UNU-WIDER Book Launch: The Poor Under Globalization in Asia, Latin America and Africa

The OUP volume presents thirteen studies selected from the three regional conferences organized under the auspices of UNU-WIDER. These studies together with the analytical overview by the editors illustrate the differential effects of globalization on growth, inequality, and poverty in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Distinct processes of institutional and socio-political change, as well as significant differences in initial conditions, such as natural resource endowment, the quantity and quality of human capital, institutional framework, and the quality of governance, have had diverse effects on the poor in these regions. Focusing on distinct manifestations of globalization and their affect on poverty, these case studies cover the spectrum from broad macroeconomic regional and country analyses to micro-oriented village studies in each of the three continents.

Arising out of the same large scale UNU-WIDER research project, the World Development special issue includes case studies that cover the spectrum from broad macroeconomic regional and country analyses to more micro-oriented studies in different settings in Central and South America. The case studies illustrate that the impact of globalization on poverty is extremely context specific, reflecting the heterogeneous and complex nature of the globalization-poverty nexus.

Chairperson

Tony Addison is Chief Economist and Deputy Director of the United Nations University's World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) in Helsinki, Finland. He was previously Professor of Development Studies, University of Manchester; Executive Director of the Brooks World Poverty Institute (BWPI), University of Manchester (from 2006-2009); Associate Director of the Chronic Poverty Research Centre (CPRC); and Deputy Director of UNU-WIDER.

Speakers

Erik Thorbecke is the H.E. Babcock Professor of Economics Emeritus, Graduate School Professor and former Director of the Program on Comparative Economic Development at Cornell University. He has published extensively in the areas of economic and agricultural development, the measurement and analysis of poverty and malnutrition, the Social Accounting Matrix and general equilibrium modeling, and international economics. The Foster-Greer-Thorbecke poverty measure has been adopted almost universally by international organizations and researchers doing empirical work on poverty.

Machiko Nissanke is Professor of Economics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. She previously worked at Birkbeck College, University College London and the University of Oxford, and was also Research Fellow of Nuffield College and the Overseas Development Institute. She has published numerous books and journal articles in financial and international economics, and has served many international organizations as advisor and coordinator of research programmes.

Discussant

Charles Gore is currently Special Coordinator for Cross-sectoral Issues in the Division for Africa, Least Developed Countries and Special Programmes in UNCTAD. In this role, he directs UNCTAD's research and policy analysis on Africa and least developed countries. Between 1999 and 2008, he directed the research for UNCTAD's Least Developed Countries Report. He also led the team and co-authored The Least Developed Countries Report 2007: Knowledge, Technological Learning and Innovation for Development.

Related WIDER Publications

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (eds) (2006). The Impact of Globalization on the World's Poor Transmission Mechanisms. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (eds) (2006). 'The Impact of Globalization on the World's Poor'. World Development, 34 (8).

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (2007). 'Linking Globalization to Poverty', WIDER Policy Brief No. 2.

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (eds) (2008). Globalization and the Poor in Asia: Can Shared Growth be Sustained? Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (eds) (2008). 'Globalization-Poverty Channels and Case Studies from sub-Saharan Africa'. African Development Review, 20 (1).

Nissanke, M. and E. Thorbecke (2010). 'Linking Globalization to Poverty in Asia, Latin America and Africa', UNU-WIDER Policy Brief No. 3.

Thorbecke, E. and M. Nissanke (eds) (2009). 'The Impact of Globalization on the Poor in Latin America'. Economía 9 (1): 153-186.

Details of other publications are available here.

Erik Thorbecke, Machiko Nissanke, and Charles Gore