World Economics Journal Archive
The contents of all previous issues of World Economics are listed below. Subscribers have access to the complete back issue archive: click on titles to view abstracts and full text of articles (PDF). If you are not a subscriber, sign-up online now.
Will Globalization Survive?
Martin Wolf, World Economics, December 2005
Globalization is not inevitable. It depends on politics. Today, it depends above all on US politics. Without successful US leadership, the present globalization may founder, just as the last one did. In this article Martin Wolf, associate editor and chief economics comm ... More
A Global Compact to End Poverty: Jeffrey Sachs on stabilisation, transition and weapons of mass salvation
An interview with introduction by Brian Snowdon
World Economics, December 2005
Brian Snowdon presents the text of a two-hour interview conducted with Jeffrey D. Sachs of Columbia University—a wide-ranging discussion relating to Professor Sachs’s work over the past thirty years on macroeconomic stabilisation, the economics of transition, and severa ... More
“Pity the Finance Minister”: Issues in managing a substantial scaling up of aid flows
Peter S. Heller, World Economics, December 2005
Substantial scaling up of aid flows will require development partners to address many issues, including the impact of higher aid flows on the competitiveness of aid recipients, the management of fiscal and monetary policy, the delivery of public services, behavioral inc ... More
Measuring Global Poverty Right: Mission impossible?
M. G. Quibria, World Economics, December 2005
The international community is committed to millennium development goals which postulate a vision of global development that makes eliminating poverty and sustaining development the overriding objective of global development efforts. In the hierarchy of the MDGs, the fi ... More
Monetary Policy, Macro-stability and Growth: South Africa’s recent experience and lessons
Janine Aron & John Muellbauer, World Economics, December 2005
There is greater appreciation now amongst economists of the negative effect of uncertainty on investment, growth and equality, especially when credit constraints are widespread. This implies an important linkage between the transparency and predictability of the policy ... More
Brazil’s Economy Under Lula: The dawn of a new era?
Edmund Amann, World Economics, December 2005
In this article Edmund Amann analyses the recent performance of the Brazilian economy, the largest in South America. For a number of years it has been clear that Brazil, despite substantial natural resource endowments and a talented and entrepreneurial population, has f ... More
Corporate China Goes Global
Friedrich Wu, World Economics, December 2005
Recent high-profile international acquisitions and take-over bids by Chinese companies have attracted much media limelight and raised intense interest in China’s rising outward foreign direct investment (FDI). This paper delineates the macro trends of China’s outward FD ... More
The ‘Death of Distance’: What does it mean for economic development?
Nicholas Crafts, World Economics, September 2005
This paper considers the implications of falling transport and communications costs for the spread of economic activity around the world. The evidence suggests that location has been and continues to be an important determinant of income levels. The Information and Comm ... More
The Value of Vaccination
David E. Bloom, David Canning & Mark Weston, World Economics, September 2005
Despite advances during the twentieth century, immunization coverage is far from universal and faces significant obstacles in both developing and developed countries. Weak policy emphasis on vaccination may be the result of the narrow view of its benefits in scientific ... More
The Economics of Happiness: Insights on globalization from a novel approach
Carol Graham, World Economics, September 2005
The economics of happiness is an approach to assessing welfare that combines economists’ techniques with those of psychologists, and relies on more expansive notions of utility than does conventional economics. Research based on this approach highlights the factors—in a ... More
Paradoxes in Biodiversity Conservation
David Pearce, World Economics, September 2005
Biodiversity is important for human wellbeing, but it is declining. Measures to
conserve biodiversity are essential but may be a waste of effort if several
paradoxes are not addressed. The highest levels of diversity are in nations least
able to practise effective co ... More
The Costs of Mitigating Climate Change
Dennis Anderson & Matt Leach, World Economics, September 2005
The paper reviews analyses of the costs of mitigating climate change and discusses the implications for policy. The estimated effects of reducing carbon emissions by 40%–60% over the next half century range from –1.0% to 4.5% of world product, averaging 2½%. This would ... More
Should Fuel Taxes Be Scrapped in Favor of Pay-by-the-Mile Charges?
Ian Parry, World Economics, September 2005
This paper discusses the appropriate balance between traditional gasoline taxes and charging by the mile, focusing on economic efficiency considerations. It begins with a brief discussion of the five major passenger vehicle issues of concern—local pollution, greenhouse ... More
Natural Resource-Based Economic Development in History
Edward B. Barbier, World Economics, September 2005
The role of natural resources in fostering economic development is examined for key historical epochs, from the agricultural revolution in 8,000 BC to the present. Natural resource exploitation has been important to development for most of global history. Depending on w ... More
The Economics of Copyright
Ray Corrigan & Mark Rogers, World Economics, September 2005
The copyright industries—such as music, film, software and publishing—occupy a significant and growing share of economic activity. Current copyright law protects the creator for up to 70 years after their death, significantly longer than patent protection (20 years afte ... More
To What Extent Should Less-Developed Countries Enforce Intellectual Property Rights?
Gilles Saint-Paul, World Economics, September 2005
This paper discusses a number of issues in the context of the debate on intellectual property in less developed countries (LDCs). It starts by discussing the consequences of IP enforcement in LDCs for global innovation and welfare in poorer countries. It then considers ... More
The Nature of Corruption in Forest Management
Charles Palmer, World Economics, June 2005
Corruption is a well-documented and common feature of natural resource management in the developing world. This article investigates the nature of corruption and whether or not there is such a thing as a ‘tolerable’ level of corruption, particularly where there is an es ... More
Anticipating Artistic Success: Lessons from history
David Galenson, World Economics, June 2005
The recent history of modern art provides clues as to how important artists can be identified before their work becomes generally known. Advanced art has been dominated by young conceptual innovators since the late 1950s, and theimportance of formal art education in the ... More
Does the World Need a Universal Financial Institution?
James Boughton, World Economics, June 2005
All financial institutions specialize, in dimensions that may include categories of assets and liabilities, types of services offered, customer demographics, and geographic coverage. The International Monetary Fund is the only international financial institution that is ... More
Tensions in the Role of the IMF and Directions for Reform
Timothy Lane, World Economics, June 2005
While the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has evolved considerably since its foundation 60 years ago, the past few years have brought fresh challenges. This paper discusses four key areas in which developments have led to a rethinking of the institution’s role: the em ... More
The IMF and Low-Income Countries
David Bevan, World Economics, June 2005
There is a wide-ranging debate about possible redefinitions of the role and structure of the IMF itself, and of the Bretton Woods Institutions more generally. This paper has a more restricted focus, on the way in which the IMF interacts with the low-income countries amo ... More
Measures of Progress and Other Tall Stories: From income to anthropometrics
John Komlos & Brian Snowdon, World Economics, June 2005
How should progress be measured? Today, economists and economic historians have available a rich array of data for a large number of countries on which to base their response to this important question. The need for alternative measures of the standard of living is part ... More
The New Economics of the Brain Drain
Oded Stark, World Economics, June 2005
For nearly four decades now, the conventional wisdom has been that the migration of human capital (skilled workers) from a developing country to a developed country is detrimental to the developing country. However, this perception need not hold. A well-designed migrati ... More
Migration and Development: A new research and policy agenda
Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah, World Economics, June 2005
There is growing interest in the impacts of international migration on economic development. Yet, despite a burgeoning literature, some of the most fundamental questions in this area remain unanswered. This article suggests five priorities for devising better methodolog ... More
Trade in the Chinese 21st Century
Howard Davies, World Economics, March 2005
In this article Sir Howard Davies, Director of the London School of Economics
and Political Science, offers some thoughts, first, on the political framework
within which trade policy is determined, then about the way in which the
globalization debate has developed, a ... More
Keynes, Globalisation and the Bretton Woods Institutions in the Light of Changing Ideas about Markets
Robert Skidelsky, World Economics, March 2005
For most of the twentieth century, pessimism about, and hostility to, markets was
prevalent and this pulled in an anti-globalist direction. Indeed, the global
institutions set up in 1944 were constructed by two market pessimists, John
Maynard Keynes, on whom this art ... More
Monetary Policy in an Uncertain World
Charles Bean, World Economics, March 2005
In this article, Charles Bean, Bank of England Chief Economist and member of
the Monetary Policy Committee, reviews and assesses the three types of
uncertainty which affect monetary policymakers: uncertainty about the data;
uncertainty about the nature and persistenc ... More
International Comparisons of GDP: Issues of theory and practice
Ian Castles & David Henderson, World Economics, March 2005
When it comes to making international comparisons of real GDP, different views,
conventions and practices are still in evidence. The authors set out the case for
using purchasing power parity (PPP) converters for this purpose, rather than
conversions based on exchang ... More
Reserve Accumulation in Asia: Lessons for holistic reform of the international monetary system
Graham Bird & Alex Mandilaras, World Economics, March 2005
In the aftermath of the 1997/1998 crisis, Asian economies have built up large
holdings of international reserves. Although initially encouraged to do so by the
IMF, more recently they have been criticised for maintaining undervalued
currencies, running large current ... More
Rethinking Development Effectiveness: Facts, issues and policies
M. G. Quibria, World Economics, March 2005
This article reviews some recent research on aid effectiveness. An important
finding of this research is that foreign aid has been much more effective than is
generally presumed. It also suggests that the current aid allocation policy of
development agencies, based o ... More
The Anomalous Case of HIV/AIDS: A critical response to Clive Bell & Maureen Lewis,
‘The Economic Implications of Epidemics Old and New’
Barrie Craven, Christian Fiala, Etienne de Harven & Gordon Stewart, World Economics, March 2005
In a recent issue of World Economics (Vol. 5, No. 4, 2004) Bell and Lewis discuss
‘The Economic Implications of Epidemics Old and New’. In their article those
authors examine several historic and recent epidemics including HIV/AIDS,
currently regarded as the greatest ... More