Ennio Emanuele Piano

This paper explores the constitutional history of American Indian tribes since the 1930s. We compile a novel data set on 1,016 constitutional change episodes by 290 tribes. We leverage this information to explore the determinants of variation in tribal constitutional change over time and across tribes. First, we show that the location of tribes influences their propensity to amend, with tribes from the Great Plains and Eastern regions doing so at much higher rates than the rest. We then investigate the influence of changes in federal attitudes towards tribal sovereignty. Our analysis unveils a relationship between a tribe’s demographic and political characteristics on the one hand and its propensity to amend and constitutional longevity on the other. We show that membership size (in 1926) and whether a tribe adopts directly democratic forms of governance positively affects how much and how often it amends its constitution. We also find a surprising positive association between constitutional rigidity and the number and rate at which tribes amend. Our results confirm the influence of federal Indian policy on the trajectory of American Indian sovereignty. Changes in federal Indian policy significantly affect tribes’ choice to amend their constitutions, with the number of amendments per tribe per year doubling during the so-called ‘Self-Determination’ period (1968–1988).

We investigate the availability of the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) using data from the Catholic Church in England and Wales from 2015 and 2023. During this time, the traditionalist Catholic community was hit by three shocks: (1) the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, (2) restrictions imposed by Pope Francis in 2021, and (3) further restrictions in 2023. Our study reveals that the TLM was experiencing steady growth before the pandemic, with a decline during COVID-19 and then a rebound period, followed by a substantial decrease in availability after Pope Francis’s restrictions. The research also highlights differences in the supply of TLMs between dioceses led by bishops elevated by various popes. Our analysis provides the first empirical study of the supply of the TLM, shedding light on a consequential development within the Catholic Church and its traditionalist subculture.

The Catholic Church enacted broad reforms after the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), notably to the liturgies that Catholics must attend every Sunday. However, there has been a revival of pre‐Vatican II practices recently, such as the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM). We explore the role played in this resurgence by the entry of a traditionalist Catholic competitor (the Society of Saint Pius X) in the market for religious services. Using data from the continental United States, we show that the presence of SSPX chapels significantly increases the availability of TLMs, particularly on Sundays when attendance at a Mass is required. We also find evidence that the effect is strongest at a local level and that it has intensified over time, possibly due to Pope Benedict XVI's liberalization of TLM celebrations in 2007.

Napoléon Bonaparte revolutionized the practice of war with his reliance on a mass national army and large-scale conscription. This system faced one major obstacle: draft evasion. This article discusses Napoléon’s response to widespread draft evasion. First, we show that draft dodging rates across France varied with geographic characteristics. Second, we provide evidence that the regime adopted a strategy of discriminatory conscription enforcement by setting a lower (higher) conscription rate for those regions where the enforcement of conscription was more (less) costly. Finally, we show that this strategy resulted in a rapid fall in draft dodging rates across France.

This chapter reviews recent work by economists in the Austrian tradition in response to the rising influence of behavioral economics in the profession. Austrian scholars have taken issues with every aspect of the behavioral literature, from their approach to theoretical matters to their empirical methods, from their interpretation of their findings to their policy recommendations. In particular, this chapter focuses on how Austrian economists and behavioral economists differ in their understanding of human rationality, their interpretation of real human beings’ failure to behave according to the naïve neoclassical economic model, and the preferability of various behaviorally informed policy interventions to address such failure. However, while Austrian authors have taken a mostly negative attitude towards their behaviorist counterparts, some have suggested ways for the two fields to incorporate each other’s insights to produce a more robust alternative to the neoclassical economic paradigm.

We study contractual solutions to creative disagreements in the market for original paintings using a sample of ninety commission documents from Renaissance Italy (1285–1530). We investigate the determinants of creative freedom by comparing the length of the description of the final painting with variables capturing painter-, patron-, and commission-specific characteristics. Our results suggest that corporate patronage was positively associated with creative freedom for the painter as compared to individual patrons. We also find evidence that the reputation of the painter at commission and larger commission values are negatively associated with creative freedom.