A review on the resource curse

Abstract

Natural wealth is generally considered as one of the fundamental sources of economic growth. However, a vast majority of the related empirical research verified that resource-rich countries tend to underperform their resource-deficient counterparts. This paradox is known as the resource curse. During the past two decades more sophisticated analyses have revealed that the presence of the curse is conditional and its growth effects are non-monotonic. Recent efforts concentrate on understanding the transmission channels and identifying the decisive conditions on the fulfillment of the curse. This article gives an overview on the progress and depicts the current state of the research.