The Role of Organized Interest Groups in Policy Making

The book collects ten papers which give a broad overview of the most recent economic studies in the fields of lobbying and special interest groups. This field of research has been attracting a growing interest in economic literature. The papers in this volume are both theoretical and empirical and throw new light on the role of organized interest groups in a large range of political issues including electoral competition, public debt taxation, trade policy, social security, environmental polices and public spending.

Debora Giocchino is Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Rome "La Sapienza". She graduated (M.Phil and Ph.D.) in Economics from the University of Cambridge (U.K.). She has published articles on monetary and fiscal policies, EMU and game theory. Her current research interest includes political economics and European economics.

Sergio Ginebri is Associate Professor at University of Molise, Italy, where he teaches courses in Economics and Public Economics. He studied at University of Rome "La Sapienza", University of Warwick, Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva. Lately, his research interest is concentrated on the political economy of public debt taxation and of European economic policy coordination.

Laura Sabani is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Florence where she teaches Monetary Economics, International Economics and Economics of Developing Countries. She obtained a Ph.D. in Economics in Cambridge (U.K.) in 1993 and an Italian Doctorate at Bocconi University in 1992. Her research activity includes: banking regulation; lobbying activity and macro policies; endogenous growth. She wrote several papers published in international and Italian journals.