The Political Economy of Trade Controls and Rent-Seeking in International Economics: Why Does Government Bureaucracy Become the Epicenter of “Mafia-Like” Networks?

Abstract

This study aimed to systematically synthesize the international economics and political economy literature on trade controls and rent-seeking in order to explain the institutional mechanisms through which government bureaucracy may become a central organizational locus for the creation, allocation, protection, and reproduction of mafia-like networks of economic privilege. This study was designed as a systematic review with an integrative qualitative synthesis of 60 scholarly publications addressing trade restrictions, rent-seeking, administrative corruption, regulatory capture, bureaucratic discretion, political connections, and informal economic networks. Relevant studies were identified through searches of Scopus, Web of Science Core Collection, EconLit, JSTOR, and Google Scholar. Eligibility assessment involved duplicate removal, title and abstract screening, and full-text evaluation based on predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria. Data were extracted using a structured protocol covering regulatory instruments, institutional settings, rent-generating mechanisms, forms of bureaucratic discretion, political influence, and reported economic consequences. The evidence was analyzed through thematic synthesis, comparative institutional analysis, and theory-driven causal mechanism mapping. The synthesis indicated that trade controls generate the greatest rent-seeking risks when economically valuable restrictions are combined with concentrated administrative discretion, opaque allocation procedures, weak oversight, and repeated interaction between officials and privileged economic actors. Bureaucratic gatekeeping emerged as the principal mediating mechanism linking regulatory scarcity to preferential access. Regulatory capture, political patronage, selective enforcement, informational asymmetry, and circular rent reinforcement were identified as the most important pathways through which temporary privileges may become durable networks of economic advantage. The findings further indicated that such arrangements are associated with allocative inefficiency, higher transaction costs, market concentration, reduced productivity, institutional distrust, and persistence of inefficient regulatory structures. Transparency, digital traceability, judicial review, professionalized administration, and credible anti-corruption enforcement emerged as important moderating mechanisms.