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461. The G20 and Global Governance

Author:
Stephen Kirchner
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Cato Journal
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
The Group of 20 sees itself as “the premier forum for international economic cooperation” (G20 2009b). This article examines its evolution and performance, and member countries’ compliance with G20 summit commitments. The G20 evolved as a response to the shortcomings of its predecessor, the G7/8. Yet its creation allowed member countries to avoid confronting many of the problems that arose out of the earlier forum. The best defense of the G20 is that it is the only institution of its type, but it still consumes scarce political and diplomatic capital, sometimes to the detriment of the policy objectives to which it is notionally committed. In this article, I compare data on members’ compliance with G20 summit commitments to proxy measures of the quality of domestic policies and institutions. While the proxies predict G20 compliance, it turns out that G20 compliance has no power to predict subsequent changes in domestic policies and institutions. The main implication of this data is that international economic and political cooperation is a symptom, not a cause, of domestic policies and institutions. Improvement in domestic policies makes the best contribution to advancing the G20 agenda, but such improvements do not appear to depend on the G20 process.
Topic:
Economics, International Cooperation, Governance, and G20
Political Geography:
Global Focus

462. Rethinking the International Monetary System

Author:
John B. Taylor
Publication Date:
06-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Cato Journal
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
In previous articles in the annual monetary issue of the Cato Journal, I drew on historical facts and economic theory to explain the benefits of rules-based monetary policy and why legislation could help the United States reap those benefits (Taylor 2011, 2013a). In this article, I discuss the international aspects of monetary policy, a subject often glossed over in modern debates about rules-based policy, at least compared with discussions about the classic rulesbased gold standard.
Topic:
Economics, International Cooperation, and Monetary Policy
Political Geography:
North America, Global Focus, and United States of America

463. Global Safe Haven Bonding Foreign and Domestic Owners of the U.S. Public Debt

Author:
Sandy Brian Hager
Publication Date:
01-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Global Political Economy, University of Sussex
Abstract:
This paper offers new theoretical and empirical insights to explain the resilience of the U.S. Treasuries market as a safe haven for global investment. Going beyond the standard systemic explanation, the paper highlights the importance of domestic politics in reinforcing the safe haven status of U.S. Treasury securities. In particular, the research shows how a formidable “bond” of interests unites domestic and foreign owners of the public debt and works to sustain U.S. power in global finance. Foreigners who now own roughly half of the U.S. public debt have something to gain from their domestic counterparts. The top one percent of U.S. households that dominate domestic ownership of the U.S. public debt have considerable political clout, thus alleviating foreign concerns about the creditworthiness of the U.S. federal government. Domestic owners of the U.S. public debt, in turn, have something to gain from the seemingly insatiable foreign appetite for U.S. Treasury securities. In supplying the U.S. federal government and U.S. households with cheap credit, foreign investors in U.S. Treasuries help to deflect challenges to the top one percent within the wealth and income hierarchy.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, International Political Economy, Inequality, and Finance
Political Geography:
United States and United Kingdom

464. Beyond Elitism: The Possibilities of Labour-Centred Development

Author:
Benjamin Selwyn
Publication Date:
04-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Global Political Economy, University of Sussex
Abstract:
This article outlines the theory and practice of Labour Centred Development (LCD). Much development thinking is elitist, positing states and corporations as primary agents in the development process. This article argues, by contrast, that collective actions by labouring classes can generate tangible developmental gains, and therefore, that under certain circumstances they can be considered primary development actors. Examples of LCD discussed here include shack-dweller’s movements in South Africa, the landless labourer’s movement in Brazil, unemployed worker’s movements in Argentina and large-scale collective actions by formal sector workers across East Asia. The article also considers future prospects for LCD.
Topic:
Development, Economics, International Political Economy, Labor Issues, and International Development
Political Geography:
East Asia, South Africa, Brazil, and Argentina

465. Global Value Chains or Global Poverty Chains? A new research agenda

Author:
Benjamin Selwyn
Publication Date:
06-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Global Political Economy, University of Sussex
Abstract:
Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis is part and parcel of mainstream development discourse and policy. Supplier firms are encouraged, with state support, to ‘link-up’ with trans-national lead firms. Such arrangements, it is argued, will reduce poverty and contribute to meaningful socio-economic development. This portrayal of global political economic relations represents a ‘problem-solving’ interpretation of reality. This article proposes an alternative analytical approach rooted in ‘critical theory’ which reformulates the GVC approach to better investigate and explain the reproduction of global poverty, inequality and divergent forms of national development. It suggests re-labelling GVC as Global Poverty Chain (GPC) analysis. GPC’s are examined in the textiles, food, and high-tech sectors. The article details how workers in these chains are systematically paid less than their subsistence costs, how trans-national corporations use their global monopoly power to capture the lion’s share of value created within these chains, and how these relations generate processes of immiserating growth. The article concludes by considering how to extend GPC analysis.
Topic:
Development, Economics, International Political Economy, Labor Issues, Inequality, and Global Political Economy
Political Geography:
United States, Eastern Europe, and Asia

466. The problem with ‘embedded liberalism’: the World Bank and the myth of Bretton Woods

Author:
Samuel Appleton
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Global Political Economy, University of Sussex
Abstract:
The Bretton Woods conference is conventionally understood as a radical break between the laissez faire order and its ‘embedded liberal’ successor, in which finance was suppressed in the interest of trade and productive growth. The new institutions, particularly the IBRD are often considered emblematic of this. In response to this, the paper argues that the Bretton Woods order required the enlistment, not repression, of private American finance. Firstly, laissez-faire era proposals for international financial institutions provided important precedents for the Bretton Woods institutions. Second, these were predicated on the uniquely deep liquidity of American financial markets following upon Progressive-era reforms, in the legacy of which the Roosevelt administration sought to locate the New Deal. Thirdly, they found new relevance in the 1940s as the IBRD turned by necessity to American financial markets for operating capital. Negotiating the imperative of commercial creditworthiness had two important consequences. First, it entailed the structural and procedural transformation of the IBRD, and allowed management to carve out a proprietary terrain in which its agency was decisive. Second, this suggests that US agendas were mediated by the Bank’s institutional imperatives – and that finance was no more ‘embedded’ during the Bretton Woods era than its predecessor.
Topic:
Development, Economics, World Bank, Global Markets, International Development, and Global Political Economy
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and Latin America

467. Regards sur l’Eurasie - L’année politique 2015

Author:
Anne De Tinguy, Bayram Balci, Isabelle Facon, Adrien Fauve, Thorniké Gordadze, Sergei Guriev, Raphaël Lefèvre, Gilles Lepesant, and Céline Marangé
Publication Date:
02-2016
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
"Looking into Eurasia" provides some keys to understand the events and phenomena that have left their imprint on a region that has undergone major mutation since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991: the post-soviet space. With a cross-cutting approach that is no way claims to be exhaustive, this study seeks to identify the key drivers, the regional dynamics and the underlying issues at stake.
Topic:
Demographics, Economics, Energy Policy, Migration, Nationalism, Political Economy, Sovereignty, Terrorism, Natural Resources, Europeanization, Political Science, Regional Integration, and State
Political Geography:
Russia, Central Asia, Caucasus, Middle East, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Georgia, Western Europe, and European Union

468. Democratic Peace, Pakistan-India relations and the possibilities of economic cooperation in South Asia

Author:
Ahmed Ijaz Malik
Publication Date:
01-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
South Asian Studies
Institution:
Department of Political Science, University of the Punjab
Abstract:
The relevance of theory of democratic peace to the case of Pakistan has been a topic of discourse in western academia, as Pakistan struggles to develop democratically and subsequently regarding its efforts to minimise the chances of war and maximising the possibilities of economic cooperation with its adversary India, therefore contributing towards possible regional economic development in South Asia. Considering the significant aspect at the core of these issues the focus of this article is primarily on the Pakistan’s domestic factors playing a significant role in its foreign policy making. Regarding foreign policy vis-a-vis India, the diplomatic and militarystrategic engagement over the issue of Kashmir remains pertinent. Broadly the analysis of these issues shall be accomplished by focussing on the governments of Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz group PML (N) from the post-second martial law years (1985 onwards) till the most recent elections in 2013. Considering the history of electoral politics in Pakistan, PML (N) has been inclined towards introducing advanced economic and developmental reforms in Pakistan therefore may be regarded as favouring economically liberal reforms. In order to ascertain the role of democracy as a form of governance in affecting the foreign policy making and conflict resolution, the interactions of these PML (N) governments with their Indian counterparts, on the issue of Kashmir shall be examined. This also contributes to the assumption at the core of democratic peace theory that as Pakistan evolves democratically, the chances of peace and economic cooperation in South Asia may be maximised. Therefore this article engages with the themes of separation of powers and problems of governance, different types of governments and regimes, civil-military relations, and possibilities of peace between historical adversaries through domestic economic progress and regional trade and cooperation. Moreover, in the South Asian perspective, it includes the liberal and internationalist discourses that expect regional economic blocks to develop in South Asia supported and guided by economically, financially and strategically advanced states.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Economics, History, Bilateral Relations, Governance, and Peacekeeping
Political Geography:
Pakistan, South Asia, India, and Punjab

469. Explaining the Prevalence, Scaling and Variance of Urban Phenomena

Author:
Andres Gomez-Lievano, Oscar Patterson-Lomba, and Ricardo Hausmann
Publication Date:
12-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:
The prevalence of many urban phenomena changes systematically with population size1. We propose a theory that unifies models of economic complexity2, 3 and cultural evolution4 to derive urban scaling. The theory accounts for the difference in scaling exponents and average prevalence across phenomena, as well as the difference in the variance within phenomena across cities of similar size. The central ideas are that a number of necessary complementary factors must be simultaneously present for a phenomenon to occur, and that the diversity of factors is logarithmically related to population size. The model reveals that phenomena that require more factors will be less prevalent, scale more superlinearly and show larger variance across cities of similar size. The theory applies to data on education, employment, innovation, disease and crime, and it entails the ability to predict the prevalence of a phenomenon across cities, given information about the prevalence in a single city.
Topic:
Economics, Urbanization, Employment, and Economic Theory
Political Geography:
Global Focus and United States of America

470. Exploring the Uncharted Export: An Analysis of Tourism-Related Foreign Expenditure with International Spend Data

Author:
Michele Coscia, Ricardo Hausmann, and Frank Neffke
Publication Date:
11-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:
Tourism is one of the most important economic activities in the world: for many countries it represents the single largest product in their export basket. However, it is a product difficult to chart: "exporters" of tourism do not ship it abroad, but they welcome importers inside the country. Current research uses social accounting matrices and general equilibrium models, but the standard industry classifications they use make it hard to identify which domestic industries cater to foreign visitors. In this paper, we make use of open source data and of anonymized and aggregated transaction data giving us insights about the spend behavior of foreigners inside two countries, Colombia and the Netherlands, to inform our research. With this data, we are able to describe what constitutes the tourism sector, and to map the most attractive destinations for visitors. In particular, we find that countries might observe different geographical tourists' patterns - concentration versus decentralization -; we show the importance of distance, a country's reported wealth and cultural affinity in informing tourism; and we show the potential of combining open source data and anonymized and aggregated transaction data on foreign spend patterns in gaining insight as to the evolution of tourism from one year to another.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, and Tourism
Political Geography:
Europe, Colombia, South America, and Netherlands