The Economic Consequences of Legal Origins
Open accessAbstract
In the last decade, economists have produced a considerable body of research suggesting that the historical origin of a country's laws is highly correlated with a broad range of its legal rules and regulations, as well as with economic outcomes. We summarize this evidence and attempt a unified interpretation. We also address several objections to the empirical claim that legal origins matter. Finally, we assess the implications of this research for economic reform.
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Common law tends to have superior contract enforcement and better property rights protection than civil law.
“The literature has reported significant differences in the protection of property rights across the two systems; common law tends to have superior contract enforcement and better property rights protection.”
From Legal Origins and Female HIV (2018) · cites this paper as La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, and Shleifer 2008
A well-established literature has documented the link between legal origins and measures of development.
“A well-established literature has documented the link between legal origins and measures of development ( La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, and Shleifer 2008 ) .”
From Legal Origins and Female HIV (2018) · cites this paper as La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, and Shleifer 2008
Civil law countries exhibit less secure property rights than common law countries.
“In particular, it has been shown that civil law countries exhibit less secure property rights than do common law countries.”
From Legal Origins and Female HIV (2018) · cites this paper as La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, and Shleifer (2008)
Cites
La Porta, R., Lopez‐de‐Silanes, F., Shleifer, A., & Vishny, R. W. (1998) · Journal of Political Economy · doi:10.1086/250042 · Cited by 18,025 · see citing works
Self-citationDjankov, S., La Porta, R., Lopez-de-Silanes, F., & Shleifer, A. (2002) · The Quarterly Journal of Economics · doi:10.1162/003355302753399436 · Cited by 3,993 · cited 3× · see citing works
“Djankov et al. (2002) look at the number of steps an entrepreneur must complete in order to begin operating a business legally, a number that in 1999 ranged from 2 in Australia and Canada to 21 in the Dominican Republic.”
InfluentialSelf-citationEstimating Trade Flows: Trading Partners and Trading Volumes <sup>*</sup>
Helpman, E., Melitz, M., & Rubinstein, Y. (2008) · Quarterly Journal of Economics · doi:10.1162/qjec.2008.123.2.441 · Cited by 2,436 · see citing works
Entry regulation as a barrier to entrepreneurship
Klapper, L., Laeven, L., & Rajan, R. (2006) · Journal of Financial Economics · doi:10.1016/j.jfineco.2005.09.006 · Cited by 1,723 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Klapper et al. (2006) and Djankov et al. (2007b) show that such regulations stifle entry.”
Financial development, property rights, and growth
Claessens, S., & Laeven, L. (2003) · The Journal of Finance · doi:10.1046/j.1540-6261.2003.00610.x · Cited by 338 · see citing works
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Ding, W., Levine, R., Lin, C., & Xie, W. (2021) · Journal of Financial Economics · doi:10.1016/j.jfineco.2021.03.005 · Cited by 1,484 · see citing works
The European Trust Crisis and the Rise of Populism
Algan, Y., Guriev, S., Papaioannou, E., & Passari, E. (2017) · Brookings Papers on Economic Activity · doi:10.1353/eca.2017.0015 · Cited by 693 · see citing works
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Elert, N., & Henrekson, M. (2016) · Small Business Economics · doi:10.1007/s11187-016-9725-x · Cited by 114 · see citing works
The Causes and Consequences of Development Clusters: State Capacity, Peace, and Income*
Besley, T., & Persson, T. (2014) · Annual Review of Economics · doi:10.1146/annurev-economics-080213-041128 · Cited by 104 · see citing works
Anderson, S. (2018) · American Economic Review · doi:10.1257/aer.20151047 · Cited by 101 · see citing works
- Authors
- Porta, R. L., Lopez-de-Silanes, F., & Shleifer, A.
- Affiliations
- Dartmouth College (US)
- EDHEC Graduate School of Management.
- Harvard University (US)
- Venue
- Journal of Economic Literature
- Publisher
- American Economic Association
- Published
- 2008-05-01
- Volume
- 46
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 285-332
- ISSN
- 0022-0515 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W3121522673
- Cited by
- 3,220
- References
- 5
- Citations by year
- 2026: 150 · 2025: 192 · 2024: 159 · 2023: 128 · 2022: 193 · 2021: 208 · 2020: 240 · 2019: 259 · 2018: 192 · 2017: 186 · 2016: 173 · 2015: 193 · 2014: 201 · 2013: 164 · 2012: 160
- FWCI
- 367.80
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- dare.uva.nl
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- Journal of Economic Literature (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- UvA-DARE (University of Amsterdam) (submittedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Demography › Culture, Economy, and Development Studies
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Law, Economics, and Judicial Systems
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Historical Economic and Social Studies
- Keywords
- legal origins, common law, civil law, legal history, legal institutions, economic reform, institutional quality
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