This analysis explores the consequences of West Bank annexation for Israel’s international standing, internal cohesion and socio-economic fabric, and security within a larger framework of regional stability.
Key industry practices followed by international oil and gas companies, if adequately implemented by Pemex, may complement Mexico's energy plan to help recognize areas of opportunity for Pemex, the authors write.
Religion nonresident scholar David R. Brockman examines an attempt to force the removal of Tarrant County GOP vice chair Dr. Shahid Shafi because he is Muslim. The paper places the controversy within the context of Islamophobia in politics and outlines the challenges the case presents for the Republican Party both nationally and statewide.
Who speaks for Islam and who holds religious authority in the Middle East? These questions strike at the heart of the relationship between religion and politics in the Muslim world, for whoever can legitimately claim religious authority has an opportunity to shape the extent to which religion is politicized in the region.
Our study examines this issue by identifying the channels of influence between religious leaders who claim to hold Islamic authority and individual Muslims across the region. The findings depict a complex religious space in the Middle East that reflects its citizens’ nuanced approach toward religion and the religion-politics relationship.
In separate papers, two Baker Institute fellows — one Palestinian, the other Israeli — provide their perspectives on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The authors examine a unique and anonymized dataset of complaints about government corruption in an urban Mexico district. The trends they found are transferable to other urban districts across the country and Latin America, they write, and may help anticorruption agencies in Mexico and beyond direct their efforts. https://doi.org/10.25613/cqgc-xv79.
Ana Grajales, Paul Lagunes, Tomas NazalDecember 13, 2018
In this paper for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, fellows Jorge Barro and John W. Diamond examine the history behind Texas’ property tax system, recent attempts to reduce the growing magnitude of the property tax burden, and the economic effects of two options for eliminating the school maintenance and operations (M&O) property tax: https://bit.ly/2zIZRZy
Public finance fellow John Diamond and Rice faculty scholar George Zodrow analyze the short- and long-term economic effects of a federal carbon tax in the United States.
A numerical simulation of the macroeconomic effects of the House Republican Tax Reform plan, using the Diamond-Zodrow model, suggests that its net macroeconomic effects would be positive.
