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1041. U.S. Climate Policy After Kyoto: Elements for Success

Author:
Daniel Bodansky
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
With the U.S. withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and the agreement's likely entry into force, it appears that the United States and the rest of the world will go their separate ways on climate change. The United States now faces a stark choice: Do nothing, join Kyoto, or come up with a policy of its own. The first option would be unwise, environmentally and politically. The second would require an embarrassing flip- flop by the Bush administration. This leaves the third option: proposing a credible U.S. approach separate from Kyoto.
Topic:
Energy Policy, Environment, Globalization, Industrial Policy, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
United States

1042. Sustainable Development A Dubious Solution in Search of a Problem

Author:
Jerry Taylor
Publication Date:
08-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
From August 26 through September 4, 2002, approximately 100 heads of state and 60,000 delegates will gather in Johannesburg, South Africa, to attend a “World Summit on Sustainable Development.” The conference—convened on the 10th anniversary of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and expected to be the largest U.N. summit in history— will explore domestic and international policy options to promote the hottest environmental buzzwords to enter the public policy debate in decades.
Topic:
Economics, Environment, Globalization, and Poverty
Political Geography:
South Africa

1043. The Globalization of Human Well-Being

Author:
Indur M. Goklany
Publication Date:
08-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Controversy over globalization has focused mainly on whether it exacerbates income inequality between the rich and the poor. But, as opponents of globalization frequently note, human well-being is not synonymous with wealth. The central issue, therefore, is not whether income gaps are growing but whether globalization advances well-being and, if inequalities in well-being have expanded, whether that is because the rich have advanced at the expense of the poor.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, and Human Welfare

1044. Fixing Argentina

Author:
Kurt Schuler
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Argentina's currency crisis and economic depression have been caused by the bad policies of its government—not by banks, speculators, the International Monetary Fund (despite the bad advice it has given), or other scapegoats. The De la Rúa and Duhalde governments have made several gigantic blunders, namely, increasing tax rates, freezing bank deposits, devaluing the peso, and forcibly converting dollar bank deposits and contracts into pesos (“pesofication”).
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Argentina, South America, and Latin America

1045. The Worried Friend, or: Hegemony vs. Globalization

Author:
Claus Leggewie
Publication Date:
11-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies (IES), UC Berkeley
Abstract:
How real is American hegemony, given that only a few years ago talk about the decline of American power dominated discussion? How do allied states deal with a superpower that is no longer so benign? Does the United States still provide security for Western Europe and the rest of the world at all? And is a transnational world in need of Pax Americana, or what should, from a European and transatlantic perspective, take its place?
Topic:
Security and Globalization
Political Geography:
United States, America, and Europe

1046. Assessing Globalization's Critics: "Talkers Are No Good Doers???"

Author:
Kimberly Ann Elliott, Debayani Kar, and J. David Richardson
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE)
Abstract:
This paper is about the critics of the “doers” of globalization. It describes who they are, where they came from, what they want, how economists, policymakers, and others might understand them better, and where globalization might head from here. Many critics are themselves strongly internationalist and want to see globalization proceed, but under different rules. Some, particularly the protesters in the streets, focus mainly on what is wrong with the world. But some of them put forward broad alternative visions and others offer detailed recommendations for alleviating the problems they see arising from status quo globalization. Most of them have roots in long-standing transnational advocacy efforts to protect human rights and the environment and reduce poverty around the world. What brings them together today is their shared concern that the process by which globalization's rules are being written and implemented is undermining democracy and failing to spread the benefits broadly. This paper sketches the key issues and concerns that motivate the critics in a way that is broadly representative and intelligible to economists. It finds more resonance for the critics' agenda in economics than they commonly recognize. And it attempts to capture the concerns of Southern as well as Northern critics and to analyze the issues that divide as well as bring them together. Finally, it evaluates those issues and alternative proposals on which even globalization enthusiasts and the critics might come together cooperatively.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, and International Trade and Finance

1047. Disentangling the Reform Gridlock: Higher Education in Germany

Author:
Helga A. Welsh
Publication Date:
12-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
Abstract:
For more than a decade, bemoaning the many roadblocks to reforming important aspect of German politics has become commonplace. Explanations emphasize formal and informal veto points, such as the role of political institutions and the lack of elite and societal support for reform initiatives. Against this background, I was interested in factors that place policy issues on the political agenda and follow up with concrete courses of action; i.e., in factors that lead to a disentangling of the reform gridlock. I emphasize the importance of agenda setting in the emergence of higher education reform in Germany. Globalization, European integration and domestic pressures combined to create new pressures for change. In response, an advocacy coalition of old and new political actors has introduced a drawn-out and ongoing process of value reorientation in the direction of competition, including international competition, and greater autonomy. The result has been a burst of activities, some moderate, some more far-reaching in their potential to restructure German higher education.
Topic:
Education, Globalization, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe and Germany

1048. Threats to Democracy: Prevention and Response

Author:
Elizabeth Frawley Bagley and Morton H. Halperin
Publication Date:
11-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Threats to democracy—erosions of democracy and democratic institutions and unconstitutional interruptions to the democratic process—continue to plague countries on the path to democracy. Democratic governments, both individually and in their capacity as members of the Community of Democracies, regional and international organizations, and international financial institutions, must secure more effective international action against threats to democracy in states that have chosen the democratic path.
Topic:
Democratization, Development, Globalization, and Government

1049. Terrorist Financing

Author:
Maurice R. Greenberg, Lee S. Wolosky, and William F. Wechsler
Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Unlike other terrorist leaders, Osama bin Laden is not a military hero, a religious authority, or an obvious representative of the downtrodden and disillusioned. He is a rich financier. He built al- Qaeda's financial network from the foundation of a system originally designed to channel resources to the mujahideen fighting the Soviets.
Topic:
Security, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Soviet Union

1050. Moral Integrity and Reparations to Africa

Author:
Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition, McMaster University
Abstract:
This paper presents some very preliminary thoughts on reparations due to Sub-Saharan Africa, including acknowledgment, apology, and financial compensation. I am a political sociologist, a specialist in international human rights with a background in African studies. Focusing on the Afactual@ history of Africa, I consider the possibility of arguing a case for Western compensation for racial discrimination. I also consider the case for acknowledgment, apology and compensation drawn from the need to recognize the moral integrity of Africans.
Topic:
Globalization and Imperialism
Political Geography:
Africa