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841. Origins and Growth of the Software Industry in India

Author:
Rafiq Dossani
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
The paper explains the evolution of India's software industry. Domestic entrepreneurship emerges as the key factor for origination, survival and innovation in a hostile industrial policy environment. The maturing of the industry required a shift to a supportive government policy; maturation was also critically enabled by the modularization of the programming function through new technologies. These changes favored domestic firms that provided programming services. Later policy and technological changes induced transnational entry and led to higher value-added output. The paper shows that technologically sophisticated industries can develop even when many conditions typically present elsewhere are missing. We provide conditions under which this may happen and show their effect on subsequent developments.
Topic:
Industrial Policy and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
India and Asia

842. Information Technology and the New Global Economy: Tensions, Opportunities, and the Role of Public Policy

Author:
David Bollier
Publication Date:
03-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Aspen Institute
Abstract:
Changes in technology have been transforming commerce, politics, and culture for centuries. Yet it is now becoming clear that the explosion of the Internet and assorted digital technologies is provoking epochal changes in the global economy. Finance capital now roams the world with unprecedented speed. Transportation and logistics have become radically more efficient. Work readily moves to wherever it can be most skillfully and cheaply performed. Innovation and productivity are forging ahead, sometimes at blinding speeds.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Globalization, Government, and Science and Technology

843. The Importance of Politics to Nuclear New Build

Author:
Malcolm Grimston
Publication Date:
12-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Though difficult to model as accurately as, say, the effects of oil price or the influence of climate change on decision-making in energy, the stance of the political establishment, locally, nationally and internationally, towards a major technical-scientific issue such as nuclear energy can be enormously important.
Topic:
Civil Society, Climate Change, Environment, Nuclear Weapons, Politics, and Science and Technology

844. The Limits of Europeanization: Regulatory Reforms in the Spanish and Portuguese Telecommunications and Electricity Sectors

Author:
Jacint Jordana, David Levi-Faur, and Imma Puig
Publication Date:
07-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Research Papers Archive
Abstract:
The creation of an EU-level regulatory regimes for telecommunications and electricity was a highly successful political initiative of the European Commission. In promoting market liberalization for telecommunications (a key sector in the creation of the 'information economy') and electricity (one of the sectors most resistant to change) the European Commission asserted the political importance of European project. Indeed, the two new regimes are commonly cited as successful cases of 'Europeanization'. However, this paper argues that the causal link between European initiatives and national policy change is weak. Building on an emerging tradition of cross-sector research of these two sectors, and considering two most-similar European countries, the paper examines commonalities and variations in the regulatory reforms of telecommunications and electricity in Spain and Portugal in the last two decades. It applies a series of comparisons, including a stepwise comparative analysis of two countries (one a reluctant liberalizer, the other an enthusiastic one), of two sectors (a pace-setter and a foot-dragger) and of two time periods (before and after the regulatory reforms). We suggest that processes of Europeanization can impinge on the strategic capacities of European member states only to a limited degree. Spain and Portugal were able to shape their sectors according to the preferences of their national policy communities and in a context of a global shift in the way countries both within Europe and outside it defined their interests.
Topic:
International Cooperation, Politics, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
Europe, Spain, and Portugal

845. Lingering Shadows of World War II

Author:
Zia Mian
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Foreign Policy In Focus
Abstract:
Many events commemorating the 60th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War were held this past May. Yet there has been little or no discussion of some of the most important and enduring legacies of that war, legacies that have cast long shadows ever since. Nationalism, industrial production, the bureaucratic state, and science and technology were harnessed to the cause of war in terrible new ways. It brought us the gas chambers, the systematic bombing of cities, and nuclear weapons. These three forms of modern violence are different in some significant ways, but they shared important features. Among these were centralized authority, extensive compartmentalization of responsibilities, tasks, and knowledge accompanied by strong organizational loyalty, along with scientific rationalization for the policy and technical ways of distancing perpetrators from victims.
Topic:
Security, Development, Science and Technology, and War
Political Geography:
Germany

846. Is Cybersecurity a Public Good? Evidence from the Financial Services Industry

Author:
Benjamin Powell
Publication Date:
03-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Independent Institute
Abstract:
The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States heightened concerns about vulnerabilities to future attacks. One new area of concern is cyberterrorism: the possibility of terrorists using computers to attack our critical infrastructure electronically. The government has made efforts to better secure its own computer networks to prevent terrorists from hacking into computer systems in the Pentagon, FBI, and other government agencies. Increasingly, however, the government has been concerned that the private sector is vulnerable to cyberterrorism. The private sector owns approximately 85 percent of the critical infrastructure in the U.S. (Deloitte 2004 p. 15). There are concerns that a cyber attack on dams, trains, electrical grids, pipeline pumps, communications networks, or the financial services industry could cause significant physical or economic damage to the U.S. The policy question being asked is whether private businesses, when left to their own devices, provide enough cybersecurity or if some form of government involvement is justified.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, Industrial Policy, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
United States and United Nations

847. Public Sector Modernisation: The Way Forward

Publication Date:
11-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
Governments have made major changes to the way they manage the public sector in the past two decades, privatising commercial activities such as telephone services, cutting red tape and making government more transparent and responsive to citizens.
Topic:
Civil Society, Economics, Government, and Science and Technology

848. Solutions in Space

Publication Date:
10-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
Space, and man's relationship to it, has captured the human imagination for centuries. During the 20th century, dreams of space exploration became reality, and now dozens of countries, in particular in the OECD area, devote major resources to space programmes. But is this money well spent? Can we use space to find solutions to Earth's problems not available on the ground, or are we just pursuing high-priced star-filled dreams? Space technology may have brought us benefits from satellite telecommunications and their associated benefits such as telemedicine, but could we be doing more to exploit the link between space exploration and Earth application?
Topic:
Development, Economics, Environment, and Science and Technology

849. Intellectual property and competition policy in the biotechnology industry

Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
The science of biotechnology has been pushing the frontiers of human knowledge and intellectual property (“IP”) for three decades. As scientists developed techniques for isolating and creating genetic material and began to apply them commercially, a new industry grew and so did its appetite for patent protection. Although the wisdom of granting patents on DNA is still debated, the policy of OECD countries to allow such patents has been fairly well settled for some time. The door was therefore open for biotechnological innovators to create a flood of IP, and they did
Topic:
Economics, Environment, Industrial Policy, and Science and Technology

850. Public Sector Modernisation: Modernising Accountability and Control

Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
In the past two decades, new forms of public sector management, privatisation and new technologies have changed the way the public sector operates, but have also created a need for new ways of making both agencies and governments accountable for what they do. With an increasingly devolved public sector, ensuring conformity with government policy objectives, control of expenditure and monitoring of actual agency performance has become increasingly complex. At the same time, the changing relationship between government and the public sector has profoundly affected the traditional accountability of ministers to the legislature
Topic:
Development, Economics, Government, and Science and Technology