The Political Economy Foreign Direct Investment

Project Overview

Several projects examine political and economic consequences of foreign direct investment (FDI). Tobias Rommel examines why FDI increases the chances of survival of autocratic regimes and how it impedes democratization, focusing on distributional consequences and the perceived legitimacy of the ruling elites. Rommel, Palmtag and Messerschmidt analyze local distributional consequences of FDI across Africa. Luca Messerschmidt and Nicole Jantz examine the consequences of FDI for labor rights. Luca Messerschmidt also scrutinizes the mechanisms of the attribution of credit and blame for FDI-induced economic effects.

Project Members

• Tobias Rommel
• Luca Messerschmidt

+ Dr. Tabea Palmtag (Zurich) + Prof. Dr. Nicole Jantz (Nottingham)