Published Papers
28. “The Elusive Quest for Disarmed Peace: Contest Games and International Relations”, with Johann Caro-Burnett and Sebastian Galiani. Accepted for publication in Economic Theory. Working Paper Series No. 4475941 [Link]
27. “Colonial Wars and Trade Restrictions: Fighting for Exclusive Trading Rights”, with Iván G. Lopez Cruz. Accepted for publication in Canadian Journal of Economics. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 3969393 [Link]
26. “A Two-Wave Death History: Fentanyl Overdoses in the US, Bullets in Mexico”, with Iván G. Lopez Cruz. Journal of Development Economics. Volume 178, January 2026. [Link]
25. Governing Resources in the Final Frontier, with Scott J. Shackelford, Jessica Steinberg, and Eytan Tepper. Constitutional Political Economy, October 2025.
24. (Editorial) “The Economic Approach to Geopolitics”, with Sebastian Galiani. Introduction to Special Issue: The Economic Approach to Geopolitics (guest editors Gustavo Torrens and Sebastian Galiani). Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization Volume 237, September 2025.Link]
23. “Ostromian Institutions and Violence: Community Forestry and Nepal’s Civil War”, with Nathan J. Cook, Birendra K. Karna, and Jessica Steinberg. Accepted for publication in World Development.
22. Geopolitics and International Trade Infrastructure Deterrence, with Sebastian Galiani and José Manuel Paz y Miño. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization Volume 234, June 2025. [Link]
21. “Campaign Contributions, Partisan Politics, and Environmental Polarization in the US Congress”, with Dean Lueck and Julio Ramos Pastrana. Journal of Law, Economics and Organization, Volume 41, Issue 1, Pages 159–195, March 2025. [Link]
20. “From Local Adaptation to Global Mitigation: How Improving Food Security by Building Local Resilience Can Help Limit Climate Change”, with Ore Koren. Accepted for publication in Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law. Volume 57, Issue 5. December 2024. [Link]
19. “Nationalistic Bias in Collusion Prosecution: The Case for International Antitrust Agreements”, with Filomena Garcia and José Manuel Paz y Miño. In Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Volume 126, Issue 3, Pages 489-528, July 2024. [Link]
18. “Institutional-Cultural Coherence and Economic Development: The Case of the Spanish Regions”, with David Soto-Oñate. In Journal of Comparative Economics, Volume 51, Pages: 41-89, March 2023. [Link]
17. “Hidden Drivers of Violence Diffusion: Evidence from Illegal Oil Siphoning in Mexico”, with Iván G. Lopez Cruz. In Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume 206, Pages: 26-72, February 2023. [Link]
16. “The Political Economy of Trade and International Labor Mobility”, with Sebastian Galiani. In Canadian Journal of Economics, Volume 54, Number 4, November 2021. [Link]
15. “The Merger Paradox, Collusion, and Antitrust Policy”, with Filomena Garcia and José Manuel Paz y Miño. In Journal of Public Economic Theory, Volume 22, Issue 6, Pages 2051-2081, December 2020. [Link]
14. “Mapping the Theory of Political Representation to the Empirics: An Investigation for Proportional and Majoritarian Rules”, with David Stadelmann and Marco Portmann. In Journal of Comparative Economics, Volume 48, Issue 3, Pages 548-560, September 2020. [Link]
13.“Property Rights and Domestication”, with Dean Lueck. In Journal of Institutional Economics, Volume 16, Special Issue 2 (Honor of Yoram Barzel), Pages: 199-215, April 2020. [Link]
12. “International Organizations and Structural Reforms”, with Sebastian Galiani and Iván Torre. In Journal of International Economics, Volume 121, November 2019. [Link]
11. “Why Not Taxation and Representation? British Politics and the American Revolution”, with Sebastian Galiani. In Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume 166, Pages: 28-52, October 2019. [Link] [Media Coverage: The Washington Post] [Media Coverage: The Wall Street Journal] [Media Coverage: Marginal Revolution]
10. “The Paradox of Power Revisited: Internal and External Conflict”, with Ivan G. Lopez Cruz. In Economic Theory, Volume 68, Issue 2, Pages: 421-460, September 2019. [Link]
9. “Horizontal and Vertical Conflict: Experimental Evidence”, with Sebastian Galiani, Cheryl Xiaoning Long and Camila Navajas Ahumada. In Kyklos, Volume 72, Issue 2, Pages: 239-269, May 2019. [Link]
8. “Stirring Up a Hornets’ Nest: Geographic Distribution of Crime”, with Sebastian Galiani and Ivan G. Lopez Cruz. In Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume 152, Pages: 17-35, August 2018. [Link] [Media Coverage]
7. “Collective Action: Experimental Evidence”, with Victoria Anauati, Brian Feld and Sebastian Galiani. In Games and Economic Behavior, Volume 99, Pages: 36-55, September 2016. [Link]
6. “Fiscal Federalism and Legislative Malapportionment: Causal Evidence from Independent but related Natural Experiments”, with Sebastian Galiani and Iván Torre. In Economics & Politics, Volume 28, Issue 1, Pages: 133-159, March 2016. [Link]
5. “The Political Coase Theorem: Experimental Evidence”, with Sebastian Galiani and Lucía Yanguas. In Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume 103, Pages: 17-38, July 2014. [Link]
4. “Autocracy, Democracy and Trade Policy”, with Sebastian Galiani. In Journal of International Economics, Volume 93, Issue 1, Pages: 173-193, May 2014. [Link]
3. “Factor Endowments, Democracy and Trade Policy Divergence”, with Sebastian Galiani and Norman Schofield. In Journal of Public Economic Theory, Volume 16, Issue 1, Pages: 119–156, February 2014. [Link]
2. “Making Rules Credible: Divided Government and Political Budget Cycles”, with Jorge M. Streb. In Public Choice, Volume 156, Issue 3-4, Pages: 703-722, September 2013. [Link]
1. “Checks and Balances on Political Budget Cycles: Cross-Country Evidence”, with Jorge M. Streb and Daniel Lema. In Kyklos, Volume 62, Issue 3, Pages: 426-447, August 2009. [Link]
Under Review and Working Papers
“Fighting Communism Supporting Collusion”, with Sebastian Galiani and José Manuel Paz y Miño. Revise and resubmit (2nd round) Journal of International Economics. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 4135570 [Link]
“Ostromian Institutions, Social Norms, and Violence during Civil Conflict”, with Nathan Cook and Jessica Steinberg. Revise and resubmit European Economic Review.
“Special Interest influence and the interpretability of the law”, with Simon Lodato and Julian Costas-Fernadez. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 6270059 [Link]
“Who is the Boss of Legislators: Voters, Special Interest Groups or Parties?”, with David Stadelmann and Marco Portmann. Repect Research Paper. [Link]
“Why Nations Join the International Oil Pollution Compensation Funds: Risk, Transaction Costs and Democracy”, with David Soto-Oñate. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 4009805 [Link]
“Populism, Protectionism, and Political Instability”, with Tyler Daun and Sebastian Galiani. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 3764096 [Link]
“When Children Rule: Parenting in Modern Families”, with Sebastian Galiani and Matthew Staiger. NBER Working Paper Series No. 23087. SSNR Working Paper Series No. 2902732 [Link] [Media Coverage: The Wall Street Journal] [Media Coverage: Marginal Revolution] [Media Coverage: Slate Magazine Podcast]
“Optimal Regulation of the Media Industry” SSRN Working Paper Series No. 2666157 [Link] [Media Coverage]
“Honesty and Lemons: The Role of Trust in Markets”, with Jorge M. Streb. UCEMA Working Paper No. 492. [PDF]
“Meaningful Talk”, with Jorge M. Streb. UCEMA Working Paper No. 443. [PDF]
Book Chapters
3. “Political regimes, intra-elite conflict and trade policy”, with Sebastian Galiani. Forthcoming in Political Economy and Economic Development: Essays in Honor of Adolfo Canitrot. S. Galiani and C. Winograd (eds.), Edward Elgar.
2. “Latin America in its Growth Labyrinth”, with Julio Ramos Pastrana. Forthcoming in The Elgar Encyclopedia of Latin American Politics, Avellaneda, Claudia N., Nathalie Mendez Mendez, and Ricardo A Bello-Gomez. Eds. Edward Elgar Publishing. ISBN 9781035325542.
1. “La Economía Política de la Política Fiscal”, with Jorge M. Streb. In Progresos en Economía del Sector Público, AAEP, Fondo Editorial Consejo, 2011. [Chapter PDF]
Gustavo Torrens 