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901. What to Say about the State

Author:
Mathias Risse
Publication Date:
02-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:
In a little-known 1677 essay by Leibniz, two diplomats wonder about the status of princes of the Holy Roman Empire. These princes obtained a great deal of independence in the Treaty of Westphalia, but nonetheless remained subject to the Emperor. Were they, at least those with sizeable territories, “sovereign” or not? While the Treaty of Westphalia is considered the Magna Charta of the state system, its historical purpose was to keep the Empire functioning politically. Conceptual clarification was not a priority. In response, Leibniz offered an account of sovereignty meant to shed light on the Empire's confusing political realities.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Globalization, and Politics
Political Geography:
Westphalia

902. From Internationalization of Terrorism to the Internationalization of Anti-terrorism: The Role of the Summer Olympic Games

Author:
Andreas Selliaas
Publication Date:
05-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Norwegian Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
The academic literature on international relations and international sports studies has long ignored the linkages between sports and international relations. The present contribution seeks to remedy this shortcoming in the literature on international relations and international sports studies, focusing on the relationship between terrorism, anti-terrorism and the Summer Olympic Games, and examining the role of terrorism and anticipated terrorist actions in the organization of the Olympic Games. In this article we show that the anti-terrorism measures undertaken before, during and after the Olympic Games since 1972 have gone from failure to success. The development of anti-terrorism measures has resulted in Olympic Games that have been held without terrorist attacks aimed at political change. Failures in previous Games have been evaluated and have served to promote new developments in the fight against terrorism in later Games. The Munich disaster alerted everyone to the importance of Olympic security; since then, the Olympic Games have become the standard-setter for national organization and international cooperation on anti-terrorism in society in general.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Globalization, and Terrorism

903. International Organizations as a Profession: Professional Mobility and Power Distribution

Author:
Jean-Marc Coicaud
Publication Date:
09-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The role of international organizations grows with the acceleration of globalization and the increasing importance of global governance. However, thus far, only limited and rather narrow research has been generated on the subject. It is a state of affairs that reflects on international studies, as well as on the power realities of the world. By assessing international organizations through the career prospects that they offer to skilled professionals, this paper is an attempt to remedy this situation. As such it unveils some of the internal dynamics of international organizations and explores their external consequences in terms of the relations between international organizations, the people employed by these, and the power play (economic, social, political and even cultural) at the national and international level.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, International Cooperation, and United Nations

904. Resource-Poor Farmers in South India: On the Margins or Frontiers of Globalization?

Author:
Rimjhim M. Aggarwal
Publication Date:
09-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
It is often argued that an important reason why globalization may lead to GDP growth but fail to reduce poverty is because the poor are unable to participate in the new market opportunities and are marginalized. In this paper we examine the experience of resource-poor farmers in south India, who participated aggressively in the new market opportunities that opened up with trade reforms. However, these expanded market opportunities failed to improve their welfare. The paper examines why and how this happened.
Topic:
Agriculture, Globalization, and Poverty
Political Geography:
India and Asia

905. The Role of Federalism in Developing the US during Nineteenth-century Globalization

Author:
Eric Rauchway
Publication Date:
07-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
During its development into a continental empire, the US, like other countries relied on the investment of capital and labour from abroad; unlike other countries, the US had a peculiar political institution, federalism, which channeled these resources and also determined the course of protest against these resources. The paper argues that federalism played a key role in determining the course of US economic development and reaction to this early instance of globalization, a role with possible lessons for other countries today.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States

906. Trade, Migration, and Poverty Reduction in the Globalizing Economy: The Case of the Philippines

Author:
Jonna P. Estudillo and Yasuyuki Sawada
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper investigates how the two types of globalization—i.e., integration of international trade and emigration—affected poverty reduction in the Philippines. Using the Family Income and Expenditure Surveys from 1985 to 2000, we found that both nontransfer and transfer incomes decreased poverty significantly but transfer income exerted greater impact. External openness reduced poverty significantly before the Asian currency crises but its impact had been reversed since. The effect of land reform in inducing transfer income from abroad was significant only in the 1990s. Yet, the ultra poor were bypassed in the land reform-credit-emigration-transfer nexus.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Migration

907. Threshold Estimation on the Globalization-Poverty Nexus: Evidence from China

Author:
Zhicheng Liang
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
China has experienced rapid integration into the global economy and achieved remarkable progress in poverty reduction over the last two decades. In this paper, by employing panel data covering twenty-five Chinese provinces over the period of 1986- 2002, and applying the endogenous threshold regression techniques, we empirically investigate the globalization-poverty nexus in China, paying particular attention to the nonlinearity of the impact of globalization on the poor. Estimation results provide strong evidence to suggest that there exists a threshold in the relationship between globalization and poverty: globalization is good for the poor only after the economy has reached a certain threshold level of globalization.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, and Poverty
Political Geography:
China and Asia

908. A Quest for Pro-Poor Globalization

Author:
Erik Thorbecke and Machiko Nissanke
Publication Date:
05-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
While the opportunities offered by globalization can be large, the question is often raised whether the actual distribution of gains is fair and, in particular, whether the poor benefit proportionately less from globalization and could under some circumstances actually be hurt by it. The paper discusses channels and transmission mechanisms through which the process of globalization affects different aspects and dimensions of poverty in the developing world. It examines how these numerous channels interact, as the net effects on poverty depend on the relative strength of the positive and negative forces of globalization. On the basis of our analysis of these transmission mechanisms from globalization to the world's poor, the paper discusses what may constitute a policy framework for encouraging globalization to be pro-poor.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, Human Welfare, and Poverty

909. Globalization and Rural Poverty: A Perspective from a Social Observatory in the Philippines

Author:
Yujiro Hayami
Publication Date:
04-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
Using a rice village in the Philippines as a social observatory, the impacts of modernization forces under globalization on rural poverty are assessed based on data collected from recurrent household surveys over the past three decades. After cultivation frontiers closed in the early 1950s relentless population increases continued to press hard on limited land resources in this village. This pauperizing force was counteracted to some extents by the development of irrigation systems followed by the diffusion of modern high-yielding varieties of rice. However, the much more important factor that prevented poverty incidence from increasing and income inequality from worsening was identified as the expansion of non-farm employment opportunities resulting from the increased integration of this village with wide urban and foreign markets. This finding does not lend support to the popular assertion that the encroachment of markets into traditional agrarian communities tends to result in greater inequality and misery of the poor.
Topic:
Agriculture, Globalization, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Southeast Asia

910. Globalization and the Urban Poor in China

Author:
Guanghua Wan and Yin Zhang
Publication Date:
04-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper examines the distributional impact of globalization on the poor in urban China. Employing the kernel density estimation technique, we recovered from irregularly grouped household survey data the income distribution for 29 Chinese provinces for 1988-2001. Panels of the income shares of the poorest 20, 10 and 5 per cent of the urban residents were then compiled. In a fixed-effect model, two of the central conclusions of Dollar and Kraay (2002)—that 'the incomes of the poor rise equi-proportionately with average income' and that trade openness has little distributional effect on poverty—were revisited. Our results lend little support to either of the Dollar-Kraay conclusions, but instead indicate that average income growth is associated with worsening income distribution while globalization in general, and trade openness in particular, raises the income shares of the poor. It is also found that openness to trade and openness to FDI have differential distributional effects. The beneficial effect of trade was not restricted to the coastal provinces only, but also weakened significantly after 1992. These findings are robust to allow for nonlinearity in the effect of globalization and to control for the influence of several other variables.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, and Poverty
Political Geography:
China and Asia