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Publications (203)
Research Brief
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– Income inequality in former British African colonies
The presence of European colonial powers in Africa has left a long-lasting legacy that has severely impacted their development trajectories. But what are the lingering effects of colonization on economic performance, in particular with regard to inequality? While clear information on many economic...
– Socioeconomic class and poverty in South Africa
South Africa is often cited as the most unequal economy in the world. Its experience of having to overcome both colonialism and apartheid makes it unique from the vantage of studies on socioeconomic class, economic mobility, and poverty — with household characteristics like race, gender, and...
Research Brief
In 2008 Doucouliagos and Paldam published a paper, hereafter known as DP08, based on a meta-analytic approach to the aid-growth question. Working with a database including 68 studies on the relationship between foreign aid and economic growth they arrived at a pessimistic result. This is in line...
– Addressing the lack of data and observing the structure of the economy
With the recent democratic elections, Myanmar has entered a new development phase. To support this process there is amongst others a need for sound economic policies that have an economy-wide perspective. To enable such policies, appropriate analytical methods and the relevant underlying data, must...
– Experience over the last fifty years
Asia has achieved remarkable economic growth and seen hundreds of millions of citizens rise out of poverty since the mid-1960s. Constructing and analysing the factors behind continent’s poverty and inequality over the last fifty years helps gain important insights for further reducing global poverty...
Research Brief
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Microfinance evaluations reveal a positive impact on per capita income, non-land asset value and poverty incidence. Across countries and methodologies, microfinance is most likely to have a short-term positive effect; regionally, the most positive impacts are seen in Africa. Women tend to benefit...
Research Brief
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– The Impact of Development Aid and Democracy Assistance
Development aid was effective in promoting democratic transitions during the 1990s in African countries beset by economic crisis domestic discontent, and a high dependency on aid. Development aid also influenced democratic transition indirectly through conditionalities that required unpopular...
Research Brief
In 1959 the Netherlands discovered vast natural gas resources in the North Sea. This discovery led to a rapid increase in the country’s national wealth. However in the 1960s the Netherlands experienced an economic crisis. The natural gas reserves were one of the causes of this crisis, as the Dutch...
Research Brief
– The Case of Sierra Leone
Phillip Michael Kargbo's UNU-WIDER working paper, 'Impact of Foreign Aid on Economic Growth in Sierra Leone: Empirical Analysis' examines the impact of foreign aid on growth in Sierra Leone using a variety of econometric approaches. The paper finds that in the period 1970-2007 aid has a significant...
Research Brief
– What Does the Evidence Say?
Donors are concerned about how their aid is used, especially how it affects public spending. For low-income countries that receive significant amounts of aid relative to GDP, most of the aid spent in the country is given to the government either directly, or by financing services that would...
Research Brief
It is widely recognized that entrepreneurship is of critical importance to industrial development. Despite this importance we know little about the skills of business owners and managers in developing countries. In the WIDER Working Paper ‘The Role of Training in Fostering Cluster-Based Micro and...
Research Brief
– A New Agenda
It is commonly acknowledged that developing economies are characterized by large differences in output per worker across sectors. For such economies the shift of resources from low productivity to high productivity is the key potential driver of economic growth. Nearly all developing countries that...
Research Brief
The question of whether aid is effective in promoting growth is a controversial one. Views range from those who are highly skeptical that aid has any effect on growth at all, to those who believe that aid can play a significant role in promoting economic development. In the WIDER Working Paper 'The...
Research Brief
– Exploring the Fatal Flaw
Aid to Haiti has not been effective due to failure of the country’s political and economic elites to participate and assist in the development process. US foreign policy has in some cases reinforced the tendency for elites to personally profit from aid initiatives. Haiti has received more than US$20...
Research Brief
In the WIDER Working Paper ‘Aid and Investment in Statistics for Africa’ Jeffery I. Round discusses how the effectiveness of aid aimed at improving statistical capacity in Africa can be assessed. He begins by describing the reasons behind the increasing demand for data, and the institutions involved...
Research Brief
Donor political interests have heavily influenced aid flows to North Africa in the past. This has reduced the effectiveness of aid which, with the exception of Tunisia, has not been associated with sustained economic growth. The Arab Spring provides an opportunity to reappraise aid flows to the...
Research Brief
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– A Trade-Off Between Governance and Democracy?
In Mozambique donors have shifted focus from project aid to budget support in an effort to reform the public sector and ‘justice, legality and public order’. While budget support has increased state capacity and helped Mozambique’s donor community find common ground, it has had a negative impact on...
Research Brief
A key pledge of the Paris Deceleration of 2005 was that aid flows would be made more predictable. This is a key goal as aid shortfalls can cause a government to disproportionately cut their investments, while sudden spikes in aid can lead to a dramatic boost in government consumption. The majority...
Research Brief
It is predicted that the global financial crisis will negatively affect developing countries in Sub-Saharan Africa both through a reduction in Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) caused by the shrinking (or stagnating) of the economies of many major donors, and by a reduction in overseas trade due...
Research Brief
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There are over 900 million working people who earn less than US$2 a day, while 200 million people are unemployed. Unemployment is a bigger problem in high-income countries, in low-income countries unemployment is rarer as work is essential for survival for the poor. One of the most pressing goals of...
Research Brief
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The programme did lead participating households to use improved seeds. Food consumption scores did not improve after the programme. However during the programme participating households moved to more sustainable strategies to cope with food shortages. Fertilizer use improved by 20 per cent amongst...
The transformation of Asia’s education and health systems over the last 50 years has been breathtaking and unprecedented in human history. There are some central features of this transformation that clearly stand out. Over the last 50 years, all Asian countries have been able to expand citizen...
– The impact on equality in South Africa
The impact of medical deductions and medical credits on income inequality is a subject of discussion in South Africa, as well as in many other countries, raising critical questions about the fairness of the medical tax system and the impact on affordability for the poor. An in-depth analysis of...
It is important to understand how working conditions faced by workers in Vietnamese SMEs affect levels of compensation. This is salient given the scope of SMEs in Vietnam — they contribute to approximately 45% of the country’s GDP and 60% of its employment. There are no clearly defined financial or...
Several sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries have achieved substantial economic growth in the past 30 years. Likewise, access to education has considerably expanded, as reflected in rising enrolment rates for both men and women. Female labour force participation (FLFP) rates, however, are stagnant in...
Research Brief
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Corporate actors are now playing an important role in international development and contributing new ideas to development aid. Corporate–donor partnerships represent unique opportunities to combine the experience of donors with the innovative business knowhow of corporate actors. The United Kingdom...
– The case of value-added tax in South Africa
In a democratic system, taxation is a critical part of the social contract between the state and its citizens. The tax system can be used to help address the unacceptably high levels of poverty, inequality, and unemployment in South Africa. An increase in VAT from 14% to 15% caused a modest rise in...
Research Brief
The civil service is the backbone of the state, and can either support or undermine a country’s entire system of governance. Donor’s recognize this important fact and have often tried to promote civil service reform in the countries they are providing aid to. However these attempts have all too...
Research Brief
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The most successful projects and programmes are those that give local partners real ownership over the development process. Aid to health is not always allocated to the areas where it is most needed. Aid fragmentation creates extra costs for recipient countries and reduces the effectiveness of...
Research Brief
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Afghanistan has received vast amounts of development aid, but results may not be sufficiently robust. There is a limited menu of acceptable options for institutional arrangements, leading to a high dependence on external resources, technical expertise, and institutional models. There is not a...
Research Brief
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Burkina Faso is a landlocked country in West Africa, poor in natural resources, and with low levels of human development. Its economy remains agricultural and focused on food crops and cotton production. Over the last twenty years it has experienced average annual growth of around 2%. However...
– New gas finds, investments, and their implications in Mozambique
Large flows of foreign investments have not been translated into a boom for the Mozambican economy. On the contrary, they have foreshadowed a sustained period of deep economic difficulty for the country. What is the story behind this phenomenon and what are its implications? Mozambique has been...
Displaying 32 of 203 results