Alex Cobham Joins CGD to Work on Illicit Financial Flows

One of the ways that rich and powerful countries can affect development is by doing more to prevent illicit financial flows. Last year I said that CGD in Europe would start work on this because:

these flows are potentially harmful to development in many ways. They can prevent developing countries from receiving the full value of their assets and economic production; they can deprive developing countries of government revenues which could be used to pay for basic services; they can entrench elites in positions of power and hamper the emergence of a developmental state; they can distort the allocation of spending and provision of services; and they can reduce the stock of national savings

I am thrilled that Alex Cobham is joining CGD in Europe as a Research Fellow to work on illicit financial flows. For a taste of Alex's work in this area, read his chapter on tax havens and illicit flows in the World Bank book, "Draining Development" (edited by Peter Reuter); or watch him in the recent "Why Poverty?" TV programme which looked at illicit flows (he is on from about the 39th minute).Alex will be joining us in March from Save the Children UK, where he is Head of Research and runs the Uncounted blog.  He has previously been at Christian Aid, and before that was a researcher at Queen Elizabeth House (the Department of International Development at Oxford University) and a junior economics fellow at St Anne’s College, Oxford.