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61. Ukraine and the IMF's Evolving Debt Crisis Narrative

Author:
Susan Schadler
Publication Date:
11-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI)
Abstract:
Against the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) fraught experience with crises where debt restructuring is needed, Ukraine’s recent restructuring agreement has been a success. Several factors — in particular, Ukraine’s geopolitical position and the composition of its creditors — facilitated official support for the deal. As these are unlikely to be replicated in future debt crises, the IMF still needs a revamping of its policies and approach in crises requiring debt restructuring. This policy brief examines a number of key challenges in the evolution of a coherent role for the IMF in future crises.
Topic:
Debt, Political Economy, International Monetary Fund, Financial Crisis, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Ukraine

62. Strategic Insights: Economic Power: Time to Double Down

Author:
Professor John F. Troxell
Publication Date:
09-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College
Abstract:
A recent editorial in The New York Times asked the question, “Who threatens America most?” It proceeded to compare recent pronouncements by incoming senior military leaders, the President, the FBI director, and finally the Director of National Intelligence. The major candidates included the usual nation states (Russia, North Korea, and China), a few nonstate terrorist organizations (ISIS and al-Qaeda), and a couple of unattributed capabilities (weapons of mass destruction and cyberattacks). The editorial concluded with the lament: “If officials cannot agree on what the most pressing threats are, how can they develop the right strategies and properly allocate resources?”1 Given the confusion and uncertainty generated by the current strategic environment, compounded by America’s resource-driven retrenchment, it is a fair question. However, I contend that we could pursue a more focused national strategy and do a better job of allocating resources if we focus on the opportunities as opposed to this wide array of threats. The opportunity that beckons is the increasingly interconnected global economy and the integral role played by the United States in both its institutional design and future evolution. A functioning, interconnected global economy will mitigate most, if not all, of the previously mentioned threats, whereas a fractured and disconnected global economy will exacerbate them.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Security, Economics, Governance, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Global Focus and United States of America

63. China’s Rise and Reconfiguration of Central Asia’s Geopolitics: A Case for U.S. "Pivot" to Eurasia

Author:
Roman Muzalevsky
Publication Date:
07-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College
Abstract:
China’s emergence as a global actor has questioned the position of the United States as the strongest power and the future of the Washington-led global order. To achieve the status of a truly global player wielding influence in all dimensions of power would require China to leverage its regional influence in Central Asia. This region is increasingly representing China’s western leg of economic expansion and development, and is of a growing strategic importance for Beijing. It is also a region that should be of greater strategic importance to Washington, which seeks to preserve its leading position in the international system and ensure China’s peaceful integration in the global political, security, and economic architecture.
Topic:
Economics, International Cooperation, International Trade and Finance, Hegemony, Global Markets, and Global Security
Political Geography:
China, Eurasia, and Asia

64. Where Will Work Come from in the Era of the Cloud and Big Data?

Author:
John Zysman and Martin Kenney
Publication Date:
01-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Will the digital revolution, and its current manifestation in Cloud computing and platform-based work, inexorably lead to the elimination of jobs and work due to automation. Are new opportunities for work opening? Should we be thinking in terms of conventional work or is value creation the key? Certainly, nearly all firms are experiencing intense competition leading to commoditization based principally upon price. In the first section of this paper, we explore the pathways opened as cloud computing, transforms the way both goods and services are innovated, produced, and distributed. Production now has two aspects; classically understood manufacturing and ICT-enabled services, activities and virtual goods, both of which can be transformed to escape a commodity trap. As firms in advanced countries seek to sustain advantage in global markets, their efforts alter not only the terms of competition, but the character of work. The second section speculates upon the ways in which the cloud, as a platform, is transforming the nature of work, jobs, and employment. The emergence of cloud-based platforms such as, Airbnb, the Apple app store, Github, Google, LinkedIn, and Uber is redefining the forms and nature of value creation. Paradoxically, given that Google monetizes peoples’ searches, Facebook and LinkedIn monetize posts, Github monetizes open source software creation, and App stores monetize software creations, it is also possible to argue that more value than ever is being created, even while traditional notions of employment are being challenged. This suggests that as a consequence of the implementation of cloud-based strategies; an entirely new category of work organization, which we term, the “Platform Economy” is emerging.
Topic:
Science and Technology, Communications, Labor Issues, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Global Focus

65. Awaiting the Second Big Data Revolution

Author:
Mark Huberty
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
“Big data” has been heralded as the agent of a third industrial revolution–one with raw materials measured in bits, rather than tons of steel or barrels of oil. Yet the industrial revolution transformed not just how firms made things, but the fundamental approach to value creation in industrial economies. To date, big data has not achieved this distinction. Instead, today’s successful big data business models largely use data to scale old modes of value creation, rather than invent new ones altogether. Moreover, today’s big data cannot deliver the promised revolution. In this way, today’s big data landscape resembles the early phases of the first industrial revolution, rather than the culmination of the second a century later. Realizing the second big data revolution will require fundamentally different kinds of data, different innovations, and different business models than those seen to date. That fact has profound consequences for the kinds of investments and innovations firms must seek, and the economic, political, and social consequences that those innovations portend.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Science and Technology, Communications, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Global Focus

66. Awaiting the Second Big Data Revolution

Author:
Mark Huberty
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
“Big data” has been heralded as the agent of a third industrial revolution–one with raw materials measured in bits, rather than tons of steel or barrels of oil. Yet the industrial revolution transformed not just how firms made things, but the fundamental approach to value creation in industrial economies. To date, big data has not achieved this distinction. Instead, today’s successful big data business models largely use data to scale old modes of value creation, rather than invent new ones altogether. Moreover, today’s big data cannot deliver the promised revolution. In this way, today’s big data landscape resembles the early phases of the first industrial revolution, rather than the culmination of the second a century later. Realizing the second big data revolution will require fundamentally different kinds of data, different innovations, and different business models than those seen to date. That fact has profound consequences for the kinds of investments and innovations firms must seek, and the economic, political, and social consequences that those innovations portend.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Science and Technology, Communications, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Global Focus

67. The Tradability of Services: Geographic Concentration and Trade Costs

Author:
Antoine Gervais
Publication Date:
08-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE)
Abstract:
To date, empirical studies have focused almost exclusively on the trade exposure of the manufacturing sector, implicitly assuming that services are not tradable. However, because service trade has grown over time and now accounts for about 20 percent of global international transactions (and 30 percent of US exports), the traditional assumption that goods are tradable and services are not is increasingly inadequate. Gervais and Jensen use a unique dataset on the distribution of producers and consumers across regions of the United States to estimate the share of economic activity exposed to international competition. Their estimation method is a natural extension of the gravity model of trade and identifies trade costs in the absence of trade data. The estimated trade costs are higher on average for service industries, but there is considerable variation across industries within sectors. Using the trade cost estimates, they classify industries into tradable and nontradable categories. They find that accounting for tradable service industries nearly doubles the international exposure of the US economy, tradable services value added is unevenly distributed across geographical regions, labor productivity and wages are higher on average for tradable industries, and potential welfare gains from trade liberalization in the service sector are sizable.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Labor Issues, and Global Markets
Political Geography:
Global Focus

68. Capital Flight: Measurement and Drivers

Author:
Léonce Ndikumana, James K. Boyce, and Ameth Saloum Ndiaye
Publication Date:
09-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
African Economic Research Consortium (AERC)
Abstract:
This paper describes the nature of capital flight, the methodologies used to measure it, and its drivers. The paper presents updated estimates of the magnitude of capital flight from 39 African countries for which adequate data are available for the period 1970-2010. It gives a global context of the problem of capital flight from Africa by providing comparative indicators on capital flight and related flows for other developing regions. The paper undertakes a detailed econometric analysis of the drivers of capital flight from African countries. It explores empirically the role of domestic and external factors in driving capital flight, including structural factors, the macroeconomic environment, governance, risk and returns to investment, capital account openness, and financial development. The first objective of the study is to contribute to the literature by providing the most comprehensive analysis of capital flight from Africa that takes into account economic as well as non-economic dimensions, and recognizes the importance of both the domestic and global contexts. The second objective is to contribute to the policy debate on capital flight both in Africa and globally.
Topic:
Economics, International Political Economy, International Affairs, Global Markets, Global Political Economy, and Capital Flight
Political Geography:
Africa and Global Focus

69. Macroeconomic Impact of Capital Flight in Sub-Saharan Africa

Author:
John Weeks
Publication Date:
09-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
African Economic Research Consortium (AERC)
Abstract:
This paper assesses the impact of capital flight on growth in thirty-one sub-Saharan African countries. It first considers the “macro fundamentals” hypothesis that capital flight would be lower in a country whose government adhered to “sound” macroeconomic policies. Analytical considerations fail to support this hypothesis. Second, it develops a growth estimating equation derived from the Harrod-Domar framework. The growth estimations support the conclusion that capital flight had a major impact on growth over the last three decades, 1980–2010. The negative impact was greatest for the petroleum-exporting countries and those affected by internal conflict, but it was also substantial for the other countries, with a few exceptions.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Global Markets, Economic Growth, Economic Policy, Macroeconomics, and Capital Flight
Political Geography:
Africa, Sudan, Nigeria, Angola, Chad, Cameroon, Global Focus, Gabon, and Republic of Congo

70. Reinsurance in Brazil: the challenges and opportunities of the opening of the market

Author:
Claudio Contador
Publication Date:
07-2014
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Brazilian Center for International Relations (CEBRI)
Abstract:
The opening of the reinsurance market in Brazil finally took place in 2007, amidst euphoria and great expectations. The process lasted nearly two decades, with little movement, to the great frustration of the companies, international investors and, especially, the domestic insurance market, which was in need of modernization and less government involvement. The exhaustion of the nationalized reinsurance model created in 1939 was evident by the 1990s and became even more visible in that decade, in the face of opportunities for insurance offered by the large investments in infrastructure, and rural, environmental and disaster insurance, among others.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Global Markets, Financial Markets, and Global Political Economy
Political Geography:
Brazil and Global Focus