CGD's weekly Global Prosperity Wonkcast, event videos, whiteboard talks, slides, and more.
Following Robert Zoellick’s announcement that he will step down from the World Bank presidency at the end of June, the World Bank board has called for member countries to submit nominations for his successor, with a fast-approaching deadline of March 23rd. The board has said it will then narrow the nominations to a short list of three, with the goal of naming a new president before the World Bank/IMF spring meetings in April.
In this interview Liliana Rojas-Suarez argues that for a true and lasting solution to the Greek crisis to occur, a deeper restructuring of sovereign debt is needed (one that is based on the country's capacity to repay, and not on arbitrarily-determined goals for debt ratios; i.e. 120% debt/GPP by 2020) . Since the likelihood of key Eurozone members (especially Germany) to agree on further debt restructurings (including ECB’s holdings of Greek debt) is very low, the most likely scenario is still one where Greece leaves the Eurozone. This would allow for a depreciation of the domestic currency to boost competitiveness. In this scenario, it is essential a re-design of the IMF program to include the avoidance of a banking crisis (which could occur if banks' borrowers, earning' income denominated in a depreciated currency, are not able to make good on payments on Euro-denominated loans).
Tim Harford, a journalist at the Financial Times and author of The Undercover Economist and Adapt: Why Success Always Begins with Failure, talks about the implications for development of his idea that successful complex systems emerge from a process of trial and error.
Development Drums is hosted by Owen Barder and produced by Anna Scott at the Center for Global Development in Europe.
The UN is gearing up for discussions about what international development goals should come after the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which expire in 2015. My guest on this week’s Wonkcast is CGD senior fellow Charles Kenny, who recently published a working paper, written jointly with CGD visiting fellow Andy Sumner, that assesses the impact of the MDGs and offers suggestions for what should come next.
We start with a brief review of the history of the MDGs, which were adopted in 2001 by the UN General Assembly and cover eight areas of development, such as reductions in poverty and hunger, and improvements in gender equality, education, and child and maternal health.
In August 2001, when the Bush administration and key leaders in Congress were readying the plans for a sweeping overhaul of America’s troubled immigration system, filmmakers Shari Robertson and Michael Camerini were there to record history in the making—negotiating exclusive access to document the lives and strategies of the principal players. The resulting “Grand Bargain” promised to change the lives of tens of millions of immigrants and affect every citizen and every state in the union. Its eventual failure offers lessons for what a future, successful bargain might look like.
Robertson and Camerini join Esther Olavarria, a key player in the film series, and CGD senior fellow Michael Clemens, for an exclusive look at never-before-released scenes and a discussion on lessons-learned from the “Grand Bargain” era, pointing to what is possible for future, bi-partisan immigration policy.
The debate over U.S. foreign assistance in Pakistan has grown hotter lately, with Stanford political scientist Stephen Krasner arguing in Foreign Affairs that the United States should get tough by threatening to halt aid to Pakistan to force the country into cooperating better on security matters. CGD president Nancy Birdsall responded with an article in Foreign Policy. Drawing on the recommendations of a 2011 CGD study group report, Beyond Bullets and Bombs: Fixing the U.S. Approach to Development in Pakistan, she argued that U.S. development assistance should be focused on helping to create a stable, prosperous Pakistan—goals that are in America’s own best interest and would be ill-served by trying to use the aid as a bargaining chip.
When a poor country finds oil, bad things often get worse. Countries rich in extractable natural resources, especially oil, frequently suffer from crummy governance, high poverty, endemic corruption and conflict. Is it possible to beat this oil curse? My guest on the Wonkcast this week, Todd Moss, CGD vice president for programs and senior fellow, says yes. He argues that a government that transfers some or all of its oil revenue to citizens in a universal, transparent, and regular taxable payment, could strengthen the social contract, fight corruption, and lay the foundation for future prosperity.