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241. No Longer Poor: Ghana's New Income Status and Implications of Graduation from IDA

Author:
Todd Moss and Stephanie Majerowicz
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
Ghana's largest and most important creditor for the past three decades has been the International Development Association (IDA), the soft loan window of the World Bank. That will soon come to an end. The combination of Ghana's rapid economic growth and the recent GDP rebasing exercise means that Ghana suddenly finds itself above the income limit for IDA eligibility. Formal graduation is imminent and comes with significant implications for access to concessional finance, debt, and relations with other creditors. This paper considers the specific questions related to Ghana's relationship with the World Bank, as well as the broader questions about the country's new middle-income status.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Poverty, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
Africa

242. In Search of the Global Middle Class: A New Index

Author:
Uri Dadush and Shimelse Ali
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The swelling middle class in emerging economies has received much attention in recent years, as it well should. The implications of its rise are far-reaching, from expanding economic opportunity to transforming the political landscape in some of the world's most populous countries. Measuring the middle class, however, is no easy task. There is no widely accepted definition of what constitutes the middle class, and the commonly used income-based measures suffer from a number of deficiencies.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, Political Economy, Poverty, and Social Stratification

243. Global food security index 2012

Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Global food prices rose twice as fast as inflation in the last decade, impoverishing millions at a time when poverty relief captured the world's attention. Huge price swings for wheat, maize, soybeans and rice—staple crops for much of the world—made matters worse, disrupting markets and harming both producers and consumers. The food riots that swept more than two dozen countries in 2008 and 2011 were the most visible effect of these trends, but they also point to a deeper and more lasting concern: chronic food insecurity.
Topic:
Agriculture, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, Poverty, and Food

244. Outreach, Impact, Collaboration: Why Academics Should Join to Stand Against Poverty

Author:
Luis Cabrera and Thomas Pogge
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
It is a typical late afternoon in the Timarpur neighborhood, lying just across the Mahatma Gandhi Marg ring road from the University of Delhi North Campus. Families gather outside one- and two-room brick living quarters, many of which have only a single draped cloth serving as the front wall. Other homes are made of found materials: cloth or plastic bound over slim wooden poles; a mishmash of blankets, boards, and corrugated metal for walls; metal or blue plastic tarpaulins weighted against the wind with stones and bricks for roofs. A boy of perhaps four fills a bucket at the single communal tap serving a dozen families and wobbles up a set of stairs, sloshing out water with each step. Another child, younger, plays quietly beside a woman sleeping on the pavement under a shelter of plastic and burlap bags
Topic:
Poverty
Political Geography:
New Delhi

245. Global Poverty and the Limits of Academic Expertise

Author:
Onora O'Neill
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
Academics are not a natural kind. They have varied expertise and aims, and most have no expertise that is particularly relevant to problems of poverty and development. This presumably is why the essay in this issue by Thomas Pogge and Louis Cabrera-a virtual "manifesto" of the newly formed Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP)-shifts to and fro between addressing "academics" and addressing "poverty-focused academics." Even those academics whose work touches on poverty and development-a quite small minority-are mostly expert in some but not in other aspects of these topics. Some are expert in international law, but not in economics; others know about international trade, but not about aid; some study corruption, but know nothing about nutrition-and so on. A few know a lot about normative argument, but their credentials are sketchy when it comes to empirical evidence. Many more are interested in empirical evidence, usually of a specific sort, but are uncritical of or confused about normative argument. (I suspect that many suffer from a lingering positivist hangover, which suggests that there is no intellectually respectable way to support normative claims, and indeed that this fear may lie behind the appeals to the importance of academic neutrality that Pogge and Cabrera discuss.)
Topic:
Development and Poverty

246. Addressing Poverty and Climate Change: The Varieties of Social Engagement

Author:
Simon Caney
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
The world is marked by very great poverty and inequality. The lives of many of our fellow inhabitants of this planet are blighted by malnutrition, disease, and destitution. Yet mass suffering is often met by casual indifference or acceptance, and sometimes even by active support of the status quo. While tragedies occur elsewhere in the world, the vast majority of us continue in our daily tasks and, in the words of W. H. Auden, turn away " quite leisurely from the disaster. " It is in response to this reality that Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP) asks: What, in light of mass poverty, are the responsibilities of academics?
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa

247. Navigating Between Extremes: Academics Helping to Eradicate Global Poverty

Author:
Roger C. Riddell
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
Academics have been involved in development and poverty issues in poor countries since at least the 1940s. Most academics and practitioners who work professionally in the world of development engage in the ! eld not as dispassionate observers but with the explicit intention of trying to rid the world of extreme poverty. But we are now witnessing something new. For a number of years, a small band of academics from other fields, perhaps most notably from the disciplines of ethics and political and moral philosophy, have been interested in and have tried to promote a wider interest in " development ethics. " More recently, their numbers have been swelled by an ever-larger group of academics from these disciplines who are convinced of the moral obligation to respond to the problem of world poverty and are driven by the need to do more. The engagement of any individual or group concerned with quickening the end of extreme poverty is clearly both welcome and encouraging. However, before moving too quickly to promote new attempts to eradicate poverty, it is necessary to examine carefully the work that academics and development professionals have done and are currently doing in this area, the way that this work has been and is being used by policy-makers, and how these same academics understand and analyze the impact of their work, including their understanding of why they have not been more successful. The purpose of this article is to contribute to the debate and discussion about how concerned academics and individuals might add particular value to the work already being done.
Topic:
Poverty
Political Geography:
South Asia

248. Beyond Charity: Helping NGOs Lead a Transformative New Public Discourse on Global Poverty and Social Justice

Author:
Martin Kirk
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
This article looks at the role that Northern nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) can play in engaging domestic publics in efforts to eradicate mass global poverty. In doing so, it makes two assumptions about this relationship that are important to outline. First, it is assumed that what the public in Northern countries think or understand about mass global poverty is a relevant factor in alleviating or overcoming it. In other words, it is important that people in Ohio or the Scottish Highlands understand why, for example, a billion people live in absolute poverty in a world that has the physical resources to provide for all of humanity's basic needs. As long as Northern states dominate the G7, the G8, and the Bretton Woods institutions; dictate many of the terms of international trade; and consume far more than an equitable share of global resources, the social norms of these countries will directly inform global efforts against mass poverty. Further, the idea that the fight against mass global poverty is the job only of politicians and business leaders, and that the attitudes of the general public are not at all instrumental in or relevant to their decision-making, is clearly untenable. Indeed, public support for the policies that would bring transformational change is essential. As Paul Collier writes in The Bottom Billion , "Without an informed electorate, politicians will continue to use the bottom billion merely for photo opportunities, rather than promoting real transformation"
Topic:
Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa

249. How Academics Can Help People Make Better Decisions Concerning Global Poverty

Author:
Keith Horton
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
As other contributions to this special issue amply demonstrate, there is a variety of ways in which academics could have a greater impact on global poverty than they do today. In this essay I focus on just one of those ways: by doing more to help people make wise decisions about issues relevant to such poverty. Many different groups of people have to make such decisions, including those who work for certain international organizations, policy-makers and government employees of various kinds, and the global poor themselves. Many of those decisions involve difficult issues that academics generally have more time and other resources than others to study. If academics conduct the right kind of research on those issues, then, and share what they have learned with the relevant decision-makers in accessible ways, those decision-makers should be able to make better decisions. And this in turn should have a positive impact on global poverty. Moreover, given that doing so would only require academics to perform activities that are already taken to be a standard part of their role — conducting research and disseminating what they have learned — this seems one of the most straightforward and least controversial ways in which academics could have a greater impact on global poverty.
Topic:
Poverty
Political Geography:
United States and United Kingdom

250. Bridging the Gap? The New Philanthropy in India

Author:
Karl F. Inderfurth and Persis Khambatta
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Standard Poor's recently cut its outlook on India's investment rating from stable to negative. The decision was met with shock from India's Ministry of Finance, but it echoed a sentiment currently running through policy discussions about India—that investors and policymakers in and outside of India are looking at the central government with disbelief and disappointment over the stalling of further economic reforms.
Topic:
Security, Development, Economics, Poverty, and Food
Political Geography:
South Asia and India