Christopher Coyne

Christopher Coyne

  • F.A. Harper Professor of Economics at the Mercatus Center
  • Professor of Economics at George Mason University

Christopher Coyne is the F.A. Harper Professor of Economics at the Mercatus Center and a member of the Department of Economics at George Mason University.  He is also the North American Editor of The Review of Austrian Economics, a member of the Board of Scholars for the Virginia Institute for Public Policy, and he was named the Hayek Fellow at the London School of Economics in 2008. Coyne is the author of After War: The Political Economy of Exporting Democracy (2007, Stanford University Press), Media, Development and Institutional Change (co-authored with Peter Leeson, 2009, Edward Elgar Publishing), and the co-editor (with Rachel Mathers) of The Handbook on the Political Economy of War (2011, Edward Elgar Publishing).  In addition, he has authored numerous academic articles, book chapters, and policy studies.  He received his Ph.D. in Economics from George Mason University.

PUBLISHED RESEARCH

Journal Article

Book Review of 'Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World' by Ashraf Ghani and Claire Lockhart

Christopher Coyne | Jul 11, 2009
A book review of Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World by Ashraf Ghani and Clare Lockhart.
Journal Article

Unintended Consequences: How Regulation Changes Behaviour

Christopher Coyne | Jul 01, 2009
This article discusses unintended consequences in relation to regulations and automobile safety laws.
Journal Article

With Friends Like These, Who Needs Enemies? Aiding the World's Worst Dictators

Christopher Coyne, Matt E. Ryan | Jul 01, 2009
This article reviews and analyzes the foreign aid delivered to the world’s top living dictators. Also considered is why aid to these dictators fails to generate change for the better. At least rhetorically, the governments of developed countries provide aid to poor countries to facilitate development and movement toward liberal institutions that protect basic rights. Despite these good intentions, aid has failed to generate sustainable change in the countries that the world’s worst dictators rule.
MORE PUBLISHED RESEARCH

WORKING PAPERS

An Unrighteous Piece of Business image

An Unrighteous Piece of Business

A New Institutional Analysis of the Memphis Riot of 1866
Christopher Coyne, Art Carden | Jul 27, 2010
To what extent can outsiders impose sustainable change on insiders acting within existing institutional arrangements? This paper explores this question in the context of the American Reconstruction experience in Memphis, Tennessee and offers implications for current and future efforts by outsiders to engage in institutional change.
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The Political Economy of FEMA: Did Reorganization Matter?

Peter Leeson, Christopher Coyne, Russell Sobel | Dec 2009
This paper investigates the political economy of FEMA’s post-9/11 merger with the Department of Homeland Security.
With Friends Like These, Who Needs Enemies? Aiding the World's Worst Dictators - Working Paper image

With Friends Like These, Who Needs Enemies? Aiding the World's Worst Dictators - Working Paper

Christopher Coyne, Matt E. Ryan | Sep 2008
Despite rhetoric supporting liberal values and institutions, the governments of developed countries provide continued development and military assistance to the world's worst dictators. 
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