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June 1997 National patterns of technology diffusion found in country estimates probably reflect sectoral variations more than country variations. They also reflect different degrees of internationalization. Recently, interest in regionalism has mushroomed, and economists have analyzed it not only from the viewpoint of trade but that of foreign investment, macroeconomics, and political economy. But questions of technological regionalism-whether the accumulation and diffusion of technology has a regional dimension-have been considered only marginally and indirectly. Padoan offers an exploratory analysis of the regional dimension of technology and diffusion, examining both country and sectoral ...
Theatre of the Rule of Law presents a sustained critique of global rule of law promotion - an expansive industry at the heart of international development, post-conflict reconstruction and security policy today. While successful in articulating and disseminating an effective global public policy, rule of law promotion has largely failed in its stated objectives of raising countries out of poverty and taming violent conflict. Furthermore, in its execution, this work deviates sharply from 'the rule of law' as commonly conceived. To explain this, Stephen Humphreys draws on the history of the rule of law as a concept, examples of legal export during colonial times, and a spectrum of contemporary interventions by development agencies and international organisations. Rule of law promotion is shown to be a kind of theatre, the staging of a morality tale about the good life, intended for edification and emulation, but blind to its own internal contradictions.
August 1997 This paper explores a world in which regional trade agreements help reduce security tensions between neighbors. Regional integration agreements (RIAs) are examples of second best and have an ambiguous impact on welfare, contend Schiff and Winters. They build a model in which RIAs unambiguously raise welfare by correcting for externalities. It assumes that trade between neighboring countries increases trust between them and reduces the likelihood of conflict. The optimum intervention in that case is a subsidy on imports from the neighbor. The authors show that an equivalent solution is for the neighboring countries to tax imports from the rest of the world- is, to form an RIA- wit...
Printed on Demand. Limited stock is held for this title. If you would like to order 30 copies or more please contact books@worldbank.org Contact books@worldbank.org, if currently unavailable. Globalization has increased competitive pressures on firms. Together with rapid technological change, it has altered the environment in which firms operate. While globalization offers unprecedented opportunities for firms to act successfully, it simultaneously heightens the risks for firms lagging behind. In an open and liberalized world, increasing firm competitiveness has become a major challenge. This volume provides a thorough analysis of the competitiveness of firms in the Middle East and North Afr...
November 1997 This model predicts that without cooperative infrastructure agreements between countries, there will be underinvestment in those forms of infrastructure in which the investments will have spillover effects to other countries. For a relatively small country, for example, there would tend to be more underinvestment in railroad and highway infrastructure to neighboring countries than there would be in airport and harbor infrastructure (carrying goods to the whole world). Bond examines whether trade liberalization should create a greater incentive for countries to invest in transportation infrastructure. He pays special attention to the case of preferential trade liberalization bet...
November 1997 Regional trade agreements among small countries may have negative welfare implications for nearby countries excluded from the agreement--but they sometimes benefit from being excluded. Standard theory says that a country's welfare is unaffected by being excluded from a small regional trade agreement. But for most products, small countries and regional trade agreements do have some measure of market power. Such market power can arise if (1) supply is geographically concentrated; (2) tastes differ; (3) there is product differentiation (such as quality); (4) transport costs are high; (5) the principal importing countries impose quantitative restrictions; and (6) there is hysterisi...