Monetary
Union Stability: The need for a government
banker and the case for a European public
finance authority |
| Thomas
I. Palley |
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There
is accumulating evidence that the euro's
current architecture is unstable. The
source of instability is high interest
rates on highly indebted countries which
creates unsustainable debt burdens. Remedying
this problem requires a central bank that
acts as government banker and pushes down
government bond interest rates to sustainable
levels. That can be accomplished by the
creation of a European Public Finance
Authority (EPFA) that issues public debt
which the European Central Bank (ECB)
is allowed to trade.
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| Modernizing
Russia: Round III. Russia and the Other
BRIC Countries: Forging ahead, catching
up or falling behind? |
| Erik
S. Reinert and Rainer Kattel |
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| Looking
at Russian economic dynamics through evolutionary
and Schumpeterian Other Canon lenses, the
authors provide alternative explanation
as to why Russia is still lagging behind
other BRIC and leading catching-up economies.
In this context they argue that learning
from successful cases of managing industrial
policy under the WTO – what the rest of
the BRIC economies have long been doing
– is perhaps the main issue for Russia's
economic policy-making in the near future. |
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| Rethinking
Investment Provisions in Free Trade Agreements |
| Smitha
Francis |
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| Developing
country governments are increasingly resorting
to comprehensive trade agreements involving
profound commitments in public policy, which
have wide-ranging adverse consequences on
food security, industrial development, financial
stability, etc. This paper analyses investment
disciplines in FTAs in order to come to
an understanding of their overall impact
on a developing country FTA partner's policy
space, and therefore, on its development
prospects. It is argued that given the links
between trade and investment commitments
within and across different FTAs, South-South
FTAs have become as problematic as North-South
FTAs. |
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| Development
Banks: Their role and importance for development |
| C.P.
Chandrasekhar |
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| The
role of development banks in the development
trajectories of late industrialising, developing
countries cannot be overemphasised. However,
with financial liberalisation of the neoliberal
variety transforming financial structures,
some countries are doing away with specialised
development banking institutions on the
grounds that equity and bond markets would
do the job. This is bound to lead to a shortfall
in finance for long-term investments, especially
for medium and small enterprises. |
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| Evolution
Versus Equilibrium |
| Jan
Kregel |
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| Post
Keynesian economists have followed Joan
Robinson's criticism of general equilibrium
theory as abolishing history by allowing
all contracts to be executed today for all
future contingencies. This was the justification
for the support of financial innovation
to provide for the completeness of futures
markets. The recent crisis has shown that
force of history. Instead, many evolutionary
and Keynesian economists have suggested
the approach of cumulative causation as
an approach that includes history and eschews
equilibrium. This approach may provide a
way to take history seriously in economic
analysis. |
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| Coordination
of Innovation Policies in the Catching-up
Context: A historical perspective on Estonia
and Brazil |
| Erkki
Karo and Rainer Kattel |
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| This
paper highlights some of the crucial weaknesses
of innovation policy-research that limit
the relevance of this research for policy-making
practices in catching-up countries. The
authors propose a framework that takes a
multi-level and dynamic approach towards
studying innovation-policy-making processes.
Applying this framework, the authors examine
the evolution of innovation policy and governance
trajectories of Estonia and Brazil and how
this has affected the capacities for technological
accumulation and development. |
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Measuring
the Progress of Societies:
A Mexican perspective |
| Alicia
Puyana |
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The
author delves into the concept of progress
and development; how the definitions have
changed over changing global paradigms,
how the subject of economics itself has
witnessed reinterpretations etc.
The article is written in the context of
the experiences of Mexico over the last
50 years. |
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| 2010
- A Year of Innovations in the Global Poverty
Reduction Agenda |
| Timo
Voipio and Gabriele Koehler |
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| 2010
has been a tumultuous year. It has been
marked by major policy regressions with
many countries reverting back to severe
austerity programmes - or 'fiscal consolidation',
thus increasing socio-economic divides.
At the same time, however, as a notable
countermovement, there have been seven policy
innovations on the global poverty and social
justice agenda. |
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| Ten
Theses on Neo-developmentalism |
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| On
May 24 and 25 of 2010, a group of economists
sharing a Keynesian and structuralist development
macroeconomics approach convened in São
Paulo to discuss ten theses on New Developmentalism.
This document is a summary of the suggestions
that emerged from the two day long discussion. |
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| The
Global Economic Crisis: Challenges and opportunities
for public administration |
| S.K.
Rao |
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Following
a discussion of the factors leading to
the recent financial and economic turmoil,
this article offers evidence that some
countries that have relied more on the
role of government and the public sector
have managed to contain the crisis in
a more successful way. There is, therefore,
a need to revisit, redefine and bolster
the roles of government and reposition
the public sector. |
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| Looking
to the Future: Examining the dynamics of
ALBA |
| Emine
Tahsin |
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This
paper examines whether and to what extent
the experiences of ALBA (Bolivarian Alternative
for the Peoples of Our America) succeed
in putting up an ideological challenge
against neoliberalism. The path
of the socialist Cuba and the Bolivarian
revolution of Venezuela are the main driving
forces of the ALBA project. As a result,
socio-economic development on the basis
of equity and complementarity has been
realized under ALBA integration. ALBA
has also
played a role in reducing the vulnerabilities
of the Cuban economy. |
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| Corporate
and Cooperative Solutions for the Agrarian
Crisis in Developing Countries |
| Sripad
Motiram & Vamsi Vakulabharanam |
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This
article discusses credit and marketing
arrangements for small farmers in developing
countries.
The authors draw on the mixed experience
with agricultural cooperatives in developing
countries to
present the design of a credit and marketing
cooperative. The authors argue that in
conjunction with
other state policies, this arrangement
works better for small farmers than other
alternatives, in particular
corporate ones. |
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on Alternatives >> |
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