Financing firms in emerging markets

The 5th Annual Conference on the Financing of Corporations in Emerging Countries was recently held. To highlight some of the papers:

• Does Campaign Finance Imply Political Favors?: The Case of the 1998 Brazilian Elections
• The Influence of Domestic Firms on Foreign Direct Investment Liberalization
• Financing Firms in India
• Do local analysts know more? A Cross-Country Study of the Performance of Local Analysts and Foreign Analysts
• Do Foreigners Invest Less in Poorly Governed Firms?

...and to quote an email I received about the event:

So if institutional development is good for access to finance, why do not all countries adopt "good” institutions? “It’s politics, stupid!” is the expected answer.

Update: Also see Deloitte's leveraging emerging markets for commercial success. Via IEM.