Links to required readings:

Grossman and Helpman, 1994, Protection for Sale, American Economic Review, 84:4, 833-850.

Ornelas, 2005, Rent Destruction and the Political Viability of Free Trade Agreements, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 120:4, 1475-1506.

Besley and Coate, 2003, Centralized versus Decentralized Provision of Local Public Goods: A Political Economy Analysis, Journal of Public Economics, 87:12, 2611-2637.

Brou and Ruta, Special Interests and the Gains from Political Integration, Economics and Politics, 18:2, 191-218.

Acemoglu, 2006, Introduction to Modern Economic Growth, Part 8: Political Economy of Growth (chapters 22, 23 and 24), mimeo, MIT.