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3001. Rising Spatial Disparities and Development

Author:
Ravi Kanbur and Anthony J. Venables
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
Amidst a growing concern about increasing inequality, the spatial dimensions of inequality have begun to attract considerable policy interest. In China, Russia, India, Mexico, and South Africa, as well as most other developing and transition economies, there is a sense that spatial and regional disparities in economic activity, incomes and social indicators, are on the increase. Spatial inequality is a dimension of overall inequality, but it has added significance when spatial and regional divisions align with political and ethnic tensions to undermine social and political stability. Also important in the policy debate is a perceived sense that increasing internal spatial inequality is related to greater openness of economies, and to globalization in general.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Demographics, and Development
Political Geography:
Russia, China, India, South Africa, and Mexico

3002. Extension of Saving and Investment Incentives

Author:
Eric Toder
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Urban Institute
Abstract:
Thank you for inviting me to testify today at this hearing on extension of the incentives for savings and investment that are scheduled to expire in the next few years. Major tax incentives enacted in 2001 and 2003 that are scheduled to expire and that the Congress may consider renewing include the special lower tax rates for capital gains and dividend income enacted in 2003, and the increase in the annual deduction amount for qualified section 179 property, the savers credit, and the above the line deduction for qualified post-secondary education expenses, all enacted in 2001. The education deduction and the increase in the section 179 deduction expire at the end of this year, the savers credit expires at the end of 2006, and the lower tax rates for capital gains and dividends expire at end of 2008.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Education, and Government

3003. Caucasian Diaspora in Turkey and Its Impact on Turkish Foreign Policy

Author:
Mitat Çelikpala
Publication Date:
03-2005
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Abstract:
The concept of diaspora, which was incorporated into the literature on politics in the 1960s, has become a significant notion in current international politics. This study aims to present a theoretical assessment of the diaspora concept, followed by the organisation and the evolution of the Caucasian diaspora(s) in Turkey, which include Armenians, Azeris, Georgians and other North Caucasian peoples. It discusses their transformations from emigrants to diaspora, their views regarding each other as well as the changes that took place within these groups after the collapse of the Soviet Union which had a dramatic impact on their relations with their homelands. The second part of this study shifts the emphasis to the recent developments in Abkhazia and Chechnya, and to the activities and increasing influence of the diaspora over Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the political leaders in Turkey.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Development, Migration, and Politics
Political Geography:
Turkey, Chechnya, Armenia, Georgia, and Abkhazia

3004. Measuring the Economic Impact of an EU–GCC Free Trade Agreement

Author:
David Kernohan and Dean A. DeRosa
Publication Date:
07-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
Economic growth rates in the Gulf region have languished in recent years and need to be raised to accommodate the rapidly growing populations and social aspirations of the region. Using a simple model of world trade, this report investigates the economic impacts of the new customs union of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and the proposed free trade agreement (FTA) between the GCC and European Union. The quantitative results suggest that the new customs union and proposed EU-GCC free trade agreement both appreciably expand trade and improve economic welfare in the GCC countries, with little significant economic impact on the EU. As expected, the FTA results in larger GCC economic gains than the customs union because it affords GCC consumers greater opportunity to enjoy imports at internationally competitive prices. Although welfare gains under the proposed FTA closely approximate those under open regionalism (concerted trade liberalisation on a most favoured nation basis), reducing the 5% GCC common external tariff to about 3% as part of the FTA negotiations would not only ensure near-maximum trade performance and welfare gains but also add further to the attractiveness of the GCC countries as a location for foreign direct investment.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Treaties and Agreements, and Population
Political Geography:
Europe

3005. Why Is There a Productivity Problem in the EU?

Author:
Francesco Daveri
Publication Date:
07-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
Magazines and newspapers often refer to or even take for granted the economic decline of the EU, particularly when contrasting the EU data with US data. The first part of this paper poses the question of whether IT – as often alleged – is really the only cause for the EU's productivity slowdown. The conclusion is that it is not. The non-IT part of the economy has not only contributed to the slowdown but appears to have crucially contributed to the EU-US growth gap as well. There is thus little reason for the EU to target IT-diffusion as an intermediate goal, as implied by the Lisbon strategy. The second part of the paper, after showing that the growth slowdown comes from the reduction of non-IT capital deepening and the lack of acceleration in total factor productivity growth, argues that the slowdown of capital deepening will continue. The scarce resources available for enhancing growth should concentrate on providing incentives to R and innovation at large, rather than financing traditional infrastructures. This is at odds with the goals pursued by the EU within the framework of the European Growth Initiative.
Topic:
Development, Economics, and Treaties and Agreements
Political Geography:
Europe

3006. The challenge of United Nations reform

Author:
Christian Reus-Sumit, Marianne Hanson, Hilary Charlesworth, and William Maley
Publication Date:
11-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
The first half of the twentieth century saw multiple crises in the expanding international system, characterised most tragically and dramatically by two world wars, the Great Depression, and the Holocaust. In response, the international community engaged in history's most ambitious program of international institution building, a program that centred on the creation of the United Nations, the Bretton Woods institutions, and a plethora of functional regimes governing everything from arms control to the prohibition of genocide. Despite the impediments imposed by four decades of Cold War, these institutions have evolved into a complex global architecture of institutions which can claim partial yet significant credit for the decline in traditional interstate warfare, the containment of nuclear proliferation to a handful of states, management of the world economy, and the prosecution of an ever more comprehensive humanitarian agenda.
Topic:
Security, Development, Economics, and United Nations

3007. Whose Oceania? Contending Visions of Community in Pacific Region-building

Author:
Greg Fry
Publication Date:
10-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
In the past year the 'war against terror' and perceptions of state failure within the post-colonial Pacific have sparked an Australian-led initiative to deepen and widen regional integration in Oceania. This paper argues that behind the seeming unanimity of the 2004 Auckland Declaration and agreement by Pacific Islands Forum leaders on a 'Pacific vision' and a 'Pacific plan' are several contending visions of regional community, and of community-building. The political and moral legitimacy of each vision depends significantly on how these visions answer the question of who is Oceania for, and who has the right to speak for it? The seemingly dominant vision (that of the Australian government) is problematic in this regard. Past practice of Pacific region-building suggests that it may therefore not receive the legitimacy it requires for sustainability. This therefore is in danger of producing an unintended consequence: the replication at a regional level of the legitimacy problem associated with the so-called failing state.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Australia/Pacific

3008. Rentier Shifts, Legitimacy, and the Social Sources of International Financial Hegemonie

Author:
Leonard Seabrooke
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
This paper provides an analysis of the domestic legitimation of 'financial reform nexuses' during two periods of English and US international financial hegemony. Following Max Weber's work on the state and finance, I argue that positive state intervention is required to legitimise a 'financial reform nexus' (the interrelation of credit, property, and tax politics) for people on below median income. I hypothesise that sufficient legitimation of a financial reform nexus provides the means to generate and sustain international financial hegemony, including the capacity to tailor the structure of the international financial order to suit the hegemon's interests. Conversely, if the hegemon is unable to sustain the legitimation of its domestic financial reform nexus-a choice that correlates with negative state intervention that supports a 'rentier shift'-its capacity to maintain international financial hegemony wanes. I draw from examples of the legitimation of financial reform nexuses in England (1900-15) and the US (1985-2000), linking domestic legitimation to consequent changes in the structure of the international financial order. Through this analysis of the social sources of English and US international financial hegemonies, I differentiate the English 'international rentier economy' from the US 'international creditor economy'. Finally, I stress the importance of positive state intervention for the legitimation of the US financial reform nexus.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Government, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
England

3009. International Relations' First Great Debate: Context and Tradition

Author:
Darshan Vigneswaran and Joel Quirk
Publication Date:
08-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
According to International Relations (IR) orthodoxy, the story of three Great Debates accounts for the most important theoretical developments in the discipline. Over the last decade, critical historiographers have established that the story of a First Debate, which tells of a struggle between idealism and realism between the 1920s and 1940s, is a misleading caricature of early academic international thought. This article adds to this critical literature by tracing the manner in which the story of a First Debate became a part of disciplinary orthodoxy between the 1950s and 1980s. Our analysis reveals that a myth of a First Debate was produced when more recent scholars detached the concept of a struggle between idealism and realism from both the unique historical milieu in which this dichotomy was conceived, and the rhetorical purposes for which it was employed. We use these findings to make the case for a contextual approach to disciplinary historiography, and to illuminate the historical contingency of contemporary notions of scholarly purpose in IR.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, and Education

3010. Protect or Neglect? Toward a More Effective United Nations Approach to the Protection of Internally Displaced Persons

Author:
Simon Bagshaw and Diane Paul
Publication Date:
11-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
In theory it seems quite straightforward. All United Nations humanitarian and development agencies have a role to play in ensuring respect for the human rights of persons who have become, or are at risk of becoming, displaced within the borders of their own country as a result of armed conflict and human rights violations.
Topic:
Development, Human Welfare, Third World, and United Nations