Policies·ir_rial_unification_attempt_2018

Rouhani rial unification attempt and NIMA FX system

IRN·2018 – 2021·enacted 2018-04-09·Moderation and Development Party-aligned cabinetcandidate

movestrade openness↓central bank independence↓

What the policy did

On 9 Apr 2018 Iran announced unification of official and free-market exchange rates at 42,000 rial/USD, criminalised unauthorised FX transactions, and barred street-bureau trading. The unification collapsed within weeks as free-market rates moved to 80,000+ then 140,000+/USD following the 8 May 2018 US JCPOA withdrawal. The CBI then introduced a multi-tier system: the 42,000 rate preserved for essential imports (medicine, staples), a NIMA (Integrated Foreign Currency Exchange System) market-determined rate for other imports from Aug 2018, and a parallel free-market rate. Tiered architecture generated arbitrage rents and import-licensing distortions.

Policy-content fingerprint — what this policy moved, on which axes

Per invariant 3, reforms are scored by what they did on each channel-separated axis, not by the party that enacted them. This fingerprint is how the policy-match engine finds historical analogues.

unintended / side-effect

↓

trade openness

regulatory.trade_openness

Trade policy openness — tariffs, non-tariff barriers, FTAs, industrial protection.

decreased · moderate · unintended

more protectionist

Multi-tier FX regime under sanctions shock reintroduced import-licensing distortions.

↓

central bank independence

monetary.central_bank_independence

De jure and de facto independence of the central bank from fiscal authority. Per D.1.5 scope, one of the framework's defensible monetary positions.

decreased · moderate · unintended

lower independence (fiscal dominance, politicised appointments)

CBI forced into administered multi-tier FX regime by sanctions shock.

Enacted by

iran_rouhani_moderate_2013_2021

Empirical evidence — linked hypotheses

Explicit links are curated by the author. Inferred links are hypotheses in the library that test the same axes this policy moved — the framework's answer to "what does the data say about a policy like this?".

Estonia adopted among the most radical market-liberalisation packages of any post-Soviet state — flat tax (26% universal rate, 1994), currency board (EEK pegged to DM/EUR, 1992), rapid privatisation, unilateral free trade, and minimal capital controls — and by 2007 had recovered to Soviet-era GDP per capita levels and substantially exceeded them, while Belarusian and Ukrainian peers had not recovered comparably.

estonia_market_reform_post_soviet_growth_1991_2007inferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

PARTIAL — recovery threshold pass=True (year_recovered=1998, 2007 vs 1991 = 70.53282727739165); Baltic−CIS gap pass=False (gap=5.1509956229348575)

partial

Canada’s long-run prosperity after the Canada–US Free Trade Agreement (1988) and NAFTA (1994) is more associated with market openness than with national industrial-policy initiatives.

canada_market_liberalisation_vs_state_industry_1988_2024inferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'canada_post_1988' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

run pending

Singapore's long-run prosperity and frontier convergence are better predicted by extreme trade openness, strong rule of law, competitive product and services markets, and high economic freedom than by state ownership or industrial targeting alone.

singapore_state_capacity_market_openness_comboinferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

PARTIAL — coef=-0.0001143, p=0.713 (above α=0.1); direction inconclusive

partial

The ASEAN-China Free Trade Area (ACFTA), with the goods agreement effective 2010-01-01 for the original ASEAN-6, raised ASEAN-6 merchandise-export intensity over the 2010-2019 window relative to non-ASEAN comparator economies.

trade_lib_acfta_asean_china_2010_export_growthinferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

PARTIAL — ATT=+3.31, p=0.324, N=295, treated_countries=1 (above α=0.10)

partial

Estonia’s radical market reforms after independence in 1991 — including a currency board, flat tax, rapid privatisation, and full trade liberalisation — generated a cumulative GDP-per-capita convergence gain of at least 15 log-points by 2024 relative to a synthetic counterfactual constructed from gradual post-Soviet reform comparators (Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan).

estonia_market_reform_30yr_income_convergenceinferred

viaregulatory.trade_opennessmonetary.central_bank_independence

supported

Global value chain (GVC) participation predicts real GDP per capita income upgrading when firms can enter and exit freely, but not when rents are reserved for protected incumbents, in a panel of developing and emerging economies 1990-2020.

global_value_chain_participation_upgradeinferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — insufficient observations after listwise deletion (22)

run pending

Across countries 1990-2020, accession to a substantive free-trade agreement (FTA) — defined as a WTO-notified preferential-trade agreement going beyond MFN with measurable bilateral tariff reductions — is followed by higher trade openness and higher per-capita real GDP growth in the post-accession 5-year window than in the matched pre-accession 5-year window.

liberal_free_trade_partner_growth_panel_1990_2020inferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

PARTIAL — ATT=-4.069, p=0.264, N=1342, treated_countries=61 (above α=0.10)

partial

China's WTO accession (2001-12-11) triggered a structural acceleration in Chinese merchandise-export intensity and manufacturing value-added relative to a synthetic-control donor pool of large emerging economies that did not accede to the WTO on the same date.

trade_lib_china_wto_2001_manufacturing_export_surgeinferred

viaregulatory.trade_openness

PARTIAL — mean_gap=+4.793, |gap|/pre_sd=2.3, p_perm=0.833 (gap below 0.5×pre_sd or placebo p≥0.10)

partial

Similar historical policies

Ranked by axis-fingerprint overlap with this policy. Direction match bolded — those are the closest historical analogues. Shape of the match is what drives policy-outcome comparison, not the country or party label.

Massa-era stepped devaluations and multi-rate FX regime (2023)

ARG·2023

match

1.7

trade opennesscentral bank independence

Bolivia dollar-peg defence and gold-reserve monetisation (2023-2024)

BOL·2023

match

1.5

central bank independencetrade openness

CBN 43-item FX ban list

NGA·2015