Replication Data for: Can “Soft” Advice from International Organizations Catalyze Natural Resource Sector Reform?

Can international organizations improve natural resource governance? The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is most noted for its role in crisis lending, where it can wield the “teeth” of loan suspensions to push for reforms. But IMF officials also spend a large amount of time conducting routine surveillance through Article IV consultations, which assess a country’s economic developments and provide non-binding recommendations. Do governments follow this “toothless” advice? To answer this question, we examine the content of all Article IV staff appraisals published between 2004 and 2019. Using text analysis and a difference-in-differences estimator, we find that resource-rich developing countries are more likely to adopt legislation reforming the oil, gas, and mining sectors in the wake of an Article IV appraisal that extensively discusses the natural resource sector and recommends natural resource governance reforms. Our results suggest that technocratic advice—a tool often overlooked in international organization scholarship—can lead to the adoption of policies that help ameliorate the resource curse.

国际组织能否改善自然资源治理？国际货币基金组织（International Monetary Fund，IMF）最广为人知的职能是危机放贷，其可动用暂停贷款的强制威慑力推动成员国实施改革。不过，IMF工作人员亦会投入大量时间，通过第四条款（Article IV）磋商机制开展常规监督工作，评估一国经济发展态势并出具非约束性建议。那么各国政府是否会遵从这类"无强制约束力"的建议？为解答这一问题，我们梳理了2004至2019年间发布的全部第四条款磋商工作人员评估报告的内容。通过文本分析与双重差分（difference-in-differences）估计方法，我们发现：若某份第四条款磋商评估报告对自然资源领域展开充分讨论并提出自然资源治理改革建议，资源丰裕型发展中国家后续更有可能出台针对石油、天然气与采矿行业的改革法案。本研究结果表明，在国际组织研究领域常被忽视的技术专家建言，能够推动各国出台有助于缓解资源诅咒的政策。