Soylemez, Busra2022-02-112022-02-112021https://udspace.udel.edu/handle/19716/30333This dissertation project points out the role of critical junctures and domestic political-institutional frameworks on the financial globalization of developing countries. It diverges from the majority of the international political economy scholarship on financial globalization in several ways. First, it shifts the focus of analysis to de facto measures of financial globalization that consider capital flow amounts, international debt, and foreign exchange reserves of a country, instead of the policy level (de jure) liberalization. By doing so, this dissertation avoids issues of capital account policy evasions and more accurately captures the level of financial integration of a country. Second, it adopts a positive integration approach that seeks the active contribution of the political and economic elite in enabling a country’s financial integration, instead of perceiving financial globalization as a secular trend or an automatic process that occurs by the simple removal of capital controls. This approach enlightens the variations in timings and levels of financial globalization across the developing world. More importantly, the approach also signifies the political aspect of financial globalization and emphasizes the contention within the process. Third, amongst many other factors, this dissertation focuses on drivers of financial globalization to attract attention to the variations in why a country gets integrated into the global capital market. ☐ In the analysis of de facto financial globalization, this dissertation reveals that financial crises have acted as a catalyst for the financial integration of developing countries regardless of the presence of policy level liberalization. ☐ The dire need for capital in periods of crisis causes increasing reliance on international debt, strengthened monetary authorities, and banking sector restructuring. These consequences, in turn, expedite the de facto financial globalization of developing countries. Furthermore, the dissertation also shows that political corruption can increase the financial globalization of developing countries. First, high levels of corruption can be an incentive for foreign firms to invest because corrupt countries are more likely to have unexploited sectors. The entrance to these sectors, which had lacked adequate capital, technology, production mechanisms, can promise rents exceeding the costs of bribery and potential punishments by home countries. Second, the corrupt political elite also has incentives to hide their illicit gains in shell companies registered abroad as it is an easy way to launder the corrupt money into legal personal accounts. Through an analysis of 121 developing countries for the years 1970-2015, this dissertation finds extensive and robust effects of crisis and corruption on the financial integration of developing countries. Following the quantitative analyses, both arguments are supported with illustrative case studies that demonstrate the mechanisms in which crises and corruption increase the financial globalization of developing countries.CorruptionDeveloping countriesFDIFinancial crisisFinancial globalizationPortfolio flowsThesis1296376882https://doi.org/10.58088/fy7a-mg272021-09-30en