· 2007
A Brookings Institution Press and Center for Strategic and International Studies publication In a world transformed by globalization and challenged by terrorism, foreign aid has assumed renewed importance as a foreign policy tool. While the results of more than forty years of development assistance show some successes, foreign aid is currently dispersed between many agencies and branches of government in a manner that formulation and implementation of a coherent, effective strategy. The current political climate is receptive to a transition toward greater accountability and effectiveness in development aid. Because this transition is clearly an imperative but has not yet been comprehensively addressed, the Brookings Institution and the Center for Strategic and International Studies have conducted a joint study that both assesses the current structures of foreign assistance and makes recommendations for efficient coordination. Drawing on expertise from the full range of agencies whose policies affect foreign aid, Security by Other Means examines foreign assistance across four categories reflecting the interests that aid furthers: security, economic, humanitarian, and political. As disparities in the world become more untenable, foreign aid plays a key role in not only the national interests of the U.S. but also the interconnected interests of the international community. This important new volume takes aim at critical questions in a concerted manner by assigning coherence and effectiveness to U.S. foreign aid. Contributors include Owen Barder (Center for Global Development, formerly UK Department for International Development), Charlie Flickner (former Staff Director of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign Operations), Steve Hensch (George Washington University), Steve Morrison (Center for Strategic and International Studies), Steve Radelet (Center for Global Development)
· 2007
Private sector activity is crucial for development. It shapes the investment climate, mobilizes innovation and financing in areas such as global health, and can either cause or mitigate social and environmental harm. Yet so far, the international development debate has not focused on the role of the private sector. This volume—written by members of the private sector, philanthropic organizations, and academia—investigates ways to galvanize the private sector in the fight against global poverty. Using a bottom-up approach, they describe how the private sector affects growth and poverty alleviation. They also review the impediments to private capital investment, and discuss various approaches to risk mitigation, including public sector enhancements, and identify some specific new plans for financing development in neglected markets, including an equity-based model for financing small-to-medium-sized enterprises. From the top-down, the authors look at the social and environmental impact of private sector activities, investigate public-private partnerships, explore new perspectives on the role of multinationals, and discuss an in-depth case study of these issues as they relate to global public health. In addition to providing a broad overview of the current issues, this forward-looking volume assesses the action-oriented initiatives that already exist, and provides templates and suggestions for new initiatives and partnerships. Contributors include David DeFerranti (Brookings Institution), Timothy Freundlich (Calvert Social Investment Foundation), Ross Levine (World Bank), Sylvia Mathews (Gates Foundation), Jane Nelson (Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government), Alan Patricof (APAX Partners), Warrick Smith (World Bank), and Julie Sunderland (APAX Partners).
In Brazil, the confluence of strong global demand for the country's major products, global successes for its major corporations, and steady results from its economic policies is building confidence and even reviving dreams of grandeza—the greatness that has proven elusive in the past. Even as the current economic crisis tempers expectations of the future, the trends identified in this book suggest that Brazil will continue its path toward becoming a leading economic power in the future. Once seen as an economic backwater, Brazil now occupies key niches in energy, agriculture, service industries, and even high technology. Yet Latin America's largest nation still struggles with endemic inequality issues and deep-seated ambivalence toward global economic integration. Scholars and policy practitioners from Brazil, the United States, and Europe recently gathered to investigate the present state and likely future of the Brazilian economy. This important volume is the timely result. In Brazil as an Economic Superpower? international authorities focus on five key topics: agribusiness, energy, trade, social investment, and multinational corporations. Their analyses and expertise provide not only a unique and authoritative picture of the Brazilian economy but also a useful lens through which to view the changing global economy as a whole.
· 2009
"From August 3-8, 2008, the Aspen Strategy Group gathered in Aspen, Colorado to assess the instruments and institutions of American power and purpose. Aspen Strategy Group members, government officials, academics, and journalists formed a bipartisan group of foreign policy and national security practitioners from a wide range of government agencies. This publication is a collection of the fifteen papers that were used to guide their discussions during the course of the conference, along with a scene setter and concluding observations."--The Acknowledgments
Many allege multinationals are exporting' U.S. jobs when they expand operations abroad. This paper investigates the extent to which expansion of offshore production by U.S. multinationals reduces labor demand at home and at other offshore locations, using a panel on U.S. multinationals and their foreign affiliates between 1983 and 1992. The results suggest that foreign affiliate employment substitutes modestly at the margins for U.S. parent employment. There is much stronger substitution between workers at affiliates in alternative low wage locations. In contrast, activities performed by affiliates at locations with different workforce skill levels in the same region appear to be complements. The results suggest a vertical division of activities among countries with different workforce skill levels, where workers in developing countries compete with each other to perform the activities most sensitive to labor costs. When wages in developing countries, such as Mexico, fall 10 percent, U.S. parent employment falls 0.17 percent, while affiliates in other developing countries, such as Malaysia, lay off 1.6 percent of their workforce.
"A Simple Theory of Multinational Corporations and Trade With a Trade-off Between Proximity and Concentration" presents an economic model analyzing the strategic decisions of multinational corporations in the context of international trade. Authored by Lael Brainard of the Sloan School of Management, this study explores the balance between locating production near consumers (proximity) and concentrating production in fewer locations to exploit economies of scale. The work provides valuable insights into the factors driving foreign direct investment and the structure of global production networks. It remains relevant for economists and business strategists interested in understanding the complex dynamics of multinational enterprises and their impact on international trade patterns. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Climate change threatens all people, but its adverse effects will be felt most acutely by the world's poor. Absent urgent action, new threats to food security, public health, and other societal needs may reverse hard-fought human development gains. Climate Change and Global Poverty makes concrete recommendations to integrate international development and climate protection strategies. It demonstrates that effective climate solutions must empower global development, while poverty alleviation itself must become a central strategy for both mitigating emissions and reducing global vulnerability to adverse climate impacts.
· 2011
The Sec. of the Treasury is required to provide semiannual reports on the international economic and exchange rate policies of the major trading partners of the U.S. They must consider "whether countries manipulate the rate of exchange between their currency and the U.S. dollar for purposes of preventing effective balance of payments adjustment or gaining unfair competitive advantage in international trade." This Report covers developments in the second half of 2010, and data as available through the first four months of 2011. Treasury has concluded that no major trading partner of the U.S. met the necessary standards during the period covered in this Report. Contents: Introduction; U.S. Macroecononmic Trends; The Global Economy; U.S. International Accounts; The Dollar in Foreign Exchange Markets; Analyses of Individual Economies. With respect to China, the report concludes that China was not manipulating its currency to gain an unfair trade advantage, but it still needs to allow the yuan to rise much faster in value. Figures and tables. This is a print on demand report.
It is often argued that the globalization of production places workers in industrialized countries in competition with their counterparts in low wage countries. We examine a firm-level panel of foreign manufacturing affiliates owned by U.S. multinationals between 1983 and 1992 and find evidence to the contrary. Affiliate activities in developing countries appear to be complementary to rather than substituting for affiliate activities in industrialized countries. Workers do compete across affiliates, but the competition is between affiliates in countries with similar workforce skill levels. The results suggest that multinationals with affiliates in countries at different stages of development decompose production across borders into complementary stages that differ by skill intensity. The implied complementarity of traded intermediate inputs has important implications for the empirical debate over trade, employment, and wages.
Extreme poverty exhausts institutions, depletes resources, weakens leadership, and ultimately contributes to rising insecurity and conflict. Just as poverty begets insecurity, however, the reverse is also true. As the destabilizing effects of conflict settle in, civil institutions are undermined and poverty proliferates. Breaking this nexus between poverty and conflict is one of the biggest challenges of the twenty-first century. The authors of this compelling book—some of the most experienced practitioners from around the world—investigate the complex and dynamic relationship between poverty and insecurity, exploring possible agents for change. They bring the latest lessons and intellectual framework to bear in an examination of African leadership, the private sector, and American foreign aid as vehicles for improving economic conditions and security. Contributors include Colin Kahl (University of Minnesota),Vinca LaFleur (Vinca LaFleur Communications), Edward Miguel (University of California, Berkeley), Jane Nelson (Harvard University and Brookings), Anthony Nyong (University of Jos and the International Development Research Centre, Nairobi), Susan Rice (Brookings), Robert Rotberg (Harvard University and the World Peace Foundation), Marc Sommers (Tufts University), Hendrik Urdal (International Peace Research Institute), and Jennifer Windsor (Freedom House).