Political Geography: / Publication Year: within 10 Years and within 5 Years

16301. Inclusive education in ASEAN countries: how to support children with disabilities in schools

Author:: Tze Peng Wong
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: This policy brief provides recommendations to enable equal participation in education among children with disabilities in ASEAN countries. It specifically calls for governments and schools to adopt inclusive education recommendations which include the training of teachers of inclusive principles, the allocation of funding to build relevant infrastructure and the development of new curricula.
Topic:: Education, Children, and Teaching
Political Geography:: ASEAN

16302. Inclusive growth: how to encourage persons with disabilities into the labour market

Author:: Gan Siew Wei, Vengadeshvaran Sarma, and Tang Yu Hoe
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: Persons with disabilities (PWDs) are regularly discriminated against in the labour market and have little opportunity to participate in employment and entrepreneurship. In Southeast Asia, the lack of data masks the severity of their exclusion. This brief draws on an impact-evaluation of a multicountry corporate social responsibility project in the region. Policy makers should consider the collection of a centralised database and the implementation of new training and mentoring to support PWDs.
Topic:: Discrimination, Disability, Corporations, and Labor Market
Political Geography:: Asia

16303. Supporting full participation of mothers in the labour market: Childcare-related leave policy lessons from East Asian economies

Author:: Ruby Chau and Sam Yu
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: Policy makers should implement alterations to the law in order to support women and families in getting back into the workforce. This policy brief reviews how governments in Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan use paid childcare-related leave policies in supporting women to stay in the labour market. It shows that these policies have not been very successful for two main reasons: 1. The leave is not long enough to cover the whole period from birth to the time when the child is entitled to universal state childcare services or school education. 2. These policies do not address the issue of the gender pay gap and hence overlook the financial loss a family may suffer if the father, instead of the mother, takes a substantial period of time off to look after the children.
Topic:: Gender Issues, Children, Women, Family, Labor Market, and Childcare
Political Geography:: Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and Hong Kong

16304. Water quality monitoring in the Red River Delta (Vietnam): how to improve water resource management in the region

Author:: Suzanne McGowan
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: Policy makers should use collected datasets to inform policy making that supports improved water resources management. The Red River Delta has a long history of collecting water quality data. These datasets can help policy makers understand how population growth and urban development has impacted water quality in the region. This brief suggests new methodologies and approaches to guide collection, analysis and interpretation of water quality monitoring datasets for improved water resources management.
Topic:: Natural Resources, Water, Sustainable Development Goals, Urban, Population Growth, and Sustainability
Political Geography:: Asia and Vietnam

16305. Party footprints in Africa: Measuring local party presence across the continent

Author:: Matthias Krönke, Sarah J. Lockwood, and Robert Mattes
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: The conventional view holds that most of Africa’s political parties are organizationally weak, with little grassroots presence. Yet few studies are based on systematically collected data about more than a handful of parties or countries at any given point. In this paper, we focus on one crucial aspect of party organization – the local presence that enables political parties to engage with and mobilize voters – and use Afrobarometer data to develop the Party Presence Index, the first systematic, cross-national measure of local party presence in Africa. We then apply the index to a series of substantive questions, confirming its value and demonstrating its potential to add significantly to our understanding of grassroots party organization.
Topic:: Governance, Democracy, Local, Political Parties, and Community
Political Geography:: Africa

16306. Willing to kill: Factors contributing to mob justice in Uganda

Author:: Ronald Makanga Kakumba
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: Mob justice is a form of extrajudicial punishment or retribution in which a person suspected of wrongdoing is typically humiliated, beaten, and in many cases killed by vigilantes or a crowd. Mob action takes place in the absence of any form of fair trial in which the accused are given a chance to defend themselves; the mob simply takes the law into its own hands (Ng’walali & Kitinya, 2006). Mob justice is not only criminal but also amounts to a violation of human rights (Uganda Human Rights Commission, 2016). Over the past decade, Uganda has seen a significant rise in the number of cases of mob justice. According to the Uganda Police Force’s (2013-2019) annual crime reports, 746 deaths by mob action were reported and investigated in 2019, compared to 426 in 2013, a 75% increase. “Mob kills 42 in 7 weeks,” the Daily Monitor (2019) reported in March 2019, citing police figures – an average of six lynchings a week. Homicides by mob action in Uganda occur mainly in response to thefts, robberies, killings, and reports of witchcraft (Uganda Police Force, 2018). According to the 2015 Afrobarometer survey in Uganda, one in six Ugandan adults said they took part in mob justice during the preceding year or would do so if they “had the chance.” This suggests that mob justice is not just a fringe problem in Uganda but commands attention and requires collective action. Why would a substantial number of Ugandans resort to taking the law into their own hands as an alternative form of “justice”? Analysts have pointed to a number of factors that might contribute to a willingness to engage in mob justice. One is a lack of trust in the formal criminal justice system to administer fair and timely justice. A 2005 study in Uganda showed that mob actions were often motivated by widespread suspicion or misunderstanding of the justice system, especially concerning the procedure of police bail, under which suspected culprits can be temporarily released before the court process (Baker, 2005). A study in southern Nigeria also reported that a lack of trust in the police was one of the motivations for the alarming incidence of “jungle justice” (Obarisiagbon, 2018). Research has also shown that personal victimization by crime can have a lasting impact on attitudes toward the police, the courts, and the criminal justice system overall (Berthelot, McNeal, & Baldwin, 2018; Dull & Wint, 1997; Koenig, 1980; Sprott & Doob, 1997), as can negative personal experiences with the courts (Olson & Huth, 1998; Kanaabi, 2004). Amid Uganda’s surge in mob justice, Afrobarometer findings tell us that popular trust in the police and courts has been declining while citizens’ perceptions of corruption in these criminal justice institutions has been rising. Statistical analyses show that a lack of trust in the police is associated with a willingness to engage in mob justice, while perceived corruption undermines trust and thus indirectly contributes to a willingness to join others in mob actions. Further, our analysis finds that being a victim of crime (physical assault), encountering problems in the court system, finding it hard to obtain police assistance, and having to pay a bribe to police or court officials are factors that make people more likely to say they would take part in mob action against suspected criminals. Based on these findings, we offer recommendations to mitigate Uganda’s growing problem of mob justice.
Topic:: Human Rights, Courts, Police, Justice, and Bribery
Political Geography:: Uganda and Africa

16307. Corruption Crossroads? Rising Perceptions of Graft Weaken Citizen Trust, Threaten Botswana’s Democratic Standing

Author:: Thomas Isbell and Batlang Seabo
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: Corruption is widely considered one of the greatest impediments to sustainable development in African countries (United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, 2016; Bratton & Gyimah-Boadi, 2016). Corruption hinders macro-economic growth by weakening governance structures and diluting the positive effects of investments. At the micro level, corruption can trap the poorest, who are least likely to have alternatives to state provision of services, in a downward spiral (Peiffer & Rose, 2014). Botswana has long been considered one of Africa’s least corrupt countries and top performers in democratic practice and good governance. But while Transparency International’s (2019) Corruption Perceptions Index continues to rank Botswana as best on the continent, other observers have questioned this reputation (Mogalakwe & Nyamnjoh, 2017; Good, 2017). Allegations have focused on, among other things, high-level corruption in military procurement contracts under former President Ian Khama, close ties between members of the ruling party and the agricultural sector, and charges that well-connected suspects are often cleared by the courts (Motlogelwa & Civillini, 2016; Konopo, 2017; Good, 2017; Norad, 2011; Sebudubudu 2014; Gasennelwe, 2018). Recent corruption scandals have reached the highest levels of government, including the alleged looting of the National Petroleum Fund (Kgalemang, 2019; Motshegwa, Mutonono, & Mikazhu, 2019), and are still before courts of law (Shuma, 2020). In this paper we use Afrobarometer survey data to explore citizens’ perceptions of corruption in Botswana. We find that far more people see corruption increasing than decreasing and that perceptions of corruption in the Presidency and Parliament have risen sharply over the past decade. Fewer Batswana approve of how the government is handling the anti-corruption fight, and while many believe ordinary people can help fight corruption, a majority say that people risk retaliation if they report corruption to the authorities. A correlation analysis suggests that perceptions of corruption, especially in the Presidency, are strongly associated with less popular trust in public institutions and less satisfaction with democracy.
Topic:: Corruption, Governance, Democracy, and Citizenship
Political Geography:: Africa and Botswana

16308. PP67: COVID-19 in Africa - Vulnerabilities and Assets for an Effective Response

Author:: Robert Mattes, Carolyn Logan, E. Gyimah-Boadi, and George Ellison
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: Not only did the COVID-19 disease arrive on Africa’s shores (and at its airports) later than in Asia, Europe, and North America (Loembé et al., 2020), but for months the numbers of infections and deaths also appeared to remain relatively low. As of early August, the continent had experienced more than 1 million confirmed cases and 23,000 deaths (Africa CDC, 2020), though these figures were increasing rapidly. At this point, the causes behind Africa’s comparatively low initial numbers are not completely clear. One reason may be that early and decisive responses on the part of many African governments prevented the virus from gaining an easy foothold (Beech, Rubin, Kurmanaev, & MacLean, 2020; Hirsch, 2020; Levinson, 2020; Moore, 2020; Loembé et al., 2020). Indeed, according to the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (2020), 46 African countries took some form of official action – in the form of new legislation or executive orders and decrees – restricting or banning travel and public gatherings, enforcing quarantines, or in some cases imposing full “lockdowns.” But Africa, somewhat paradoxically, may also have benefited from a range of structural factors, such as the continent’s relatively limited international exposure, its relatively low rates of intra- and inter-state air travel (Marbot, 2020), a generally hot and humid climate, relatively lower levels of population density and urbanization (De Waal, 2020; Marbot, 2020), and its substantially younger populations (Binding, 2020). It may have also profited from cultural factors, such as the fact that older people tend to remain with their families, rather than being institutionalized in retirement homes (Marbot, 2020), though this also has consequences for residential density, or that it has a more collectivist, less individualistic culture, which, according to recent research, may make COVID-19 interventions more effective (Frey, Presidente, & Chen, 2020). Yet most public health experts remain wary, and still expect significant further transmission of the virus across the continent, requiring drastic public health responses and interventions, especially where governments eased initial restrictions and lockdowns. Indeed, some officials have expressed concerns that Africa’s low numbers merely reflect very low rates of testing (Sly, 2020) and even, in some countries such as Tanzania, deliberate under-reporting (BBC, 2020). Some press reports have described instances where local reports of death rates bear little relation to official data (MacLean, 2020; York, 2020). These concerns appear well-founded given that community transmission is now present in all African countries and the number of infections increased by 50%, and deaths by 22%, in the last two weeks of July (World Health Organization, 2020). And officials at the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention have warned that Africa could well become the next epicenter of the pandemic (Loembé et al., 2020). If, as these events suggest, early interventions in African countries successfully erected a wall that kept the virus at bay, albeit temporarily, how well prepared are these countries if and when the virus penetrates their initial defenses? A wealth of Afrobarometer survey data suggests that Africans are especially vulnerable, in part due to lack of access to clean water and adequate health care (Gyimah-Boadi & Logan, 2020a; Logan, Howard, & Gyimah-Boadi, 2020). In this paper, we attempt to take the issue of vulnerability a step further by developing a more fine-grained approach, using insights from public health to examine different dimensions and components of vulnerability (Morrell, 2018). Specifically, we develop three inter-connected indices intended to capture the extent to which Africans might 1) run a heightened “risk of exposure to infection,” 2) face a heightened “susceptibility to illness” (once infected), and 3) face a “lack of resilience” (to recover once they become ill). In addition, a fourth index of “lockdown readiness” estimates the proportion of people who are more (or less) likely to be able to withstand the most severe forms of government health interventions, i.e. lockdowns or “shelter in place” orders, We then demonstrate how cross-country variations in the extent of exposure and susceptibility, and in the degree to which people are prepared for a lockdown, might help us better understand policy choices that African governments have made, and the extent to which these interventions were able to achieve desired reductions in mobility and contact. Finally, we briefly explore some of the soft assets that governments can bring to the table, such as legitimacy and trust, that may help increase compliance with restrictions on mobility, especially in countries we have identified as least able to tolerate lockdowns.
Topic:: Governance, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Africa

16309. Africa’s Digital Divide and the Promise of E-learning

Author:: Matthias Krönke
Publication Date:: 06-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: According to UNESCO (2020), approximately 1.2 billion students and youth worldwide are affected by school and university closures because of the COVID-19 pandemic. To adjust to these new circumstances, governments must develop innovative solutions to ensure inclusive learning opportunities during this period of unprecedented educational disruption. This is especially true in African countries, where despite recent progress traditional education has faced infrastructural challenges and struggled to develop the human resources necessary to address students’ educational needs (Krönke & Olan’g, 2020; United Nations, 2019; UNESCO Institute of Statistics, 2016. This policy paper uses Afrobarometer survey data to look at digital infrastructure, the availability of digital devices at the household level, and digital literacy among African adults. While rates of digital literacy among children are likely to differ, it is important to understand these dynamics among adults for at least two reasons. First, adults are likely to shape children’s access to and experience with technology. Second, understanding current levels of access to devices and levels of digital literacy among adults provides a baseline against which future assessments can measure progress over time. Survey findings from Afrobarometer Round 7 (2016/2018) show a substantial digital divide both across and within countries, reflected in uneven access to resources such as electricity and unequal access to and use of smartphones and computers. The results suggest that government efforts to redress widespread inequalities need to be increased drastically to avoid the widening of an education gap among their citizens. The paper also discusses the potential benefits of providing smartphones and computers to those who currently do not have access to such devices.
Topic:: Education, Infrastructure, Inequality, Digital Economy, and Digitalization
Political Geography:: Africa

16310. Democratic Dividend: The Road to Quality Education in Africa

Author:: Matthias Krönke
Publication Date:: 04-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: Education is a powerful tool to fight poverty, enable upward socioeconomic mobility, and empower people to live healthier lives. But while the global adult literacy rate continues to increase, from 81% in 2000 to 86% in 2018 (World Bank, 2019), the challenge of access to quality education remains particularly severe in Africa. Even before the COVID-19 crisis, globally one out of five children aged 6-17 years were not in school; more than half of these children live in sub-Saharan Africa. Additionally, many African pupils attend schools that are inadequately equipped, creating a difficult learning environment. For example, more than half of the schools in sub-Saharan Africa do not have access to basic drinking water, handwashing facilities, the Internet, or computers (United Nations, 2019). COVID-19 may exacerbate these challenges as pupils lose school time, unequal access to online learning heightens inequalities, and health care and social-safety costs and economic losses put pressure on limited resources. Africans are aware of education challenges. Across 34 African countries surveyed by Afrobarometer between late 2016 and late 2018, one in five respondents (21%) cited education as one of the most important problems their governments should address, placing it among citizens’ top five priorities (Coulibaly, Silwé, & Logan, 2018). Not surprisingly, younger people placed substantially greater emphasis on education than their elders. At a global level, the United Nations (UN) has highlighted the importance of quality education by including it in its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). SDG 4 calls for governments to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.” To this end, the UN outlines specific targets to be achieved by 2030, including ensuring that “all youth and a substantial proportion of adults, both men and women, achieve literacy and numeracy.” An important step toward this goal is that by 2030, all girls and boys should be able to “complete free, equitable and quality primary and secondary education” (United Nations, 2019). Many African governments have made important commitments to universal education. Of the 34 countries surveyed by Afrobarometer in 2016/2018, 33 have made school attendance compulsory (for periods ranging from five to 11 years), and 33 provide free primary education. (See Appendix Table A.2 for details.) Many governments also commit substantial portions of their yearly budgets to improving education. For example, in Côte d’Ivoire, eSwatini, Ghana, Malawi, Senegal, Tunisia, and Zimbabwe, more than 25% of total government expenditures go to education (World Bank, 2020). Afrobarometer surveys point to slow but steady progress as fewer Africans go without formal education and more attend school beyond the primary grades. But in some countries, two-thirds of adults still have no formal schooling, and significant gender gaps continue to disadvantage girls and women. Overall, just a slim majority of Africans think their government is doing a good job on meeting educational needs. Factors that contribute to these evaluations include whether citizens find it easy to obtain school services and whether they think schools are transparent about their budgets and responsive to reports of teacher misconduct. More fundamentally, our analysis finds that more democratic countries are seen as better able to provide public education. Citizens are more likely to be satisfied with government performance on education if immediate avenues of transparency and accountability at the school level are embedded in a broader political system that encourages these qualities.
Topic:: Education, Poverty, Democracy, and Inequality
Political Geography:: Africa

16311. Lived Poverty on the Rise: Decade of Living-Standard Gains Ends in Africa

Author:: Robert Mattes
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afrobarometer
Abstract:: Economic destitution – whether measured as the frequency with which people go without basic necessities or as the proportion of people who live on less than $1.90 a day – declined steadily in Africa between 2005 and 2015. However, the findings of Afrobarometer Round 7 surveys, conducted in 34 African countries between late 2016 and late 2018, demonstrate that improvements in living standards have come to a halt and “lived poverty” is once again on the rise. To prevent squandering hard-won gains in Africans’ living standards, the data point to the necessity of a renewed commitment by citizens, governments, and international donors to defending democracy and expanding service-delivery infrastructure. Key findings Between 2005 and 2015, Afrobarometer surveys tracked a steady improvement in the living conditions of the average African. Measured as the frequency with which people go without a basket of basic necessities (food, clean water, health care, heating fuel, and cash income), “lived poverty” dropped in a sustained fashion over this period – a trend matched by consumption-based estimates of poverty by the World Bank. The most recent Afrobarometer surveys, however, suggest that Africa is in danger of squandering these gains in living standards. While the citizens of most African countries are still doing better than they were in 2005/2006, deprivation of basic necessities – captured by our Lived Poverty Index – has increased in about half of surveyed countries since 2015. The trend is similar for “severe lived poverty,” the extent to which people experience frequent shortages of basic necessities. Lived poverty varies widely across the continent. At one extreme, people rarely experience deprivation in Mauritius. At the other, the average person went without several basic necessities several times in the preceding year in Guinea and Gabon. In general, lived poverty is highest in Central and West Africa, and lowest in North Africa. Lived poverty also varies widely within societies. Reflecting the legacies of the “urban bias” of successive post-independence governments, rural residents continue to endure lived poverty far more frequently than those who live in suburbs and cities. A multilevel, multivariate regression analysis of more than 40,000 respondents across Africa reveals that people who live in urban areas, those who have higher levels of education, and those who have a job (especially in a middle-class occupation) are less likely to live in poverty, as are younger people and men. But besides personal characteristics, we locate even more important factors at the level of government and the state. First, Africans who live in countries with longer experiences of democratic government are less likely to live in poverty. Second, people who live in communities where the state has installed key development infrastructure such as paved roads, electricity grids, and piped-water systems are less likely to go without basic necessities. Indeed, the combined efforts of African governments and international donors in building development infrastructure, especially in rural areas, appears to have played a major role in bringing down levels of poverty – at least until recently.
Topic:: Poverty, Infrastructure, Inequality, and Local
Political Geography:: Africa

16312. When the Water Runs Dry: What is to be done with the 1.5 million settlers in the deserts of southwest Afghanistan when their livelihoods fail?

Author:: David Mansfield
Publication Date:: 06-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU)
Abstract:: It was following the fall of the Taliban regime that people began to encroach upon the deserts of south west Afghanistan and claim it as their own. After an initial investment in shallow wells that ran dry, increasing numbers of settlers began to use percussion drills to sink wells into the ground up to 130 metres in depth. Then, with affordable diesel generators and waterpumps imported from Pakistan and China these farmers transformed what was once rocky desert soil into productive agricultural land.
Topic:: Agriculture, Water, Rural, and Land
Political Geography:: Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, Middle East, and Asia

16313. COVID-19 Effects on US Higher Education Campuses, Report 2: From Emergency Response to Planning for Future Student Mobility

Author:: Mirka Martel
Publication Date:: 05-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute of International Education (IIE)
Abstract:: The Institute of International Education (IIE) is studying the effects of COVID‐19 (coronavirus) on global student mobility on U.S. higher education campuses. Our aim in this series is to provide more information about the effects that COVID‐19 has had on international student mobility, and the measures U.S. higher education institutions are taking regarding international students currently on campus and those abroad, international students interested in studying in the United States, and U.S. students planning to study abroad. The second survey opened April 16, 2020, and specifically focuses on the effects of COVID‐19 on U.S. higher education institutions’ emergency response and planning for future student mobility. While we continue to monitor the ongoing situation, this report examines campus life, international students both already on campus and those who could not come for the spring semester, and U.S students studying abroad. It also looks ahead to summer and fall 2020 and the recruitment of international students, as well as student interest in future study abroad.
Topic:: Crisis Management, Mobility, Higher Education, Survey, COVID-19, and Study Abroad
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

16314. COVID-19 Effects on US Higher Education Campuses, Report 3: New Realities for Global Student Mobility in Summer and Fall 2020

Author:: Mirka Martel
Publication Date:: 07-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute of International Education (IIE)
Abstract:: The Institute of International Education (IIE) is studying the effects of COVID‐19 (coronavirus) on global student mobility on U.S. higher education campuses. Our aim in this series is to provide more information about the effects that COVID‐19 has had on international student mobility, and the measures U.S. higher education institutions are taking regarding international students currently on campus and those abroad, international students interested in studying in the United States, and U.S. students planning to study abroad. The third survey opened July 9, 2020, and specifically focuses on college and university COVID-19 planning for the summer and fall 2020 semesters. As the final report of the COVID-19 Snapshot Survey Series, this report examines impact on inbound and outbound options for student exchange, such as shifts in the academic calendar and potential deferment to a future semester, as well as the future outlook for U.S. study abroad programs.
Topic:: Education, Mobility, Higher Education, Survey, COVID-19, and Study Abroad
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

16315. Studying for the Future: International Secondary Students in the United States

Author:: Leah Mason and Natalya Andrejko
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute of International Education (IIE)
Abstract:: Trends in international secondary student mobility highlight a potential recruitment pipeline to U.S. higher education institutions. This paper will provide an overview of international secondary student enrollment trends in the United States. It will then describe a case study of the AIFS Foundation Academic Year in America (AYA) program. The case study highlights the results of an alumni survey, including student motivations for participating in AYA, the skills and attributes students gained while on the program, and their academic and professional trajectories post‐program. Finally, it will bring together information presented in these first two sections to discuss possible implications for higher education.
Topic:: Education, Mobility, Higher Education, and Study Abroad
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

16316. Fall 2020 International Student Enrollment Snapshot

Author:: Julie Baer and Mirka Martel
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute of International Education (IIE)
Abstract:: The Fall 2020 International Student Enrollment Snapshot presents current international student enrollment patterns based on data from over 700 U.S. higher education institutions. The report focuses on international students studying in person or online (in the U.S. or from abroad) at U.S. higher education institutions in Fall 2020. The findings reflect how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the U.S. higher education sector and global student mobility to the United States. The report, conducted by IIE and nine partner higher education associations, is released jointly with and complements Open Doors 2020, which provides a comprehensive view of international student trends from the previous year (2019/20). Open Doors 2021, to be released in November 2021, will survey more than 2,900 institutions to provide a full picture of 2020/21 international student enrollment.
Topic:: Education, Higher Education, COVID-19, and Study Abroad
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

16317. Internationalizing the Campus at Home: Campus Globalization in the Context ofCOVID-19

Author:: Alice Rogers
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Institute of International Education (IIE)
Abstract:: When COVID-19 was declared a pandemic in March 2020, nearly every US student on a study abroad program was abruptly called home, and 93% of planned study abroad programs for the summer were cancelled, as were 64% of undergraduate Fall semester programs. In the process, most campus leaders responsible for international programs and strategy sought to fill the curricular gaps by turning to “internationalization at home” programs which would enable students to at least have intercultural experiences and exposure through special outreach and encounters with nearby Immigrant communities and/or distance learning seminars with counterparts in countries where institutional partnerships and faculty research collaborations would make possible seminar discussions and focused conversations on current issues and topics. This report highlights several key forms of “internationalization at home” and how they have been historically implemented at universities, and it discusses how these initiatives have contributed to campus globalization in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic for the 2020-2021 academic year.
Topic:: Globalization, Higher Education, COVID-19, and Study Abroad
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

16318. Ecological Threat Register: Understanding ecological threats, resilience and peace

Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP)
Abstract:: This is the inaugural edition of the Ecological Threat Register (ETR), which covers 157 independent states and territories. Produced by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), the ETR measures ecological threats that countries are currently facing and provides projections to 2050. The ETR is unique in that it combines measures of resilience with the most comprehensive ecological data available to shed light on the countries least likely to cope with extreme ecological shocks, now and into the future. The ETR includes: population growth, water stress, food insecurity, droughts, floods, cyclones and rising temperature and sea levels. In addition, the report uses IEP’s Positive Peace framework to identify areas where resilience is unlikely to be strong enough to adapt or cope with these future shocks. The ETR clusters threats into two major domains: resource scarcity and natural disasters. The resource scarcity domain includes food insecurity, water scarcity and high population growth. The natural disaster domain measures the threat of floods, droughts, cyclones, sea level rise and rising temperatures.
Topic:: Climate Change, Economics, Environment, Global Security, Peace, and Ecology
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16319. Global Terrorism Index 2020: Measuring the impact of terrorism

Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP)
Abstract:: The GTI report is produced by the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) using data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) and other sources. Data for the GTD is collected and collated by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the University of Maryland. The GTD contains over 170,000 terrorist incidents for the period 1970 to 2019. In 2019, deaths from terrorism fell for the fifth consecutive year, after peaking in 2014. The total number of deaths fell by 15.5 per cent to 13,826. The fall in deaths was mirrored by a reduction in the impact of terrorism, with 103 countries recording an improvement on their GTI score, compared to 35 that recorded a deterioration. The full GTI score takes into account not only deaths, but also incidents, injuries, and property damage from terrorism, over a five-year period. The largest fall in the impact of terrorism occurred in Afghanistan, which recorded 1,654 fewer deaths from terrorism in 2018, a 22.4 per cent decrease from the prior year. However, Afghanistan remains the country most impacted by terrorism, after overtaking Iraq in 2018.
Topic:: Political Violence, Economics, Terrorism, Counter-terrorism, and Peace
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Global Focus

16320. Positive Peace Report 2020: Analysing the factors that sustain peace

Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP)
Abstract:: Peace is the prerequisite for the survival of humanity in the 21st century. Without peace, it will not be possible to achieve the levels of trust, cooperation and inclusiveness necessary to solve these challenges, let alone empower international institutions and organisations necessary to address them. In the past, peace may have been the domain of the altruistic but in the current century it is clearly in everyone’s self-interest. Without an understanding of the factors that create and sustain peaceful societies, it will not be possible to develop the programmes, create the policies or understand the resources required to build peaceful and resilient societies. Positive Peace provides a framework to understand and address the many complex challenges the world faces. Positive Peace is transformational in that it is a cross-cutting facilitator of progress, making it easier for businesses to sell, entrepreneurs and scientists to innovate, individuals to produce and governments to effectively regulate. In addition to the absence of violence, Positive Peace is also associated with many other social characteristics that are considered desirable, including stronger economic outcomes, higher resilience, better measures of wellbeing, higher levels of inclusiveness and more sustainable environmental performance.
Topic:: Economics, International Cooperation, Peace Studies, Peacekeeping, and Peace
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16321. Building a Social Security Architecture for Informal Workers in India, Finally!

Author:: Santosh Mehrotra
Publication Date:: 07-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:: Social protection and social security have very limited coverage in India. This reality has not changed since independence, one of greatest failures of the development strategy India adopted in the early fifties. The labour force is predominantly unorganized. As much as 91 per cent of the labour force are in informal employment, i.e. without any social insurance we estimated from the NSO’s Periodic Labour Force Survey (2017-18) (Mehrotra and Parida, 2019). This is barely down 2 percentage points from 93% in 2011-12 (NSO’s 68th Round). In fact, regardless of the growth rate of GDP, this high share of informality in the workforce had not changed until 2012, and when it fell recently, it did so by merely 2 points. The rest 9 per cent of the workforce has varying levels of social security in the form of provident fund, paid leave, medical insurance and other benefits.
Topic:: Labor Issues, Social Policy, Social Security, Welfare, and Informal Economy
Political Geography:: India

16322. Did Employment Rise or Fall in India between 2011 and 2017? Estimating Absolute Changes in the Workforce

Author:: Amit Basole and Paaritosh Nath
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:: The recently released data from the 2017-2018 Periodic Labour Force Survey have created a controversy regarding the quantity of employment generated in the past few years in India. Estimates ranging from an absolute increase of 23 million to an absolute decline of 15.5 million have been published. In this paper we show that some of the variation in estimates can be explained by the way in which populations are projected based on Census 2011 data. We estimate the change in employment using the cohort-component method of population projection. We show that for men total employment rose but the increase fell far short of the increase in working age population. For women, employment fell. The decline is concentrated among women engaged in part-time or occasional work in agriculture and construction.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Employment, and Workforce
Political Geography:: India

16323. Income Distribution and Effective Demand in the Indian Economy

Author:: Zico Dasgupta
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:: Does there exist a trade-off between labour’s income share and output growth rate? Or does a reduction in wage share in itself reduces the output growth rate? These questions have returned to the centre stage in the midst of India’s present crisis as the government sought the dilution and suspension of labour laws as a counter-cyclical policy instrument. In the absence of any other stimulus or countervailing factors, the impact of such a policy would hinge on the relationship between income distribution and effective demand. This paper attempts to lay bare this relationship for the Indian economy through an empirical analysis of India’s macro data and a theoretical model on the basis of regression results.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Employment, and Demand
Political Geography:: India

16324. Economic Transition, Dualism, and Informality in India: Nature and Patterns of Household-level Transitions

Author:: Surbhi Kesar
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:: We examine the Indian economy during a peak period of high growth between 2005-2012 to analyze nature and patterns of household-level transitions across the different sectors of the economy and to relate these transitions to the broader process of structural change. We use a pan-India household-level panel data to categorize households according to their primary income sources into seven sectors characterized by varying degrees of formality/informality and various production structures and labour processes. We find that even this this relatively brief period, there has been a very large volume of transitions of households across these sectors. However, despite such volumes of transitions, the overall economic structure, and its segmentations, has continued to be reproduced, along with a regeneration of ‘traditional’ informal spaces that were often expected to dissolve over time with high economic growth. To ascertain the nature of these transitions – ‘favorable’ or ‘unfavorable’ – in terms of economic well-being of households, we employ a counterfactual analysis. We find that a majority of the transitions in the economy during the period of analysis have been ‘unfavourable’ in nature, with large proportion of households transitioning to sectors that are not ‘optimal’ locations for them, given their socio-economic characteristics. Further, using a multinomial logit regression framework, we find that the likelihood and nature of these transitions significantly vary with household characteristics, some of which, like social caste, are structurally given and cannot be optimally chosen by households. This dynamic process of reproducing a rather stagnant structure, along with substantial ‘unfavourable’ transitions towards ‘traditional’ informal economic spaces that are continuously reshuffled and reconstituted, provide insights into the complexity of India’s development trajectory that is often glossed over in the literature.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Employment, Economic Growth, and Economic Development
Political Geography:: India

16325. Mechanisms of Surplus Appropriation in the Informal Sector: A Case Study of Tribal Migrants in Ahmedabad’s Construction Industry

Author:: Rahul De
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University
Abstract:: This paper is based on fieldwork I had undertaken regarding tribal migrant workers in the construction sector, in Ahmedabad in May-July 2018, coordinated by Aajevika Bureau(AB). I had undertaken this fieldwork to assess the work of AB and advise them about strategies to collectivize migrant labour groups. While interacting with a particular social group (Bhil tribals from South West Rajasthan) who work in the construction sector, I struggled to capture the specificity of their experience through the concept of informal labour. This paper is an attempt to characterize the specificity of their social experience, while also, reframing the concept of informal labour. I use the concept of labour process (Michael Burawoy: Manufacturing Consent) to argue that there is not a binary or one-dimensional power relationship between informal labour and owner/state/capital, but instead, the process of surplus appropriation occurs at multiple nodes through different agents. In this paper, I have identified multiple modes of surplus extraction which are embedded as institutions or social norms in the labour process. Further, I argue that there is a close link between the status of tribal workers as marginalized within society, and their status as displaced and marginalized in their living areas and workplace. This difference translates into identity based discrimination faced in the city, as well as, structural exclusion from the governance apparatus faced as migrants. Therefore, tribal migrant workers do not earn enough to subsist and are highly dependent on early child birth, non-remunerated services of their family and the social security net provided by their village community. This paper concludes that primitive accumulation, fragmenting land ownership and indebtedness creates a supply of tribal migrants, who have no other recourse to employment and are forced to work in the deplorable conditions found in the construction sector. Tribal migrant workers in the informal sector are an important population to target for social policies, because they are more vulnerable than other social identities. This paper hopes to contribute to the framing of interventions and policies that civil society organizations and state authorities can implement to improve the terms of employment and working conditions of informal labour.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Employment, and Migrant Workers
Political Geography:: India

16326. Improving Pandemic Preparedness: Lessons From COVID-19

Author:: Thomas J. Bollyky and Stewart M. Patrick
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:: The United States and the world were caught unprepared by the COVID-19 pandemic despite decades of warnings of the threat of global pandemics and years of international planning. The failure to adequately fund and execute these plans has exacted a heavy human and economic price. Hundreds of thousands of lives have already been lost, and the global economy is in the midst of a painful contraction. The crisis—the greatest international public health emergency in more than a century—is not over. It is not too early, however, to begin distilling lessons from this painful experience so that the United States and the world are better positioned to cope with potential future waves of the current pandemic and to avoid disaster when the next one strikes, which it surely will. This CFR-sponsored Independent Task Force report seeks to do just that, framing pandemic disease as a stark threat to global and national security that neither the United States nor the world can afford to ignore again. It argues that future pandemic threats are inevitable and possibly imminent; policymakers should prepare for them and identify what has gone wrong in the U.S. and multilateral response. One of the most important lessons of this pandemic is that preparation and early execution are essential for detecting, containing, and rapidly responding to and mitigating the spread of potentially dangerous emerging infectious diseases. As harmful as this coronavirus has been, a novel influenza could be even worse, transmitting even more easily, killing millions more people, and doing even more damage to societies and economies alike. This Task Force proposes a robust strategy consisting of critical institutional reforms and policy innovations to help the United States and the world perform better. Although there is no substitute for effective political leadership, The recommendations proposed here would if implemented place the nation and the world on a firmer footing to confront humanity’s next microbial foe. The Task Force presents its findings grouped into three sections: the inevitability of pandemics and the logic of preparedness; an assessment of the global response to COVID-19, including the performance of the World Health Organization (WHO), multilateral forums, and the main international legal agreement governing pandemic disease; and the performance of the United States, while also drawing lessons from other countries, including several whose outcomes contrast favorably with the U.S. experience.
Topic:: International Cooperation, World Health Organization, Pandemic, COVID-19, Health Crisis, and Global Health
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16327. Global Trade Cooperation after COVID-19: What is the WTO's Future?

Author:: Peter Draper
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Commentary and Analysis
Institution:: Institute for Development and Peace
Abstract:: International trade cooperation has been under growing strains since at least the turn of the twenty-first century. Forces promoting global trade integration were in the ascendancy for most of the first decade. They were anchored on com- plex production specialisation mediated through cross-border value chains, underpinned by con- sumer demand for a variety of cost-effective prod- ucts, and cemented through regional and bilateral trade agreements. However, since 2008, succes- sive shocks unleashed cumulative disintegrative forces that counter-balanced and now threaten to overwhelm the forces of integration. These com- prise rising nationalism, associated desires for sovereignty, growing concerns over uneven distri- bution of the benefits of economic globalisation, shifting international power balances and associ- ated security concerns. These disintegrative forces threaten to unravel the World Trade Organization (WTO). COVID-19 mostly accelerates this trajec- tory, rendering WTO reform and restoration to its central role at the apex of the global trading sys- tem increasingly challenging. But all is not lost, as the forces of global trade integration have not dissipated and every crisis also presents reform opportunities.
Topic:: International Cooperation, International Trade and Finance, World Trade Organization, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16328. Tech Power to the People! Democratising Cutting-edge Technologies to Serve Society

Author:: Renata Avila Pinto
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Commentary and Analysis
Institution:: Institute for Development and Peace
Abstract:: Governments all over the world are adopting cutting-edge technologies to experiment with quicker, cheaper and more efficient delivery of services traditionally provided by human beings. From citizen security to allocation of social ben- efits, technologies are being deployed at a rapid pace, the aim being to serve people better, reduce costs and enhance accountability. The results are mixed. In some cases, the technologies exclude entire groups of the population, thereby exacer- bating race, gender or economic inequalities. In other cases, technology is used to surveil specific groups or communities, eroding their right to pri- vacy. And there are no clear remedies to mitigate the harm done by machines or to increase the accountability of those deploying the systems. However, when designing tech interventions, universal human rights, democratic rules and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) should shape the initiatives of the public sector. An important prerequisite is a higher degree of autonomy from big tech companies. Further- more, participatory design and testing in collabo- ration with the communities the technologies are intended to serve are needed, not only to avoid harm but to increase effectiveness and quality.
Topic:: Development, Science and Technology, Governance, Inequality, and Sustainability
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16329. Recommendations for Electoral Reform in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Author:: Typhaine Roblot, Manuel Wally, Rushdi Nackerdien, Kimberly Riddle, and Adele Ravida
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) 2018-19 elections were followed by the country’s first peaceful and democratic transfer of executive power. However, the elections – particularly their results management – were widely criticized. While voters appear to have ultimately accepted the results, lingering uncertainty could depress future voter turnout and undermine the current government’s authority. This post-electoral period offers an unprecedented opportunity to initiate broad electoral reforms to shore up the credibility of future elections. A white paper from the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) analyzes the DRC context and finds that the government or Parliament could initiate the reform process. IFES then highlights comparative examples of electoral reform from Kenya, Senegal, Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire and presents considerations and recommendations for the DRC. Given that truly inclusive, sustainable and holistic electoral reform could take years to complete, the process should begin now to ensure more credible, transparent elections in 2023 and beyond.
Topic:: Reform, Elections, Transparency, Transition, and Rigged Elections
Political Geography:: Africa and Democratic Republic of the Congo

16330. OFES COVID-19 Brefing Series: Preventing Government Corruption in Crises

Author:: Erica Shenin
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: Preventing Government Corruption in Crises, the fifth paper in the International Foundation for Electoral Systems’ (IFES) COVID-19 Briefing Series, looks closely at this question and offers guidance for democracy and governance practitioners, policymakers and supporters. Corruption undermines the efficiency and efficacy of government, which, in the short term, can derail the response to a public emergency. It also drives distrust in democratic institutions, including legislatures, executive agencies and courts. As a result, corruption by bad actors in public office – whether for personal or political gain – has the potential to damage the credibility and integrity of governments long after the immediate crisis has passed. The long-term ill effects of political corruption must not be ignored, given the potential for state capture and the entrenchment of incumbent regimes. This risk is especially concerning as many elections have been postponed and modified as a result of the health crisis, subverting the ultimate accountability measure for governments. The unprecedented volume of funds being deployed to address the COVID-19 crisis and bolster economies creates new opportunities for exploitation and undermining of accountability mechanisms in several key areas.
Topic:: Corruption, Elections, Democracy, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16331. IFES COVID-19 Briefing Series: Preserving Independent and Accountable Institutions

Author:: Erica Shenin
Publication Date:: 09-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: Preserving Independent and Accountable Institutions, the final paper in the International Foundation for Electoral Systems’ (IFES) COVID-19 Briefing Series, looks closely at this question and offers guidance for independent institutions as well as legislatures, executive agencies, special task forces and the international community. While their role is not always acknowledged directly, independent institutions that undergird the democratic process — anti-corruption agencies, human rights institutions, supreme audit institutions and election management bodies, among others — have important roles to play in responding to all of the challenges presented in this series. When functioning properly, they can ensure safe, secure and trustworthy elections; bolster government transparency and information integrity; protect political rights; provide checks on government; and ensure the continuation of democratic processes during a crisis. When they lack the independence, resources or accountability mechanisms to be effective, they may be unable to play this essential role, now or over the longer term of crisis recovery. While these independent institutions usually operate in complex and often politicized environments, by design, they have faced unique challenges during the pandemic that impact their autonomy and accountability.
Topic:: Corruption, Elections, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16332. Vote by Mail: International Practice during COVID-19

Author:: Erica Shenin, Staffan Darnolf, and Katherine Ellena
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: The COVID-19 pandemic has reinvigorated debate around alternative voting methods. A growing number of democracies successfully operate distance voting, in which ballots are delivered to voters’ home and voters then return ballots by mail or in person. The most effective administrations have scaled up operations over several electoral cycles, incrementally calibrating and perfecting capacity and safeguards. However, COVID-19 has suddenly increased demand for this complex election service. Election authorities, voters and politicians should therefore be cognizant of the risks and rewards associated with rapidly scaling up distance voting. Vote by Mail: International Practice During COVID-19, a new paper from the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), compares practices across Europe, Asia, Oceania and different U.S. states. It then provides recommendations for legislators and election administrators – in the U.S. and globally – to address challenges related to distance voting.
Topic:: Elections, Voting, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16333. IFES Helps Shape UN's International Anti-corruption Agenda

Author:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: The United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) in June 2021 is a milestone event that will reflect on progress made under the UN Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) since its inception. Most importantly, at the end of this session, the General Assembly has committed to producing an action-oriented political declaration to shape the international anti-corruption agenda for the coming years. “This event … has the potential to pave the way for strengthened global anti-corruption efforts and co-ordination between organisations active in the field of anti-corruption in the years to come.” – Secretariat of the Group of States Against Corruption The International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) is an accredited observer to the Conference of the States Parties to UNCAC and welcomes the opportunity to inform this agenda based on three decades of experience supporting effective and accountable governing institutions in more than 145 countries. IFES believes that global commitment and cooperation on anti-corruption has become even more imperative as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has undermined existing transparency and accountability mechanisms globally and increased the risks of corrupt behavior. As part of our contribution to preparations for UNGASS 2021 and the development of a draft political declaration, IFES has recommended that the General Assembly include the following six priority areas in the agenda: Increasing transparency and accountability in political finance Addressing election-related corrupt practices Strengthening anti-corruption authorities and other independent institutions Strengthening judicial ethics and independence Leveraging civil society to bolster oversight and implementation Bolstering the UN Convention Against Corruption review process
Topic:: Corruption, International Cooperation, United Nations, Elections, Democracy, and Rigged Elections
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16334. Parliamentary Oversight of Constitutional Bodies in the Maldives

Author:: Alexandra Brown, Erica Shein, and Katherine Ellena
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Abstract:: After decades of power centralized in the executive, the Maldives’ 2008 Constitution introduced separation of powers and created “independent institutions to monitor the three branches of power and safeguard human rights.” The Election Commission, Anti-Corruption Commission and other independent institutions must have sufficient autonomy to operate effectively and carry out their mandates without susceptibility to undue influence. However, they are not immune from corruption, poor leadership or partisan behavior, and still require oversight to ensure accountability. Finding the correct balance between accountability and autonomy can be challenging, but it is essential to ensure that the institutions appropriately fulfill their mandates. In response to a request from Parliament, the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) conducted an extensive literature review, analyzed comparative practices and consulted stakeholders to develop a set of recommendations for effective parliamentary oversight of independent institutions. The resulting paper, Parliamentary Oversight of Constitutional Bodies in the Maldives, explores how parliamentary tools and mechanisms can be effectively tailored to provide the appropriate level of oversight. The paper has recommendations and lessons that are broadly applicable outside the Maldivian context, and helped inspire the development of IFES’ Autonomy and Accountability Framework. Because constitutional bodies have a unique role to play in bolstering good governance, any improvement to their performance will improve the quality of democracy as a whole and help prevent corruption, improve service delivery and increase transparency and rule of law. IFES’ Autonomy and Accountability Framework helps countries achieve this in practice.
Topic:: Elections, Democracy, Constitution, Transparency, Autonomy, and Parliamentarism
Political Geography:: South Asia, Asia, and Maldives

16335. Is the Most Unproductive Firm the Foundation of the Most Efficient Economy? Penrosian Learning Confronts the Neoclassical Fallacy

Author:: William Lazonick
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: Edith Penrose’s 1959 book The Theory of the Growth of the Firm [TGF] provides intellectual foundations for a theory of innovative enterprise, which is essential to any attempt to explain productivity growth, employment opportunity, and income distribution. Properly understood, Penrose’s theory of the firm is also an antidote to the deception that is foundational to neoclassical economics: The theory, taught by PhD economists to millions upon millions of college students for over seven decades, that the most unproductive firm is the foundation of the most efficient economy. The dissemination of this “neoclassical fallacy” to a mass audience of college students began with Paul A. Samuelson’s textbook, Economics: An Introductory Analysis, first published in 1948. Over the decades, the neoclassical fallacy has persisted through 18 revisions of Samuelson, Economics and in its countless “economics principles” clones. This essay challenges the intellectual hegemony of neoclassical economics by exposing the illogic of its foundational assumptions about how a modern economy functions and performs. The neoclassical fallacy gained popularity in the 1950s, during which decade Samuelson revised Economics three times. Meanwhile, Penrose derived the logic of organizational learning that she lays out in TGF from the facts of firm growth, absorbing what was known in the 1950s about the large corporations that had come to dominate the U.S. economy. Also, during that decade, the knowledge base on the growth of firms on which economists could subsequently draw was undergoing an intellectual revolution, led by the business historian, Alfred D. Chandler, Jr. He was engaged in the first stage of a career that would span more than a half century, during which Chandler documented and analyzed the centrality to U.S economic development of what he would come to call “the managerial revolution in American business.” In combination, the works of Penrose and Chandler form intellectual foundations for my own work on the Theory of Innovative Enterprise—an endeavor that has enabled me, as an economist, to recognize not only the profound importance of organizational learning for economic theory but also the illogic of the neoclassical theory of the firm for our understanding of the central institution of a modern economy, the business corporation. In this essay, I argue that the key characteristic of the innovative enterprise is fixed-cost investment in the productive capabilities of the company’s employees to engage in organizational learning. The purpose of this investment in organizational learning is to develop a higher-quality product than was previously available. When successful, the development of the higher-quality product enables the firm to capture a large extent of the market, transforming high fixed cost into low unit cost. The result is sustainable competitive advantage that enables the growth of the firm, contributing to the growth of the economy as a whole. I argue that to get beyond the neoclassical fallacy, economists have to stop relying on constrained-optimization methodology. Rather, they need to be trained in a “historical transformation” methodology that integrates history and theory. It is a methodology in which theory serves as both a distillation of what we have learned from the study of history and a guide to what we need to learn about reality as the “present as history” unfolds.
Topic:: Economics, Political Economy, Macroeconomics, and Neoclassical Economics
Political Geography:: United States

16336. Payment vs. Funding: The Law of Reflux for Today

Author:: Perry Mehrling
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: The analytical tension in post-Keynesian thought between the theory of endogenous (credit) money and the theory of liquidity preference, brought to our attention by Dow and Dow (1989), can be viewed through the lens of the money view (Mehrling 2013) as a particular case of the balance between the elasticity of payment and the discipline of funding. Further, updating Fullarton’s 1844 “law of reflux” for the modern condition of financial globalization and market- based credit, the same money view lens offers a critical entry point into Tobin’s fateful 1963 intervention “Commercial Banks as Creators of ‘Money’” which established post-war orthodoxy, and also to the challenge offered by so-called Modern Money Theory.
Topic:: Economics, Globalization, Monetary Policy, Economic Theory, Macroeconomics, Keynes, and Credit
Political Geography:: United States

16337. Modeling Myths: On the Need for Dynamic Realism in DICE and other Equilibrium Models of Global Climate Mitigation

Author:: Claudia Wieners and Michael Grubb
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: We analyze and critique how optimizing Integrated Assessment Models, and specifically the widely-used DICE model, represent abatement costs. Many such models assume temporal independence –abatement costs in one period are not affected by prior abatement. We contrast this with three dimensions of dynamic realism in emitting systems: inertia, induced innovation, and path dependence. We extend the DICE model with a stylized representation of such dynamic factors. By adding a transitional cost component, we characterize the resulting system in terms of its capacity to adapt in path-dependent ways, and the transitional costs of accelerating abatement. We formalize a resulting metric of the pliability of the system, and the characteristic timescales of adjustment. With the resulting DICE-PACE model, we show that in a system with high pliability, the optimal strategy involves much higher initial investment in abatement, sustained at roughly constant levels for some decades, which generates an approximately linear abatement path and emissions declining steadily to zero. This contrasts sharply with the traditional formulation. Characteristic transition timescales of 20-40 years result in an optimum path which stabilizes global temperatures around a degree below the traditional DICE behavior; with otherwise modest assumptions, a pliable system can generate optimal scenarios within the goals of the Paris Agreement, with far lower long run combined costs of abatement and climate damages. We conclude that representing dynamic realism in such models is as important as – and far more empirically tractable than – continued debate about the monetization of climate damages and ‘social cost of carbon’.
Topic:: Climate Change, Economics, Paris Agreement, and Models
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16338. Who’s Responsible Here? Establishing Legal Responsibility in the Fissured Workplace

Author:: Tanya Goldman and David Weil
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: The nature of work is changing, with workers enduring increasingly precarious working conditions without any safety net. In response, this Article proposes a new “Concentric Circle framework” which would improve workers’ access to civil, labor, and employment rights. Many businesses, including app-based platforms, have restructured toward “fissured workplace” business models. They treat workers like employees (specifying behaviors and closely monitoring outcomes) but they classify workers as independent contractors (engaging them at an arms-length and cutting them off from rights and benefits tied to employment). These arrangements confound legal classifications of “employment” and expose deficiencies with existing workplace protections, which are based on “employment relationships.” As a result, a growing number of workers lack both bargaining power and critical workpalce rights and benefits. We propose a Concentric Circle framework to better govern workers’ rights in the modern era. At the core, we maintain that certain rights and protections should not be tethered to an employment relationship, but to work itself. Thus, the right to be compensated for work and paid a minimum wage; freedom from discrimination and retaliation; access to a safe working environment, and the right to associate and engage in concerted activity should belong to all workers, not just employees. Second, as a middle circle, we argue for a rebuttable presumption of employment to address those rights that remain exclusive to employees (and not independent contractors), and we propose an updated legal test of employment. Finally, at the outer ring of the framework, we suggest policies that could enhance workers’ access to benefits that promote worker mobility and social welfare. Other scholarship has focused exclusively on either independent contractors or employees, or it has proposed a new category of worker altogether. We contend that this comprehensive framework better assigns rights, responsibilities, and protections in the modern workplace than do current legal doctrines or alternative proposals.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Law, Legal Theory, Civil Rights, Legal Sector, and Workforce
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16339. Private Equity Buyouts in Healthcare: Who Wins, Who Loses?

Author:: Eileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: Private equity firms have become major players in the healthcare industry. How has this happened and what are the results? What is private equity’s ‘value proposition’ to the industry and to the American people -- at a time when healthcare is under constant pressure to cut costs and prices? How can PE firms use their classic leveraged buyout model to ‘save healthcare’ while delivering ‘outsized returns’ to investors? In this paper, we bring together a wide range of sources and empirical evidence to answer these questions. Given the complexity of the sector, we focus on four segments where private equity firms have been particularly active: hospitals, outpatient care (urgent care and ambulatory surgery centers), physician staffing and emergency room services (surprise medical billing), and revenue cycle management (medical debt collecting). In each of these segments, private equity has taken the lead in consolidating small providers, loading them with debt, and rolling them up into large powerhouses with substantial market power before exiting with handsome returns.
Topic:: Economics, Privatization, Health Care Policy, Health Insurance, and Private Equity
Political Geography:: United States

16340. The EU’s Green Deal: Bismarck’s ‘What Is Possible’ Versus Thunberg’s ‘What Is Imperative’

Author:: Servaas Storm
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: The European Union’s Green Deal, a €1 trillion, 10-year investment plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55% in 2030 (relative to 1990 levels), has been hailed as the first comprehensive plan to achieve climate neutrality at a continental scale. The Deal also constitutes the Union’s new signature mission, providing it with a new raison d’etre and a shared vision of green growth and prosperity for all. Because the stakes are high, a dispassionate, realistic look at the Green Deal is necessary to assess to what extent it reflects ‘what is politically attainable’ and to what degree it does ‘what is required’ in the face of continuous global warming. This paper considers the ambition, scale, substance and strategy of the Deal. It finds that the Green Deal falls short of ‘what is imperative’ but also of ‘what is politically possible’. By choosing to make the Green Deal dependent on global finance, the European Commission itself closes down all policy space for systemic change as well as for ambitious green macroeconomics and green industrial policies, which would enable achieving climate neutrality in a socially and economically inclusive manner. Hence, Otto von Bismarck would have been as unpersuaded by the Green Deal proposal as Greta Thunberg, who dismisses it as mere “empty words”.
Topic:: Climate Change, Environment, European Union, Green Technology, Green New Deal, and Green Deal
Political Geography:: Europe

16341. Firm-Level Exposure to Epidemic Diseases: Covid-19, SARS, and H1N1

Author:: Tarek A. Hassan, Stephan Hollander, Laurence van Lent, and Ahmed Tahoun
Publication Date:: 04-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: Using tools described in our earlier work (Hassan et al., 2019, 2020), we develop text- based measures of the costs, benefits, and risks listed firms in the US and over 80 other countries associate with the spread of Covid-19 and other epidemic diseases. We identify which firms expect to gain or lose from an epidemic disease and which are most affected by the associated uncertainty as a disease spreads in a region or around the world. As Covid-19 spreads globally in the first quarter of 2020, we find that firms’ primary concerns relate to the collapse of demand, increased uncertainty, and disruption in supply chains. Other important concerns relate to capacity reductions, closures, and employee welfare. By contrast, financing concerns are mentioned relatively rarely. We also identify some firms that foresee opportunities in new or disrupted markets due to the spread of the disease. Finally, we find some evidence that firms that have experience with SARS or H1N1 have more positive expectations about their ability to deal with the coronavirus outbreak.
Topic:: Economics, Infectious Diseases, Global Markets, Finance, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16342. How Much Can the U.S. Congress Resist Political Money? A Quantitative Assessment

Author:: Thomas Ferguson, Paul Jorgensen, and Jie Chen
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: The extent to which governments can resist pressures from organized interest groups, and especially from finance, is a perennial source of controversy. This paper tackles this classic question by analyzing votes in the U.S. House of Representatives on measures to weaken the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill in the years following its passage. To control as many factors as possible that could influence floor voting by individual legislators, the analysis focuses on representatives who originally cast votes in favor of the bill but then subsequently voted to dismantle key provisions of it. This design rules out from the start most factors normally advanced by skeptics to explain vote shifts, since these are the same representatives, belonging to the same political party, representing substantially the same districts. Our panel analysis, which also controls for spatial influences, highlights the importance of time-varying factors, especially political money, in moving representatives to shift their positions on amendments such as the “swaps push out” provision. Our results suggest that the links between campaign contributions from the financial sector and switches to a pro-bank vote were direct and substantial: For every $100,000 that Democratic representatives received from finance, the odds they would break with their party’s majority support for the Dodd-Frank legislation increased by 13.9 percent. Democratic representatives who voted in favor of finance often received $200,000–$300,000 from that sector, which raised the odds of switching by 25–40 percent.
Topic:: Economics, Political Economy, Elections, Democracy, Finance, Legislation, and Money
Political Geography:: United States

16343. Profits, Innovation and Financialization in the Insulin Industry

Author:: Rosie Collington
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: The list prices of analogue insulin medicines in the United States have soared during the past decade. In the wake of high-profile cases of prescription medicine “price-gouging”, such as Mylan’s EpiPen and Turing-acquired Daraprim, actors across the insulin supply chain are today facing growing scrutiny from US lawmakers and the wider public. For the most part, however, the role of shareholders in the insulin supply chain has been overlooked. This paper considers the relationship between profits realized from higher insulin list prices, pharmaceutical innovation, and the financial structures of the three dominant insulin manufacturing companies, which set list prices. It shows that despite claims to the contrary, insulin manufacturers extracted vast profits from the sale of insulin products in the period 2009-2018, as insulin list prices rose. Distributions to the company shareholders in the form of cash dividends and share repurchases totaled $122 billion over this period. The paper also considers the role of other actors in the insulin supply chain, such as pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs), in the determination of list prices. The data and analysis presented in the paper indicates that financialization could be considered in tension with not only the development of new drugs that will be available to patients in the future, but also the affordability of products that already exist today.
Topic:: Economics, Health, Health Care Policy, Finance, and Price
Political Geography:: United States

16344. Payroll Share, Real Wage and Labor Productivity across US States

Author:: Ivan Mendieta-Muñoz, Codrina Rada, Ansel Schiavone, and Rudi von Arnim
Publication Date:: 04-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Abstract:: This paper analyzes regional contributions to the US payroll share from 1977 to 2017 and the four major business cycles throughout this period. We implement two empirical exercises. First, we decompose the US payroll share across states. Utilizing a Divisia index decomposition technique yields exact contributions of real wages, employment structure, labor productivity and relative prices across the states to the aggregate change in the payroll share. Key findings are that the decline in the aggregate (i) is driven by decoupling between real wage and labor productivity; and (ii) is initially driven by the rust belt states, but subsequently dominated by relatively large states. Second, we employ mixture models on real wages and labor productivity across US states to discern whether distinct mechanisms appear to generate these distributions. Univariate models (iii) indicate the possibility that two distinct mechanisms generate state labor productivities, raising the question of whether regional dualism has taken hold. Lastly, we use bivariate mixture models to investigate whether such dualism and decoupling manifest in the joint distributions of payroll shares and labor productivity, too. Results (iv) are affirmative, and further suggest a tendency for high performing states to have relatively high payroll shares initially, and low payroll shares more recently.
Topic:: Economics, Political Economy, Labor Issues, Productivity, and Workforce
Political Geography:: United States

16345. China’s Activities in the South Caucasus: Issue 2, 27.07.2020 – 23.08.2020

Author:: Medea Ivaniadze
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: The digest covers China’s political, diplomatic, economic and other activities in the South Caucasus region and relations between China and the South Caucasus countries. It relies on a wide variety of sources, including the Chinese media. It is worth noting that the Chinese media is controlled by the Communist Party of China (according to the World Press Freedom Index China is nearly at the bottom of the list and ranks 177th out of 180 countries)
Topic:: Diplomacy, Politics, Media, Economy, and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)
Political Geography:: China, Eurasia, Caucasus, Georgia, and South Caucasus

16346. Some Considerations on the Election of the BSEC Secretary General: The Georgian Perspective

Author:: Valeri Chechelashvili
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: Multilateral diplomacy is an effective leverage to advance the foreign policy interests of a state in the network of international relations. This, similarly, applies to the regional level. Therefore, the Organization of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC), despite the mostly justified criticism addressed towards it, in this sense remains in the focus of the attention of its member states.
Topic:: International Relations, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Regional Integration, and Economic Cooperation
Political Geography:: Caucasus, Georgia, and Black Sea

16347. China’s Activities in the South Caucasus: Issue 3, 24.08.2020 – 20.09.2020

Author:: Medea Ivaniadze
Publication Date:: 09-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: The digest covers China’s political, diplomatic, economic and other activities in the South Caucasus region and relations between China and the South Caucasus countries. It relies on a wide variety of sources, including the Chinese media. It is worth noting that the Chinese media is controlled by the Communist Party of China (according to the World Press Freedom Index China is nearly at the bottom of the list and ranks 177th out of 180 countries).
Topic:: Diplomacy, Economics, Politics, and Media
Political Geography:: China, Caucasus, Georgia, and South Caucasus

16348. China’s Activities in the South Caucasus: Issue 4, 21.09.2020 – 18.10.2020

Author:: Medea Ivaniadze
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: The digest covers China’s political, diplomatic, economic and other activities in the South Caucasus region and relations between China and the South Caucasus countries. It relies on a wide variety of sources, including the Chinese media. It is worth noting that the Chinese media is controlled by the Communist Party of China (according to the World Press Freedom Index China is nearly at the bottom of the list and ranks 177th out of 180 countries)
Topic:: Diplomacy, Economics, Politics, and Media
Political Geography:: China, Caucasus, Georgia, and South Caucasus

16349. Impact of Anti-Pandemic Restrictions and Government Anti-Crisis Measures on Employment, Incomes and the Poverty Level in Georgia

Author:: Merab Kakulia and Nodar Kapanadze
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: The COVID-19 pandemic has posed unprecedented challenges to the world economy. It is no coincidence that the crisis provoked by the pandemic has been compared to the largest economic crises of the last hundred years such as the “Great Depression” of 1929-1933 and the “Great Recession” of 2008-2009. According to the International Monetary Fund, the “Great Lockdown” (Gopinath, 2020) has simultaneously weakened economic activity around the world, sharply reduced household consumption, particularly harmed the service sector and severely hit the labor market and international trade (IMF, 2020). The result was a massive loss of jobs and a depletion of regular sources of income for households, precipitating a real threat of a sharp rise in poverty. Clearly, Georgia has not been able to avoid these events, even more so since the service sector particularly affected by the pandemic crisis, including the tourism industry, accounts for 74 percent of the country's economy (Geostat, 2019). Although the spread of the disease was initially relatively small in the face of anti-pandemic restrictions imposed by the government, the country's economy has suffered greatly. To at least partially offset the severe socio-economic consequences caused by the restrictions to prevent the further spread of COVID-19, including forced home isolation, governments around the world, among them the Georgian government, have started to implement anti-crisis measures. However, the assessment of their effectiveness proved to be difficult in the view of an almost continuous increase in the scale of the pandemic. The following study aims to evaluate the: - Direct impact of state anti-pandemic restrictions on employment and unemployment; - Role of government emergency anti-crisis measures in mitigating the negative impact of antipandemic restrictions, including lockdowns, on employment and unemployment; - Employment and unemployment forecast for 2020-2021, taking into account the results of the first wave of the pandemic; - Direct impact of anti-pandemic restrictions on the dynamics and structure of household incomes; - Role of government emergency anti-crisis measures in neutralizing the negative impact of anti-pandemic restrictions on household incomes; - Household income forecast for 2020-2021, taking into account the results of the first wave of the pandemic; - Direct impact of anti-pandemic restrictions on the poverty level according to the subsistence minimum (extreme poverty line); - Role of government emergency anti-crisis measures in preventing a rise of extreme poverty as a result of anti-pandemic restrictions; - Forecast of extreme poverty levels for 2020-2021 taking into account the results of the first wave of the pandemic; - Effectiveness of government emergency anti-crisis measures.
Topic:: Economy, Crisis Management, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Eurasia, Caucasus, and Georgia

16350. Policy Documents: National Minorities in Political Processes – Engagement for Better Future

Author:: Ana Mosashvili, Nika Petriashvili, Irakli Mikiani, Gega Oragvelidze, Irakli Kartvelishvili, Roland Baghaturia, Elena Alimbarashvili, Lasha Makhatadze, Tornike Mumladze, Giorgi Mskhalaia, Salome Lomidze, Giorgi Areshidze, Ani Shaishmelashvili, Mamuka Jugheli, Nino Gachechiladze, Nino Tsanava, Ednar Mgeladze, Elisabed Sarkisova, and Natia Liluashvili
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Georgian Foundation for Strategic International Studies -GFSIS
Abstract:: The Policy Paper Series include policy documents developed within the framework of the project - National Minorities in Political Processes – Engagement for Better Future. The papers were elaborated by the young representatives of political parties, for whom it was the first attempt to work on an analytical document. The papers address the challenges and solutions for the ethnic minorities engagement in the political, economic or social life of Georgia. The project was implemented by the Rondel Foundation with the support and active participation of the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities (OSCE HCNM). The project aims to increase the political and social inclusion of ethnic minorities and to facilitate healthy policy debate on the issues of national minorities among the political parties, thus overall contributes to the good governance practices. Within the framework of the multi-component project, members of Tbilisi-based political party youth organizations, young people living in Samtskhe-Javakheti and Kvemo Kartli and active representatives of the local community attended various thematic seminars. The project also included thematic meetings of representatives of political parties and government agencies with the representatives of national minorities, the preparation of TV programs, and internships for young people representing ethnic minorities in political parties.
Topic:: Development, Education, Politics, Tourism, Culture, Minorities, and Youth
Political Geography:: Caucasus and Georgia

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