World Bank technical assistance: Locating and cultivating sympathetic interlocutors

International development agencies have need of sympathetic interlocutors in developing countries who are receptive to and capable of sustainably implementing global policy norms. This article analyses World Bank technical assistance (TA) as a tool used to stack the policy deck in its favour by identifying and cultivating those government officials receptive to its ideas. Pairing its analysis with the policy mobilities literature, the article considers two questions: how does the World Bank locate receptive actors and how does it socialize new actors into accepting its ideas and practices? Observing the World Bank's four main TA pillars, the article reviews the different strengths and weaknesses of these pillars in garnering domestic support. In critiquing the World Bank's attempts to identify and cultivate sympathetic interlocutors, the article provides new insights into the mechanisms that facilitate the transnational movement of policy.     

DOES THE NUMBER OF COUNTRIES IN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS CYCLE MODELS MATTER?

Until the 1980s, standard models with two large open economies (i.e., the United States and Europe) provided plausible representations of the world economy. However, with the emergence of many developing countries since the 1990s, this approach no longer seems reasonable. In line with this change to the global economic environment, cross-country output correlations between the United States and other countries have risen. This paper extends the standard two-country model to many countries to show that doing so produces closer cross-country correlations to the data. In particular, based on analytical investigation with a simple model and quantitative analysis with a more general model, I show that the cross-country output correlation rises and the cross-country consumption correlation falls as the number of countries in the two models increases. (JEL F40, F41, F44)     

CLIMBING TO THE TOP? FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT AND PROPERTY RIGHTS

This article operates at the interface of the literature on the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on host countries and the literature on the determinants of institutional quality. We argue that FDI contributes to economic development by improving institutional quality in the host country. This proposition is tested within a large panel data set of 70 developing countries for the period 1981–2005. We show that FDI inflows have a positive and highly significant impact on property rights. Results are very robust and not affected by model specification, different control variables, or estimation technique. To our knowledge this is the first article to empirically test the FDI—property rights linkage. (JEL F23, O43, P48)     

The Right Price of Food

Only a few years ago the widely shared view was that low food prices were a curse to developing countries and the poor. Their dramatic increase in 2006–8 appears to have altered this view fundamentally. High food prices are now judged to have a devastating effect on developing countries and the world's poor – a reversal of opinion that raises questions about the old and the new arguments and the proposed remedies, and also about the causes of this dramatic turnaround in analysis and policy conclusions. This article puts these changes in perspective and discusses their potential implications.     

Empowered Wives and Frustrated Husbands: Nursing,Gender and Migrant Nepali in the UK

Since 2000, increasing numbers of Nepali nurses have crossed national borders to participate in the global healthcare market. The most common destination countries are the UK, US, Australia and New Zealand. In particular, educated middle‐class women are attracted to nursing with the full support of their families. There have been profound changes in women's position in Nepali society. As a female only profession in Nepal, nursing provides an excellent focus on how and why these changes have occurred. Based on a multi‐sited ethnography, including in‐depth interviews with nurses and their families, conducted in Nepal and the UK from 2006–2008, this article discusses the changing nursing profession within the broader context of gender dynamics. Between 2000 and 2008, around 1000 Nepali nurses migrated to the UK. International nurse migration hugely affects nurses' immediate family dynamics. This article illustrates how migrant nurses' husbands have to accept a compromised social position, from being family bread‐winners in Nepal to dependent husbands in the UK .

Policy Implications

• Since the late 1990s, a new women‐migration phenomenon has emerged in Nepal. The Nepal government's current women migration policy has created a serious controversy, which requires urgent policy attention.
• Because of British work permit regulations, Nepali nurses migrate to the UK on their own. Typically the UK government gives little consideration to how its international nurse recruitment practices and work permit policy affects migrants' family life. There is a need for a family‐friendly immigration policy.
• Female / nurse migration has a profound impact on nurses' families' lives in the UK. This area requires further enquiry.

     

STRATEGIC ENFORCEMENT,INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS,AND CONTRACTUAL R&D

This study examines the role of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in contractual research and development (R&D) in developing countries. We find that strong IPRs provide incentives for firms, both multinational and local, to specialize in R&D activities in which they have competitive advantage (the specialization effect). They also facilitate the switching process from imitators to potential innovators for local firms (the switching effect). Moreover, we also demonstrate that a multinational firm's strategic IPRs enforcement behavior can be an effective instrument for subsidizing contractual R&D in developing countries (the subsidizing effect). We further illustrate how a policy mix of IPRs and a foreign direct investment subsidy in these countries affects R&D activities by adding an offshore R&D subsidiary as an additional organizational form. (JEL L13, O31, O34)     

Local planning and global implementation: Foreign investment and urban development of Pudong, Shanghai

Competitive planning programmes for global integration have been created in cities throughout developed and developing countries during the past 2 decades. In China, global aspiration planning has been characterised by the establishment of Pudong New Area of Shanghai in 1990, with a group of foreign direct investment (FDI)-oriented themed zones targeting different types of global flows. Pudong very rapidly became a focus of FDI in the city, which extended to China as a whole in the 1990s, and now is further extended to playing a global role. However, spatial planning for the themed zones in Pudong has been limited in its scope to the physical design, land use, and the pattern of transport routes. This limited role of land use planning has been inadequate to coordinate the mutual engagement between global and local factors; however, an improved mechanism for coordinating planning has not yet emerged to replace it. The competitive and entrepreneurial approach of land management in conjunction with the imperatives of global firms has effectively diminished the original plan's intention that each zone should focus on particular industries, with each of them complementing the others.     

CAN TRADE REALLY HURT? AN EMPIRICAL FOLLOW‐UP ON SAMUELSON'S CONTROVERSIAL PAPER

This paper investigates Samuelson's [Samuelson, P. A. “Where Ricardo and Mill Rebut and Confirm Arguments of Mainstream Economists Supporting Globalization.” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18(3), 2004, 135–46] argument that technical progress of the trade partner may hurt the home country. We illustrate this prospect in a simple Ricardian model for situations with outward knowledge spillovers. Within this framework Samuelson's Act II effects may occur. Based on industry level panel data for 17 OECD countries for the period 1973–2000 we show econometrically that the outflow of domestic knowledge via exports or foreign direct investment (FDI) to the rest of the world may have a negative impact on industry output in the home country. This is particularly so when exporting to technologically less advanced countries and, more specifically, China. (JEL F10, F11, F14, O30)     

Main Determinants of Foreign Direct Investment in the Southeast European Countries

The growth of foreign direct investments (FDI) in the world has been significant in recent years. Between 1990 and 2000 worldwide FDI inflows increased more than five times, and since 2000 they have declined. During the period of FDI expansion, growth was especially strong from 1997 onward. However, most of the FDI transactions were between the developed countries. The distribution of FDI is unequal and less-developing countries face difficulties in attracting FDI. Despite the fact that FDI is increasingly important to developing countries, over the past few years the share of the developing countries in worldwide FDI inflows has been declining. The paper analyses geographical and sector distribution of FDI in the Southeast European countries (SEEC) and compares its amount with that in Central East European countries. According to economic theory, FDI towards developing countries flows for labor-intensive and low-technology production, while towards developed states, it flows for high-technology production. Identification of determining factors of FDI is a complex problem which depends on several characteristics specific for each country, sectors, and companies. All those factors could be grouped in three broad categories: economic policy of host country, economic performance, and attractiveness of national economy. On the desegregated level, FDI depends on size and growth potential of a national economy, natural resources endowments and quality of workforce, openness to international trade and access to international markets, and quality of physical, financial, and technological infrastructure. An important question is how SEEC can attract more foreign investment. To find the answer, this paper uses data on FDI inflows to SEEC to determine the main host country determinants of FDI and provides regression-based estimation of determinants of FDI. Using a sample of SEEC and panel data techniques, the determinants of FDI in this part of Europe are investigated. The paper researches the relationship between FDI, GDP, GDP per capita, number of inhabitants, trade openness, inflation, external debt, and information and communication technology sectors. For SEEC, FDI inflows are largely dependent on the completion of the privatization process and in this paper we include the level of private sector and privatization as explanatory variables. Our findings suggest that certain variables such as privatization and trade regime, as well as the density of infrastructure, appear to be robust under different specifications. A positive significance of the agglomeration factor is also observed, confirming the relevant theoretical propositions. However, certain differential variables, such as the privatization, could not be fully captured due to the statistical homogeneity of the sample.     

Foreign Direct Investment,Services Trade Negotiations and Development: The Case of Tourism in the Caribbean

This article examines whether and how developing countries can use services trade negotiations to increase the amount of inward FDI conducive to development. It reviews how services trade rules can affect inward FDI, and employs panel data analysis with innovative use of instrumental variables in the tourism sectors of 9 Caribbean countries during 1997–2003. It argues that Caribbean countries may want to signal openness to inward FDI in GATS, while maintaining a degree of flexibility in the use of policy measures; in the current negotiations with the EU on Economic Partnership Agreements, the focus could be on emphasising the development dimension.     

FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT AND COUNTRY‐SPECIFIC HUMAN CAPITAL

This paper exploits an international bilateral data set over the period 1963–1998 to investigate the relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and foreign‐educated labor in an FDI host country. Workers educated abroad acquire country‐specific human capital that is more productive in the host country of study. A foreign subsidiary sharing a parent firm's technology will invest more if it has more foreign‐educated labor, since it can utilize this labor more productively because of the country‐specific human capital. Consistent with our predictions, our empirical findings show that foreign‐educated labor accounted for a sizable portion of growth in FDI flows. (JEL F21, F10)     

Global ideals and local practicalities in education policies and planning in Lima, Peru

In the past decades two International Summits, namely the Education for All Conference in Jomtien, Thailand (1990) and the Framework for Action in Dakar, Senegal (2000), have assessed and summarised the status and goals of primary and secondary education and drawn comparisons on prospects and problems between developed and developing countries. The Framework for Action, as its title suggests, sought to put in place a framework for goal realisation in education planning and practice primarily, but not exclusively, in developing countries. This paper assesses the extent to which global goals and summaries of progress mask the difficulties faced in local education delivery, focusing on access to and use of spatial data in the education planning process. Attention is focused on the situation in Peru in general and in the District of Independencia in the Cono Norte of Lima in particular. The quality of spatial and other data resources and the technical difficulties in assembling these into a form that can support local decision making in education planning and governance suggests that there remain significant obstacles in achieving a quality education for all, especially in developing countries.     

Fairtrade credentialism: towards understanding certified producer organizations’ perceptions of Fairtrade as a credential

ABSTRACT

Fairtrade is a transnational voluntary labelling initiative that aims to upgrade the social, economic, and environmental conditions of producers in developing countries. In this paper, we systematically translated, coded, and analysed open-ended responses from a global survey of Fairtrade producers to explore how Fairtrade operates as a credential. The credentialism literature sheds light on Fairtrade's ability to create social and economic mobility, the operation of positive and negative selection processes and the hidden curriculum. We conclude with research and policy recommendations, including the need for the research community and Fairtrade International to track and monitor initial conditions of Fairtrade producers and measure progress over time to improve understanding of how Fairtrade operates as a credential and structures the social and economic mobility of developing country producers.     

An Overview of Work,Retirement, and Pensions in Japan

Work to retirement in Japan is a sequential transition for the most part, and Japan permits mandatory retirement by firms at age 60. But many older people work beyond the age of 60, many more than in other industrialized countries. A number of hypotheses are examined, having to do with pensions, health, opportunity, interest in working, cultural attitudes (including the concept of ikigai), and public policy initiatives (such as employment policy and the Silver Human Resource Centers). Japan's cultural attitudes and existing policies appear to have set Japan on a unique course in considering the aging of its population. To what extent should other nations emulate Japan?     

From intergovernmental negotiations to (sub)national change

In the last thirty years, a process of global norm creation in the field of gender equality has taken place. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women marks a milestone in this process: it emerged as the first legally binding international instrument for the protection of women's rights. The 180 states that have ratified the Convention have interpreted their treaty obligations in diverse ways, ranging from reluctance to active incorporation. Beyond its original mandate, CEDAW has increased attention on gender issues within the UN human rights framework. Further, it has motivated transnational NGO activism that uses the Convention to connect local understandings of women's rights with global standards to influence national policy developments. Taking these global, national and transnational dynamics together, the article argues that CEDAW has been transformed from a ‘classical’ intergovernmental regime to a transnational network enforcing women's rights. Based on these findings, a theoretical view on global norm creation and enforcement is developed that stresses the reciprocal interrelation between global, national and local spheres. Instead of assuming a ‘trickle-down’ dynamic as a consequence of global agreements, it is argued that the legitimacy and authority of global norms depends on their active interpretation and appropriation within national and local contexts all over the world.     

Social Security in Asia and the Pacific

Abstract

In terms of numbers of people, the global challenges facing social security systems are largely Asian. Because of rapid population aging in Asia, while it accounted for 28% of the world's population aged 60 and older in 1985, that percentage will more than double to 58% in 2050. Provident funds are a prominent feature of retirement income systems in the region-Asia and the Pacific contain the majority of the world's countries with provident funds. These programs typically provide lump-sum benefits, and thus, do not provide annuity protection against outliving one's resources. Because of the influence of Confucian philosophy with its emphasis on family responsibility for elders, countries in the region have been relatively slow in developing social security programs. China does not have a social security program for workers who do not work for the government or in government-owned enterprises.     

DOMESTICATING WOMEN, CIVILIZING MEN: Rousseau's Political Program

I argue in this study that when Rousseau's oeuvre is read as a whole, the novels as well as the conventional texts of political theroy, it reveals a political program for reform of the ancient regime. This reform is founded on a reform of domestic mores. Rousseau's attendant conception of the relations between private and public spheres is more unified than that found in modern sociology. Rousseau shows that the domestic role of women is a structural precondition for a “modern” society.

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Transforming the public sphere: the case of Moscow’s city libraries

ABSTRACT

This article aims to explore the link between civil society and the public sphere in present-day Russia by studying a recent library reform project in Moscow. In 2013, a comprehensive reconstruction of Moscow's network of 448 public libraries was initiated by a group of intellectuals, architects and urbanists. The project team aimed at modernizing Moscow's city libraries by making them more accessible and appealing to the public. The reconstruction gained support from the city administration that sought to strengthen the function of public libraries as cultural and educational institutions and, at the same time, improve the city's image in the eyes of its citizens. The article poses the question of whether this reform has been successful in making Moscow's city libraries more open, accessible and inviting for the public, and whether the reform has contributed to the development of a public sphere in the city by providing new spaces for participation and civic engagement. The article explores the reform process based on interviews with key informants and document analysis. It looks into the project objectives, its implementation process and its legacy. The analysis of the library reform project revealed contradictory results, as the reform did not develop beyond the pilot phase, but was stopped due to fading support from the city administration. Overall, the library reform thus remained an unfinished process. For developing the public sphere, the legacy of the reform project is ambivalent. On the one hand, the project has proved that creating new public spaces in Moscow is possible. On the other hand, it showed that the public sphere remains limited in today's Russia, as civic initiatives cannot develop beyond a cultural niche project. Due to a lack of political support for societal pluralism, a true autonomous public sphere remains beyond reach in present-day Russia.     

Understanding 2016: China,Brexit and Trump in the history of uneven and combined development

This article uses the theory of uneven and combined development (U&CD) to produce a novel explanation of ‘Brexit and Trump’ – the two shock political events of 2016. The argument proceeds in three steps. First, we identify the global conjuncture of historical unevenness in which the votes occurred: how the neoliberal transformation of the advanced capitalist countries was synchronized with the radically different process of primitive accumulation in China. Second, we apply the theory of U&CD to this peculiar ‘simultaneity of the non‐simultaneous’: the ‘big country’ effects of China's industrialization, we find, were thrice multiplied by its combination with the advanced sectors of the world economy, which accelerated China's take‐off, brought forward its export phase, and widened its export profile at a moment of maximum openness in international trade. Finally, this produced the pattern of development that led to the events of 2016: the resultant trade shocks intensified the internal inequalities of British and American societies in ways that match the geography of the Leave and Trump votes. The analysis has a wider intellectual implication too, for the phenomena of historical unevenness and combination are intrinsic to the history of the global political economy; and the theory of U&CD therefore has a unique contribution to make to the field of International Political Economy.     

Taking Feminist Violence Seriously in Feminist International Relations

In this article we explore questions about feminism and violence to constructively complicate understandings about this relationship. Feminism is conventionally positioned as oppositional to direct and structural violences, importantly so, as this has been seen key to feminism's viability as a constructive knowledge project. Yet there are increasingly persistent concerns about epistemic, juridical and other violences circulating around feminism, which render feminism's role in the production of oppositional knowledge and politics suspect. This is especially the case where western feminist ideas have been problematically taken up in neoliberal global policy making and for militarized human rights interventions. As feminist international relations scholars troubled by such associations, we investigate – via an exploration of three provocative feminist texts – how feminism is perceived to be both violated and violating by its contemporary imbrication in the violences of neoliberalism and global governance. We further suggest that metaphors of feminized corporeality, which infuse representations of feminism in these texts (especially in its western homogenized governance form), inhibit the destabilizing potential of feminism through its harmful associations with the ‘failing’ female body. This bodily shaping of feminism, which we examine by following a ‘trail of blood’, tells us something important about the relationship between feminism and violence, about recurring discursive and theoretical closures around feminism and about the possibilities for reinventions of feminism to unsettle the violent degradations, which feminists insistently reveal and decry.