Decentralization in many countries has given subnational governments certain spending responsibilities, revenue-raising authority, and the capacity to incur debt. Furthermore, rapid urbanization in developing countries is requiring large-scale infrastructure financing to help absorb influxes of rural populations. Not surprisingly, the subnational debt market in some developing countries has been going through a notable transformation.
These are some of the views and reports relevant to our readers that caught our attention this week.
TechCrunch
Meet The $35 Tablet That Could Connect The World
“TechCrunch just got its hands on the new Aakash UbiSlate 7Ci, the super-cheap tablet that will attempt to connect every student in India to the Internet. Educators have long hoped that cheap computing devices could bridge the global information divide, but previous attempts have been dogged by disappointing performance, lack of Internet access, and financial barriers. The latest version of India’s $35 tablet comes equipped with WiFi and has an optional upgrade ($64) of a cellular Internet package of $2/month for 2 GB of data (roughly 25 emails, 25 websites, 2 minutes of streaming video, and 15 minutes of voice chat a day). More importantly, it is expected to launch this month in India with the government’s commitment to connect even the most remote areas to the Internet. The impact of a successful rollout is difficult to overestimate: rural schools that have been connected to the Internet show immediate and tremendous gains.” READ MORE
These are some of the views and reports relevant to our readers that caught our attention this week.
Trust Law
Corruption in water sector increases hunger risk – experts
“Stamping out corruption in the water sector is crucial to boosting global food production as world population growth increases pressure on water supplies, according to experts meeting at World Water Week in Stockholm.
Corruption in the water sector is already a major problem for farmers and it’s likely to get worse as competition for water increases, a joint statement released by the Water Integrity Network (WIN), Transparency Internationaland the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP) Water Governance Facility at the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) said.
Governments, businesses and civil society must work together to improve transparency in the water sector, and introduce better checks and balances to counter corruption and nepotism, the statement said.” READ MORE
Last week I was a speaker at a Global Water Intelligence summit in Rome. The organizers asked the panelists to imagine a perfect water future in 25 years and then re-engineer what is necessary to get there. I came up with a long list for an ideal water future, and gradually whittled it down to my personal four:
Our Top Ten Blog Posts by Readership in 2011
Originally published on July 20, 2011
Last week, more than 59 governments and 100 civil society groups joined the Government of Brazil and the United States to announce the Open Government Partnership (OGP) in Washington, DC. The initiative brings together nation states, civil society, and the private sector to address problems that Governments are unable to solve alone. Rather than seeing citizens and civil society groups as competitors, governments from the North and South asserted that private actors, commercial and non-profit, are essential partners in solving complex social problems. And this requires a new social contract, a shift from eGov to WeGov.
The history of political thought has been, in a sense, a tussle between two ideas regarding who should govern: the idea that experts should rule and the idea that the people should rule themselves. It has been a never-ending tussle, and just when you think the idea that the people can and should rule has won, we see established democracies tossing out elected governments and installing rule by technocrats. The issue is important for this blog for a simple reason: in international development, the belief that experts know best and should shape public policy in developing countries is as difficult to kick as an addiction to cocaine.
So, let’s be clear: while the allurement of technocratic competence in a crisis is understandable it remains just a trifle absurd to suppose that technocratic competence can replace democratic politics rather than being its humble servant. Experts have a huge role in a crisis, financial or otherwise, but to believe that finding a path out of a crisis is the sole business of experts is not only wrong but naïve. For, the response to a crisis is inherently and inescapably political. And this is true on at least two levels.
Yesterday, a democratic jurisdiction that is part of a much larger and deeply interconnected political federation declared bankruptcy. This bankruptcy promises to have a significant disruptive effect across the larger federation. Think I’m talking about Europe? Think again.
These are some of the views and reports relevant to our readers that caught our attention this week.
Freedom House
Report Finds Governments Restricting Media Freedom Through Regulation
A range of governments are increasingly restricting media freedom using licensing and regulatory frameworks and receive little criticism or attention for doing so, according to Freedom House’s newest report, License to Censor: The Use of Media Regulation to Restrict Press Freedom.
The report provides an overview analyzing this trend at a global level and in-depth analyses of the regulatory environments in eight countries: Ecuador, Georgia, Indonesia, Lebanon, Pakistan, South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe. It describes some of the most commonly used methods to regulate the media—legal controls on licensing and registration, regulatory bodies that are not independent or operate in an nontransparent or politicized manner, and the imposition of vague content requirements on media outlets—as well as detailing the use of arbitrary or extralegal actions, including license denials and the suspension or closure of media outlets to restrict media freedom. READ MORE
These are some of the views and reports relevant to our readers that caught our attention this week.
Tech Change
This Live Broadcast Is Brought To You By Bambuser: Streaming Video for Activists
"In the technological game of cat and mouse, where activists and governments seek to control the flow of information through digital devices, activists have a new card to play: Bambuser.
Information is power. And controlling the flow of information is important to the strategies of those who have power, and those who seek to take it away from them. Different tech tools have been taking center stage at different times – each with it’s own features that make it the right tool for the right at the time. And right now, Bambuser is giving the upper hand to those want to stream video in real time. As described by CEO Hans Eriksson, Bambuser is what you get if “YouTube fell in love with Skype and had a love child.” Compatible with 260 mobile phone models, Bambuser allows users to broadcast live from their mobile device. As footage is taken, Bambuser streams it directly to social network platforms, blogs, and the Bambuser site among others." READ MORE
That is how Mr. John Suffolk, former UK CIO, began his keynote address. So why, you might ask, do we keep on trying to re-invent the wheel?
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China’s massive stimulus spending has raised widespread concerns about local government finances. Local governments have ramped up infrastructure spending since late 2008, while they are also under pressure to spend more on health, education, and social security, for which they are in large part responsible. With monetary conditions likely to become tighter this year and land revenues possibly slowing down or even declining, local government finances may become strained.
At the heart of the concerns are local government investment platforms. These are state-owned-enterprise (SOE)-type entities set up to finance infrastructure construction and urban development—sometimes also called Urban Development and Construction Companies. Set up in part to circumvent rules prohibiting local governments from borrowing, their investment activities are mainly financed by land sale revenue and bank financing, often using as collateral land requisitioned from local residents.
The winds of change are blowing in Malaysia, as the government is taking on an ambitious agenda of structural reform. The objective is to climb up the income ladder and join the league of high-income economies. This is a difficult challenge – one which not many countries have successfully met in the post-war period.
Against this backdrop, the World Bank’s launch of a new report on the Malaysian economy (full disclosure: I lead the team who authors the report) is timely. The Malaysia Economic Monitor, which will be published twice a year, aims to provide context to the challenges facing Malaysia and serves as a platform for discussion and the sharing of knowledge.
The issue of China-Africa engagement has been in the headlines this week as leaders from China and from across the African continent gathered in Egypt for the Fourth Heads of State Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) where Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao announced China’s latest round of
As next month’s climate change conference in Copenhagen draws closer, we are undoubtedly going to see the amount of online discourse on the topic continue to increase. The latest example comes from the British government, which last week released an interactive map showing the possible impact of a global temperature rise of 4 degrees Celsius (7 degrees Fahrenheit). An article in the Guardian says the UK’s Met Office Hadley Centre produced the map based on a recent study that indicates, "such a 4C rise could come as soon as 2060 without urgent and serious action to reduce emissions." The newspaper also quotes the government’s chief scientist as saying that such a temperature shift would be “disastrous.”
Indeed, after exploring the map for just a few minutes, you see how devastating the consequences of a warmer planet might be. By zooming in and clicking and dragging with your mouse, you can navigate the map to see what could happen to different parts of the globe. Be sure to click on some of the plus signs, which give you a brief overview of an issue and the option to click to learn more and view sources of the research. The map, its creators say, displays the latest in peer-reviewed climate change research.
Looking around East Asia, you’ll see that some of the impacts listed include decrease in rice yield, extreme temperatures in population centers of eastern China, and flooding caused by rising sea levels.
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Click on the map to interact. View full screen map here. |
(Hat tip: From Poverty to Power blog.)
