Somalia Debt Relief: A Longer-Term Proposition
Blog Post
5/11/17
I make five recommendations as Somalia heads down the arrears clearance/debt relief path, using Liberia’s experience as a reference point.
Tag: Africa
A Vision for Africa's Future – Podcast with African Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina
Blog Post
5/4/17
The African Development Bank recently turned 50. In that time it's made more than 4,000 grants and loans, totaling more than $71 billion. So what might its next half-century look like? Bank President Dr. Akinwumi Adesina joins me on this week's podcast to share his vision for Africa's future.
The "Big Bond": How to Maintain African Growth While Reducing the Fiscal Burden on Donors
Blog Post
4/17/17
Sub-Saharan African countries are at a critical juncture. With China's slowdown and the collapse in commodity prices, growth slipped to 3.4 percent in 2015, on average just over half what it has been for the past 15 years. Estimated growth for 2016 is below the population growth rate of about 2 percent, thus negative in per capita terms.
Liberians’ Eagerness for Debate Can Bode Well for Accountable Leadership
Blog Post
3/29/17
At the Liberia Development Conference, I laid out four interlinked themes vital to Liberia’s future development progress and to pose questions for conference participants, including what Liberia’s development partners can do to leverage their support with stronger Liberian ownership and concrete enduring results. Here, I summarize my speech’s four themes and attempt to give my thoughts in answer to the question I posed to others.
Does the World Bank RISE to the Challenge of Measuring Energy Access?
Blog Post
3/17/17
The World Bank recently released a "global scorecard for policymakers" called the Regulatory Indicators for Sustainable Energy (RISE). Here are a few of our takeaways from an initial read of the energy access section.
How to Support Post-Dictator Recovery in the Gambia
Blog Post
2/8/17
In the Gambia, the newly elected Barrow administration has to rebuild the country which has been suffering autocratic repression and staggering corruption for 22 years. The Gambia is the only country in the region to have grown poorer over the past two decades. I lay out ways outsiders can help the Gambia recover.
The Warlord and the Ambassador: A Review of Dante Paradiso’s "The Embassy"
Blog Post
1/25/17
The Embassy: A Story of War and Diplomacy by Dante Paradiso tells the inside story of how US Ambassador John Blaney and his team kept the Liberian embassy open, risked their lives to cross the front lines to meet with General Cobra, and played a crucial role in negotiating a complicated sequence that included Taylor being forced into exile, the rebels allowing ECOWAS peacekeepers to reopen the port, and getting peace negotiators back to the table. Paradiso, a foreign service officer who served in that embassy, skillfully tells the story through the eyes of several unsung heroes.