Policy Brief
Rising Spatial Disparities and Development
The UNU-WIDER project on 'Spatial Disparities in Human Development' has collected and analyzed evidence on the extent of spatial inequalities within developing countries. The studies find that spatial inequalities are high, with disparities between...
Blog
Beyond the Urban Tipping Point
by
Jo Beall, Basudeb Guha-Khasnobis, Ravi Kanbur
September 2011
Jo Beall, Basudeb Guha-Khasnobis, and Ravi Kanbur By many estimates, the world has just crossed the point where more than half the global population...
Working Paper
Toward Efficient Urban Form in China
Land efficiency in urban China is examined, using Tianjin as a case study, from the perspective of agricultural land conservation; reduction in energy use, conventional pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions; and human time savings. Issues addressed...
Working Paper
Gender Earnings Differentials and Regional Economic Development in Urban China, 1988-97
Gender earnings differentials in urban China by region and their changes during the first decade of economic reform are examined. It is found that the female–male earnings ratio increased during the early stage of reform. The male earnings premium...
Working Paper
Challenges for Latin American Cities
Current urban interventions, particularly in cities in developing countries like Santiago de Chile, evidence major neglect in understanding the way contemporary living takes place and how it is changing under processes of globalization, global...
Working Paper
Is Internal Migration Bad for Receiving Urban Centres?
During the twentieth century, internal migration and urbanization shaped Brazil’s economic and social landscape. Cities grew tremendously, while immigration participated in the rapid urbanization process and the redistribution of poverty between...
Working Paper
Unlocking Public Entrepreneurship and Public Economies
Unlocking human potential requires a rich network of institutional arrangements in both private and public spheres. Opening the private sphere to entrepreneurship and complex market organization is well understood as a key to increasing the level and...
Working Paper
A New Way of Monitoring the Quality of Urban Life
A growing number of cities around the world have established systems of monitoring the quality of urban life. Many of those systems combine objective and subjective information and attempt to cover a wide variety of topics. This paper introduces a...
Working Paper
Socio-Spatial Implications of Street Market Regulation Policy
Unlike in most Latin American cities, street vendors organized in farmers’ markets popularly known as ferias libres in Santiago de Chile, gained legal recognition early in the twentieth century. Since then, comunas, or local municipalities, have...
Working Paper
Growth and Recovery in a Time of Default
International narratives on Argentina’s recovery from the crisis of 2001-02 tend to emphasize the role of rising commodity prices and growing demand from China. Argentina is said to have been ‘lucky’, saved by global demand for its agricultural...
Working Paper
Cocaine Cities
The relationship between the cocaine trade and urban land markets in South America has been overlooked by the mainstream economics and urban studies literature. This paper examines two avenues through which the cocaine trade can have a large impact...
Working Paper
Latin American Urban Development into the 21st Century
This paper argues for a more systemic engagement with Latin American cities, contending it is necessary to reconsider their unity in order to nuance the ‘fractured cities’ perspective that has widely come to epitomise the contemporary urban moment in...
Working Paper
Social Benefits in Urban China
This study provides the first set of empirical evidence on the determinants of social benefits received by urban families in China and the impact on income inequality using the China Household Income Project (CHIP) 1988 and 2002 data. It finds that...
Working Paper
Globalization and the Urban Poor in China
This paper examines the distributional impact of globalization on the poor in urban China. Employing the kernel density estimation technique, we recovered from irregularly grouped household survey data the income distribution for 29 Chinese provinces...
Working Paper
Gender Aspects of Urban Economic Growth and Development
The urbanization process is frequently shaped by prevailing constructions of gender. The recognition of this phenomenon is vital both in diagnosis and policy terms. This paper aims at illustrating the importance of gender in three major related...
Journal Article
Latin American Urban Development into the Twenty-first Century
This article argues for a more systemic engagement with Latin American cities, contending that it is necessary to reconsider their unity in order to nuance the ‘fractured cities’ perspective that has widely come to epitomize the contemporary urban...
Journal Article
The Efficiency of India's Cities
One reason for unsatisfactory public service delivery in Indian cities is that city finances are in poor condition. Recent research shows that given the fragmented institutional arrangements for land in India's cities, there is a case for...
Journal Article
Evaluating multiple spatial dimensions of economic growth in Brazil using spatial panel data models
The goal of this paper is to evaluate the results of regional economic growth model estimations at multiple spatial scales using spatial panel data models. The spatial scales examined are minimum comparable areas, microregions, mesoregions and states...
Blog
Urbanization and Development: The Big Questions
by
Lorraine Telfer-Taivainen
October 2011
Lorraine Telfer-Taivainen In October the London School of Economics and Political Science hosted the launch of Urbanization and Development...
Working Paper
Habitat II and the Urban Economy
The strategic conferences organized by the UN during the past 25 years have focused on assisting and mobilizing governments and other relevant actors of international life by enhancing collective thinking and action in those areas which may...
Blog
Density and Disasters: Economics of Urban Hazard Risk
by
Somik V. Lall, Uwe Deichmann
February 2010
Somik V. Lall and Uwe Deichmann Following the terrible disaster which struck Haiti last month, in which more than 200,000 people are estimated to have...
Working Paper
Youth in Tanzania’s Urbanizing Mining Settlements
Over the last fifteen years many African countries have experienced a ‘mining take-off’. Mining activities have bifurcated into two sectors: large-scale, capital-intensive production generating the bulk of the exported minerals, and small-scale...
Blog
From the Editor's Desk (June-July 2012)
Tony Addison I started writing this ‘From the Editor’s Desk’ in Accra, to the sound of an African drum band, preparing for a ceremony to mark the...
Blog
From The Editor's Desk (December 2012)
Tony Addison This year has rushed by at speed. For UNU-WIDER it’s been a year of big successes. We will have published some 110 working papers by the...
Blog
The View from Buenos Aires
Tony Addison A visit to Buenos Aires in September provided a good vantage point to look at the euro zone’s deepening crisis. Angle readers will recall...
Blog
From the Editor's desk (October 2011)
Tony Addison As autumn moves into winter in Helsinki, it is time to bring you the October edition of UNU-WIDER’s newsletter, WIDER Angle. Regular...
Blog
Urbanization and Development in Asia: Linkages with Globalization and Migration
by
Lorraine Telfer-Taivainen
June 2012
Lorraine Telfer-Taivainen The Central European University (CEU) in Budapest, Hungary, was the venue for the launch on 16 June 2012 of the just...
Working Paper
Cities of Youth
With a focus on cities in eastern and southern Africa, this paper draws on recent scholarship and my own research in Lusaka, Zambia, to analyse pathways for, and challenges to, greater social mobility for youth against the background of economic...
Blog
Decent work – discussion on working conditions in Helsinki and globally
by
Kirsi Riipinen
June 2022
How committed is Helsinki to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals? The discussion forum at the City Hall on Tuesday addressed one of the...
Working Paper
Firm Location Choice in Cities
We use large survey data sets of firms provided by the World Bank for China, India, and Brazil—Investment Climate Surveys—to address the important question: what determines the locational choice of firms among cities in these countries. We find that...