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1342. Continental Shift: New Trends in Private U.S. Funding for Media Development
- Author:
- Anne Nelson
- Publication Date:
- 12-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- National Endowment for Democracy
- Abstract:
- The field of private sector funding of independent media abroad has continued to undergo a massive upheaval over the past two years. Two major factors have driven the change. The first is economic: The 2008 recession sharply reduced the portfolios of most traditional foundations and media philanthropies, many of them by 20-30 percent. They were still recovering when the aftershock of 2011 struck. These institutions, many of them based on the East Coast, had formerly led the way in funding international media development activities, with an emphasis on journalism training and support for freedom of expression. Now they are in a period of retrenchment, struggling to maintain existing commitments and with few resources to pursue new initiatives.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, Communications, Mass Media, Foreign Aid, and Financial Crisis
- Political Geography:
- United States
1343. The Dying Bear
- Author:
- Nicholas Eberstadt
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- December marks the 20th anniversary of the end of the Soviet dictatorship and the beginning of Russia's postcommunist transition. For Russians, the intervening years have been full of elation and promise but also unexpected trouble and disappointment. Perhaps of all the painful developments in Russian society since the Soviet collapse, the most surprising -- and dismaying -- is the country's demographic decline. Over the past two decades, Russia has been caught in the grip of a devastating and highly anomalous peacetime population crisis. The country's population has been shrinking, its mortality levels are nothing short of catastrophic, and its human resources appear to be dangerously eroding. Indeed, the troubles caused by Russia's population trends -- in health, education, family formation, and other spheres -- represent a previously unprecedented phenomenon for an urbanized, literate society not at war. Such demographic problems are far outside the norm for both developed and less developed countries today; what is more, their causes are not entirely understood. There is also little evidence that Russia's political leadership has been able to enact policies that have any long-term hope of correcting this slide. This peacetime population crisis threatens Russia's economic outlook, its ambitions to modernize and develop, and quite possibly its security. In other words, Russia's demographic travails have terrible and outsized implications, both for those inside the country's borders and for those beyond. The humanitarian toll has already been immense, and the continuing economic cost threatens to be huge; no less important, Russia's demographic decline portends ominously for the external behavior of the Kremlin, which will have to confront a far less favorable power balance than it had been banking on.
- Topic:
- Development
- Political Geography:
- Russia and Soviet Union
1344. The Leadership Secrets of Bismarck
- Author:
- Michael Bernhard
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- China is hardly the first great power to make authoritarian development look attractive. As Jonathan Steinberg's new biography of Bismarck shows, Wilhelmine Germany did it with ease. But can even successful nondemocratic political systems thrive and evolve peacefully over the long run? The answer depends on whether authoritarian elites can tolerate sharing power.
- Topic:
- Development and Politics
- Political Geography:
- China, Germany, and Peru
1345. Africa Unleashed
- Author:
- Edward Miguel
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- Steven Radelet's accessible new book argues that much of the credit for Africa's recent economic boom goes to its increasingly open political systems. But Radelet fails to answer the deeper question: why some countries have managed to develop successful democracies while others have tried but failed.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Government
- Political Geography:
- Africa, United States, Asia, and Liberia
1346. An Evaluation of Overseas Oil Investment Projects Under Uncertainty Using a Real Options Based Simulation Model
- Author:
- ZhongXiang Zhang, Lei Zhu, and Ying Fan
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- This paper applies real options theory to establish an overseas oil investment evaluation model that is based on Monte Carlo simulation and is solved by the Least Squares Monte-Carlo method. To better reflect the reality of overseas oil investment, the model has incorporated not only the uncertainties of oil price and investment cost but also the uncertainties of exchange rate and investment environment. These unique features have enabled the model to be best equipped to evaluate the value of oil overseas investment projects of three oil field sizes (large, medium, small) and under different resource tax systems (royalty tax and production sharing contracts). In the empirical setting, China was selected as an investor country and Indonesia as an investee country as a case study. The results show that the investment risks and project values of small sized oil fields are more sensitive to changes in the uncertainty factors than the large and medium sized oil fields. Furthermore, among the uncertainty factors considered in the model, the investment risk of overseas oil investment may be underestimated if no consideration is given of the impacts of exchange rate and investment environment. Finally, as there is an important tradeoff between oil resource investee country and overseas oil investor, in medium and small sized oil investment negotiation the oil company should try to increase the cost oil limit in production sharing contract and avoid the term of a windfall profits tax to reduce the investment risk of overseas oil fields.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, Energy Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Oil
- Political Geography:
- China, Indonesia, and Israel
1347. Korea's Growth Performance: Past and Future
- Author:
- Marcus Noland
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- South Korea is arguably the premier development success story of the last half century. For 47 years starting in 1963, the economy averaged 7 percent real growth annually, and experienced only two years of economic contraction: 1980 after the second oil shock and the assassination of President Park Chung-hee, and 1998 at the nadir of the Asian financial crisis. At the start of that period South Korea had a per capita income lower than that of Mozambique or Bolivia; today it is richer than Spain or New Zealand, and was the first Asian and first non-G7 country to host a summit of the G20, the unofficial steering committee of the world economy.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, Economics, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Political Economy
- Political Geography:
- Israel, Asia, South Korea, Spain, Mozambique, New Zealand, and Bolivia
1348. Rent(s) Asunder: Sectoral Rent Extraction Possibilities and Bribery by Multinational Corporations
- Author:
- Nathan Jensen, Edmund Malesky, and Dimitar Gueorgiev
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- We argue that openness to foreign investment can have differential effects on corruption, even within the same country and under the exact same domestic institutions over time. Our theoretical approach departs from standard political economy by attributing corruption motives to firms as well as officials. Rather than interpreting bribes solely as a coercive “tax” imposed on business activities, we allow for the possibility that firms may be complicit in using bribes to enter protected sectors. Thus, we expect variation in bribe propensity across sectors according to expected profitability which we proxy with investment restrictions. Specifically, we argue that foreign investment will not be associated with corruption in sectors with fewer restrictions and more competition, but will increase dramatically as firms seek to enter restricted and uncompetitive sectors that offer higher rents. We test this effect using a list experiment, a technique drawn from applied psychology, embedded in a nationally representative survey of 10,000 foreign and domestic businesses in Vietnam. Our findings show that the impact of domestic reforms and economic openness on corruption is conditional on polices that restrict competition by limiting entry into the sector.
- Topic:
- Development, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, Political Economy, and Foreign Direct Investment
- Political Geography:
- Israel and Vietnam
1349. Attitudes to Chronic Poverty in the "Global Village"
- Author:
- Armando Barrientos and Daniel Neff
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- German Institute of Global and Area Studies
- Abstract:
- The paper explores attitudes to chronic poverty in a cross ‐ section of developed and developing countries based on data from the World Values Survey Wave Three (1994 ‐ 1998). The analysis finds a consistent belief among a majority of respondents that poverty is chronic. This paper also explores the factors that influence public attitudes to chronic poverty and finds that interests, position, knowledge, and shared values relating to social justice are important.
- Topic:
- Development, Poverty, Third World, and Social Stratification
1350. Inside an Embassy: Perspectives from a U.S. Ambassador
- Author:
- James Jeffrey
- Publication Date:
- 09-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Institution:
- Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract:
- James Jeffrey talks about his experiences as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq and Turkey, as well as the U.S. missions in these countries, Turkey, and the European Union, progress and development in Iraq, and relations among countries in the region.
- Topic:
- Development
- Political Geography:
- United States, Iraq, Europe, and Turkey