Maurice McTigue, Vice President of Mercatus, Vernon Smith, Mercatus Center Fellow, and Jack Goldstone, Mercatus Center Fellow, participate in a panel discussion concerning reconstruction in Iraq. The transcript of the discussion is provided in the pdf link.

Professor Kuran argues that poor economic performance in Middle Eastern economies is rooted in institutions and legal conditions that hindered the accumulation and efficient investment of private capital. He further argues that these institutions and legal conditions were specific historical developments in the Middle East, and not inherent features of Islamic societies. Thus Thus Islamic societies have the potential for better performance, provided those historical obstacles can be diminished. This much is clear from the examples of Malaysia and Indonesia, and earlier of Lebanon, all of which showed fairly rapid modernization and economic growth for substantial periods.