Religions are organized in a variety of ways. They may resemble an elected autocracy, a parliamentary democracy, or something akin to a monarchy, where heredity plays a primary role. This variation allows for a comparative study of their organization. These differing power arrangements call for different types of strategic behavior in the fight for control over church doctrine and finance. And ...

CULTURE, INSTITUTIONS AND DEMOCRATIZATION* Yuriy Gorodnichenko Gerard Roland University of California, Berkeley and NBER University of California, Berkeley, CEPR and NBER First draft: November 2012 This draft: April 2015 Abstract: We construct a model of revolution and transition to democracy under an individualistic and a collectivist culture. The main result is that, despite facing pot...

The transition from autocracy to democracy may lead a country to break-up. The break-ups of the USSR and Yugoslavia led to sharp falls in emissions. If something similar would happen in China, projected emissions would fall by 50% or more. Break-up uncertainty dominates other scenario uncertainty JEL Classification: Q54

TO THE EDITOR: I read the Viewpoint article by Haouzi (1) entitled “Precedence and autocracy in breathing control” with great interest. The author makes a strong and informative case for the complexity of the mechanisms involved in the control of breathing. But he makes conventional error of assuming that “it evolved by chance and necessity . . . shaping the structures and functions of the resp...