proud to be associated with the creation of a Swiss community of practice on thinking and working politically.
Our launch event will be on Thursday 27 March from 1pm to 2:30pm. It will explore “How does political economy differ and complement other approaches?”. In addition to case studies from Burkina Faso and Bosnia-Herzegovina, TPP Director Laure-Hélène Piron will share her insights on how PEA can be combined with other approaches.
If you would like to join the community and attend the event, please contact Andreas Weber, SDC PEA lead.
The implications of Trump for climate action - latest blog from TPP Director Neil McCulloch
Trump’s rapid reversal of Biden’s climate agenda has shocked many. In one week, he dismantled decades of environmental progress by lifting oil and gas restrictions, scrapping decarbonization targets, and abandoning international commitments including the Paris Agreement. This blog explores how these moves threaten U.S. climate progress and global climate action.