Three seemingly unrelated but nevertheless connected themes run through my research papers. One theme, which is couched in terms of the open economy macroeconomics literature, investigates the across-country distributions of wealth and income in a world where capital flows take a global aspect. In this set of papers, I explore the consequences of various policies in redistributing wealth internationally as reflected in financial and current accounts. A second theme, this time using the framework provided by development economics, looks at different aspects of globalization as reflected in the political economy of debt and the impact of the use of developmental tools in a context with economies of scale. Finally, a third theme is to be found in a set of papers looking at the historically divergent growth and development experiences of different regions of the globe and highlighting some of the political economy mechanisms that might account for this divergence.