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101. US Interests and the International Monetary Fund

Author:
C. Randall Henning
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
The United States Congress is now considering whether to raise US commitments to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). A positive decision would ratify President Obama's pledge in early April, taken with the other leaders of the G-20, to bolster the IMF as part of their cooperative response to the global economic crisis. The package of measures advanced by the G-20 leaders would triple the resources available to the Fund to $750 billion and would greatly reinforce its role in the international financial system. However, the IMF remains a controversial institution and congressional support cannot be taken for granted.
Topic:
Debt, Monetary Policy, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

102. Icon or Omen? Dubai's Debt Problem and the Gulf

Author:
Simon Henderson
Publication Date:
12-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Late on November 25, just before the start of the Islamic Eid festival and, coincidentally, Thanksgiving in the United States, Dubai's flagship investment company Dubai World announced that it would be requesting a six-month delay on paying its debts. Within hours, Dubai's reputation was being rewritten, and its ambition to be a financial center, building on its historic reputation as a focal point for regional trade, was being recast. Uncertainty continued on November 30, when the Dubai government said that it would not guarantee Dubai World's debt. In any event, the larger story has been the nervousness of world financial markets, which are now also evincing worry about the debt of countries like Greece or Ireland. Within the Middle East, the focus is on the extent of support that Dubai will receive from Abu Dhabi, the neighboring -- and richer -- member sheikhdom of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), whether other city-states like Bahrain and Qatar are also at risk, and whether Dubai's links with Iran will change as a result of its financial situation.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States, Iran, Middle East, Arabia, Bahrain, Dubai, and Abu Dhabi

103. Defense Monitor, Vol. XXXVII, No. 2 - March/April 2008

Publication Date:
04-2008
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Defense Information
Abstract:
The new 2009 defense budget has just been released. The more you look into the numbers, the more things become unclear, very unclear. Most of the numbers that have been released are inaccurate or incomplete, or both. Other numbers will change as the year progresses, but we do not know if they will go up or down.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Debt, Nuclear Weapons, and Weapons of Mass Destruction

104. Synchronized Dive into Recession: Focus on Damage Limitation

Author:
Vanessa Rossi
Publication Date:
10-2008
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
The global financial system has suffered a once-in-a-century meltdown that almost brought the world economy to a halt in late September. Confidence and trust have been shattered. In spite of concerted and extraordinary efforts on the part of central banks and political leaders, including recapitalizing the banks, it is not yet certain that the waves of panic and destruction have been halted. Many of the repercussions have yet to emerge, including possible legal action as well as economic damage. Even before this latest explosion, the leading OECD economies were plunging into an unusually synchronized recession, driven by the simultaneous collapse in consumer and business spending. This will now get worse.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, Globalization, International Political Economy, and Markets

105. Debt and Public Services

Publication Date:
10-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
In many of the poorest countries, the provision of decent, accessible public services - delivered by a qualified and properly paid workforce - is threatened by huge debt burdens and damaging policies demanded by creditors. Every day 4,000 children die from diarrhoea, a disease of dirty water, and 1,400 women die in pregnancy or childbirth. In developing countries, public services can mean the difference between life and death.
Topic:
Debt and Privatization

106. Paying for People: Financing the skilled workers needed to deliver health and education services for all

Publication Date:
04-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
This is the first in a series of three papers that examines the financing of services in developing countries. This paper focuses on external assistance in the form of aid and debt cancellation. The other papers in the series will focus on internal revenues; first, receipts from taxation and then receipts from extractive industries.
Topic:
Debt, Development, Education, Health, Humanitarian Aid, International Political Economy, and Poverty

107. Promoting Group Justice: Fiscal Policies in Post-Conflict Countries

Author:
Frances Stewart, Graham Brown, and Alex Cobham
Publication Date:
10-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center on International Cooperation (CIC)
Abstract:
Evidence suggests that economic inequalities – particularly “horizontal inequalities” among groups defined by ethnic, racial, linguistic, regional, and religious lines – can generate social tensions and fuel violent conflict. Well-designed fiscal policies can help build a sustainable peace by working to reduce these inequalities. This paper reviews some challenges raised by analyzing the impacts of tax and expenditure policies on inequality in post-conflict settings, and makes recommendations for incorporating distributional effects into fiscal policy making.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Debt, Political Economy, and Poverty

108. Oxfam Publishing: Meeting Real Needs: A major change for donors to the Democratic Republic of the Congo 2006

Author:
Eva Smets
Publication Date:
02-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is at a critical point in its history. While the forthcoming elections offer the country new opportunities, it is also facing rising tensions, and at least 42 million people still endure appalling poverty and suffering.
Topic:
Debt and Humanitarian Aid
Political Geography:
Africa and Democratic Republic of the Congo

109. Beyond Victimhood: Women's Peacebuilding in Sudan, Congo and Uganda

Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Peacebuilding cannot succeed if half the population is excluded from the process. Crisis Group's research in Sudan, Congo (DRC) and Uganda suggests that peace agreements, post-conflict reconstruction, and governance do better when women are involved. Women make a difference, in part because they adopt a more inclusive approach toward security and address key social and economic issues that would otherwise be ignored. But in all three countries, as different as each is, they remain marginalised in formal processes and under-represented in the security sector as a whole. Governments and the international community must do much more to support women peace activists.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Relations, Debt, and Diplomacy
Political Geography:
Uganda, Africa, Sudan, and Democratic Republic of the Congo

110. Fiscal Policy for Poverty Reduction, Reconstruction, and Growth

Author:
Matthew Smith, Alan Roe, and Tony Addison
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
An effective state is able to mobilize revenue and spend it on infrastructure, services, and public goods that both enhance human capital and the well-being of communities (especially the poor), as well as stimulating investment and employment creation by the private sector. An effective state also manages public finance to ensure that macroeconomic balance is maintained—with policy neither too restrictive to discourage private investment and growth, nor too accommodative to create high inflation and crowd out private investment. Fiscal issues are therefore at the heart of the state's role in the development process and failure in this policy area—whether it is in taxation, public expenditures, or in managing the fiscal deficit and public debt—can quickly undermine growth and poverty reduction. Fiscal weakness can also be fatal to social peace when one or more ethnic, religious, or regional groups are taxed unfairly—or receives too little in the allocation of public spending.
Topic:
Debt, Development, Economics, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa and Asia

111. After Gleneagles: What role for loans in ODA?

Author:
Helmut Reisen, Pierre Jacquet, and Daniel Cohen
Publication Date:
12-2006
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
Suppose a DAC donor earmarks $1 billion of taxpayers' money for official development assistance (ODA). The donor may use two instruments as an outright grant or in combination with a market loan to produce a concessional loan of $2 billion with a percentage grant element of 50 per cent. Many nowadays think the choice should be clear: provide grants only, leave loans to the market. The purpose of this Policy Brief is to qualify and inform this choice.
Topic:
International Relations, Debt, Economics, and Third World

112. The G-8 Debt Deal: First Step On A Long Journey

Author:
Debayani Kar and Neil Watkins
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Foreign Policy In Focus
Abstract:
Jubilee campaigns and debt cancellation advocates can be proud of their efforts. The Finance Ministers of the eight rich country governments as represented at the Group of 8 (G-8) have announced a deal on 100% debt cancellation of International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, and African Development Fund debt for some impoverished nations.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Debt, Development, and Economics
Political Geography:
Africa

113. Nigeria's Paris Club Debt Problem

Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
Intense domestic pressure has convinced Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo to seek a deal that would eliminate the country's $31 billion of debt owed to the governments of the U.K., France, and other aid-giving countries that use the Paris Club process to restructure debt that countries cannot repay. The Paris Club creditors have proposed an unprecedented operation—its first-ever buyback at a discount—that would cancel all of Nigeria's debt to them in exchange for a cash payment of roughly $12 billion.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Relations, and Debt
Political Geography:
Africa, United Kingdom, Paris, France, and Nigeria

114. Moving Toward Smarter Aid

Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) is seriously wounded. Unveiled by President Bush in March 2002 as a promising new bilateral aid instrument for tackling global poverty, the most prominent sign of the MCC's distress was the mid-summer resignation of Paul Applegarth, its first CEO. More disturbing are the cuts imposed by the Congressional committees marking up next year's budget. The MCC's original concept was to award $5 billion annually to low-income countries based on objective criteria measuring their performance in ruling justly, investing in people, and promoting economic freedom. Appropriations for the MCC in its third year of funding, however, appear to be stuck below $2 billion. Criticism of the MCC for getting off to a slow start misses the point. Creating a new agency takes time and the original concept remains valid. To enable the MCC to live up to its potential, its newly nominated CEO will have to sell the MCC vision to a skeptical Congress and gain the flexibility required to avoid drifting toward "more of the same."
Topic:
International Relations, Debt, Economics, and Poverty

115. The New Capital Requirements Directive: What pieces are still missing from the puzzle?

Author:
Rym Ayadi
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS)
Abstract:
After almost seven years of hard work to produce a new substantive piece of legislation updating the current banking regulation for European credit institutions and investment firms – the Capital Requirements Directive (CRD) – it looks like its timely adoption is still uncertain. The main problem is the dissatisfaction of Parliament with its limited role in comitology and in the Lamfalussy process, which has led it to suspend 'temporarily' the comitology provisions of the CRD, casting doubt over the future ability to amend the legislation. The European Constitution addresses Parliament's concern about ensuring democratic accountability in the comitology process in Art. 36. The pause for reflection on the Constitution prompted by the no-votes in the French and Dutch referenda has re-ignited the issue and is forcing EU institutions to seek a new inter-institutional agreement on this issue.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, and Government
Political Geography:
Europe

116. After Argentina

Author:
Anna Gelpern
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
Argentina has finally restructured its foreign debt. Its credit rating is up, and its debt is back in the index. The new bonds are trading roughly in line with Brazil and Uruguay's, just above 400 basis points over treasuries for instruments of comparable duration. Argentina is raising new money from foreign investors. Earlier in the summer of 2005, it reopened a domestic dollar issue to accommodate excess foreign demand. Argentina and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are on again. They might even sign a new disbursing program after the fall 2005 congressional elections. Like a bad dream, the 2001 default is fading into the night after three years of brisk growth and impressive fiscal management—even as the usual nabobs natter on about structural reform and unhappy bondholders.
Topic:
International Relations, Debt, and Economics
Political Geography:
South America

117. The New Approach to Foreign Aid: Is the Enthusiasm Warranted?

Author:
Ian Vásquez
Publication Date:
09-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
The failure of past foreign aid programs has given rise to a new consensus on how to make foreign aid effective. According to the new approach, aid that goes into poor countries that have good policies and institutions is highly effective at promoting growth and reducing poverty. Disbursing aid to countries that have good policies contrasts with the traditional practice of providing aid to countries irrespective of the quality of their policies or providing aid to promote policy reforms. President George Bush's proposed foreign aid initiative, the Millennium Challenge Account, is based on the selective approach to foreign assistance, as are, in large part, the World Bank's calls to double foreign aid flows worldwide.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance, and Third World

118. Russia—Debt Rollover

Author:
Oxford Analytica
Publication Date:
08-1999
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxford Analytica
Abstract:
On July 28, the IMF's Board of Directors announced their approval of a 4.5 billion dollar loan to Russia. Rather than representing a breakthrough deal, the agreement is merely the latest chapter in the cycle of non–compliance and renegotiation that has characterised the Fund's relationship with Moscow. With presidential and parliamentary polls scheduled during the next twelve months, electoral pressures will almost certainly prevent the latest macroeconomic programme being implemented. Moreover, unless the root cause of Russia's economic problems—its dire GDP growth rate—is rectified, a further round of comprehensive renegotiations will be required.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, Government, International Trade and Finance, Political Economy, and Politics
Political Geography:
Russia and Moscow