The Politics of Property Rights: Political Instability, Credible Commitments, and Economic Growth in Mexico, 1876–1929

Extract

The Politics of Property Rights: Political Instability, Credible Commitments, and Economic Growth in Mexico, 1876–1929. By Stephen Haber, Armando Razo, and Noel Maurer. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 408p. $75.00 cloth, $29.99 paper.

Stephen Haber, Armando Razo, and Noel Maurer provide a detailed, theoretically rich examination of the interplay between political chaos and economic growth in Mexico. Why did Mexico's economy continue to grow through a series of civil wars, coups, and outside interventions? More generally, what conditions lead to robust growth under political instability? Political scientists, economists, and others have searched for, and failed to find, a consistent link between political instability and economic failure. These authors develop an argument on the conditions under which instability and robust economic growth go hand in hand, using the years before, during, and after Mexico's chaotic revolution as their case study.