Putting the history back into economics: good new book from the FT’s Alan Beattie
‘False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World’, by Alan Beattie, the world trade editor at the Financial Times is published tomorrow in the UK and is already doing well in the US. It explores the historical backstory to current economic debates on trade, corruption, the ‘curse of wealth’ in oil and mineral producing nations,…
Dambisa Moyo goes stellar – why? Some reviews by fellow Africans and others, including me
The Dambisa Moyo phenomenon shows no signs of abating, with a front page story in the FT and an elevation this month to Time Magazine’s list of the world’s 100 most influential people. The publicity is also selling a lot of books – she’s currently 3rd in Amazon US sales rankings for books on ‘policy and current…
Road accidents claim the life of Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem, and another 1.3 million people this year
I read with sorrow but no great surprise about the death of yet another outstanding activist in a road crash. Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem, a renowned pan-Africanist, journalist and campaigner, died in a car crash in Nairobi, Kenya on 25 May – Africa Day. For an obituary and hundreds of affectionate farewells see Pambezuka News. Tajudeen (pictured),…
Climate change gets real in the US; flights v steaks; good governance isn't all it's cracked up to be; the future of capitalism and why clean stoves can save 1.6m lives a year: links I liked
Climate change becomes real politics in the US, according to Paul Krugman (is he the only Nobel laureate economist with his own tribute song on youtube?) Cut out meat or air travel asks Owen Barder? You decide (unfortunately I’m addicted to both – any other options?) Dani Rodrik argues that the crisis proves that good governance isn’t…
Big UN conference on the global crisis is postponed – why?
At the last minute, the UN has postponed its ‘Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and its Impact on Development’ from 1-3 June to 24-26th June, still in New York. This will allow it time to sort out the draft conclusions and try and convince a respectable number of world leaders to attend.…
What's different about the current spate of land grabs in poor countries?
This week’s Economist has an excellent overview of the issues surrounding what it calls ‘outsourcing’s third wave’ (the first two were manufacturing and services) – deals in which foreign investors are buying up huge tracts of land in poor countries to produce food to ship back home (see map). Some highlights: Saudi investors are spending $100m…
What are African leaders saying about the impact of the crisis? Latest overview
The African Development Bank is doing some excellent analysis and has just updated the paper submitted to the April G20 Summit by African Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (new paper here, original paper for G20 here). Main points: ‘For the first time since 1994, per capita income will contract in 2009 for the continent…
Fire brigades or arsonists? A UN debate on the economic crisis
I spoke at an UNCTAD symposium on the global crisis in Geneva this week (Oxfam’s pre-conference submission is here). A laudable attempt to get a conversation going with civil society organizations, but a classically frustrating UN event – dozens of developing country delegates mingling with NGOs and others, but any real exchange was deadened by…
US aid reform takes off
Shortly after the US election, I blogged about the promising discussions on US aid reform in Washington. Those are now starting to bear fruit. In late April, Howard Berman, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced a bill (The Initiating Foreign Assistance Reform Act of 2009–HR 2139). Here are some of his covering remarks:…
How do we get the institutions right on climate change?
Normally, I find the use of scenarios to think through policy issues pretty shallow and unhelpful. But a new paper on the institutional architecture for climate change, by Alex Evans and David Steven, has a horribly plausible and thought-provoking scenario among its three possible futures. A slightly truncated version follows in a couple of paras…