Hayek Programme Online Webinar Series
Market Reform, Democratization, and Economic Performance
Robin Grier, Kevin Grier
Wednesday 04 February 2026 18:30 - 20:00
Many of our seminars and public events this year will continue as in person or as hybrid (online and in person) events. Please check our website listings and Twitter feed @STICERD_LSE for updates.
Unless otherwise specified, in-person seminars are open to the public. Please ensure you have informed the event contact as early as possible.
Those unable to join the seminars in-person are welcome to participate via zoom if the event is hybrid.
About this event
Economists Robin Grier and Kevin Grier (2021) showed that neoliberal "Washington Consensus" economic reform raises national incomes by 15% over a decade.
Acemoglu et al (2019) showed that democratization does the same. However, neither paper takes the other finding into account! Since the two phenomena are not orthogonal, it is important to sort out the relation between the two types of reform (political and economic).
This talk follows up with studying the importance of sequencing in a sample of Latin American reformers. Latest research finds that both simultaneous reform and political followed by economic reform significantly raise national incomes in our cases, while either type of reform in isolation, and economic followed by political reform do not. Second, we ask the question, if political reform occurs in unfree economies and is not accompanied by economic reform, is there any effect on national income? Our (very preliminary) answer is no. The conclusion of economists Kevin and Robin Grier is that while democracy may facilitate the effectiveness of economic reforms, it does not generate economic gains in isolation.
About the speakers
Robin and Kevin Grier have worked together at Tulane University, CIDE in Mexico City, the University of Oklahoma, and for the last 9 years at Texas Tech. They have published joint work in the Journal of Development Economics, American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Law and Economics, and the Journal of Comparative Economics. Robin currently teaches macroeconomics, and the economics of the US / Mexico border, while Kevin teaches causal inference and the political economy of institutions.
Related
The online webinar series of the LSE Hayek Programme will feature academic scholars or policy experts on a range of interdisciplinary topics that are related in some way to the intellectual contributions of F.A. Hayek.
These include individualism and economic freedom, the nature and future of liberal democracy, social justice and welfare, decision-making under radical uncertainty, macroeconomic management, the rule of law and justice, and others.
All sessions will be conducted on Zoom, lasting 1.5 hours, with a structured format of 45 minutes for speaker presentations followed by a 45-minute Q&A session. Additionally, for those unable to attend live, all webinars will be recorded for later access.
Events in the series will begin in March 2024, usually held one Thursday each month, from 6pm - 7:30pm unless otherwise stated.
For further information please contact Bryan Cheang, by email: b.cheang@lse.ac.uk.