The IMF’s April 2025 Regional Economic Outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa presents a clear warning: regional growth is slowing, debt pressures are mounting, and donor assistance is declining. Yet the report outlines critical opportunities particularly in domestic revenue mobilization, structural reform, and private sector activation that can shape a more resilient …
Developing Asia's rapidly expanding middle class is likely to assume the traditional role of the US and Europe as primary global consumers and help rebalance the global economy, says a report on Asia
This working paper, sponsored by CFR's International Institutions and Global Governance program, examines alternatives to large-scale multilateral agreements, evaluates financing and monitoring structures, and recommends smaller and more varied negotiating venues. Climate change is the most difficult collective action problem the world has ever faced, yet global governance frameworks have …
The State Finance Commission, although a technical and quasijudicial constitutional entity like the Union Finance Commission, has to help local governments plan for economic development and deliver social justice and public services at the local level. This article evaluates the history of the performance of SFCs in general and shows …
The Eleventh Plan (2007-08 to 2011-12) sought to build on the gains achieved in the Tenth Plan and shift the economy to a path offaster and more inclusive growth. Inclusivenessa critical element in the strategy was to beachieved by ensuring that growth is broad-based and is combined with programmes aimedat …
By digitising 9,000 files of the Information Commission in three months with no extra budget, Shailesh Gandhi proves a point: it's not governments that improve governance.
The CSC scheme in Assam is a poor advertisment for both the centre's e-governance drive and the public-private partnership model. Common service centres have sprung up here with a few government services on offer and appear to exist only to profit private partners availing of the government's subsidy.
This recent paper examines Forest Rights Act 2006 to analyse whether its detailed provisions are likely to fulfil its ambitious mandate. It discusses the complementary institutional reform required for strengthening the law’s provisions & the limited attention this has so far received. Institutions relating to forest management in India have …
Hoardings of mine owning companies and hot winds greet you once you exit the cool comfort of the aircraft at Raipur airport. Temperatures have been unusually high almost all over the country this year. But on the second day of my visit to Raipur, I was offered some local explanations …
Anastasio Somoza, the Nicaraguan dictator deposed in 1979, once told a journalist: “I would like nothing better than to give Nicaraguans the same kind of freedom as the US. But it is like what you do with a baby. First you give it milk by drops, then more and more, …
VIDEH UPADHYAY Counsel, Delhi Pollution Control Committee THINK an environmental problem. Think authority. A close look at the institutional and legal history of environmental governance in the country can show that this has been the simple formula that provides a working basis to respond to an environmental issue. The buzz …
Numerous countries have undergone decentralisation reforms in the management of natural resources. However, the policies implemented are often not applied in ways compatible with the democratic potential with which decentralisation is conceived. The paper analyses the issue of decentralisation in resource management, in Thanagazi block, Alwar District, Rajasthan. In this …
New ways of thinking about governance are challenging our basic understandings about how we organise ourselves in a world that is increasingly characterised by uncertainty, ambiguity and unpredictability, and about how we should organise ourselves (emphasis added). Through consideration of developments in East Africa under the auspices of a United …
The focus of this paper is that the contextual issues influencing the adequacy and appropriateness of opportunity cost as a proxy for payments required to get successful REDD+ can be major ones in most tropical developing countries; and resolving them can be expensive and time consuming.
This report summarizes the good practices that were culled from a case study series on successful Asian water utilities. The case studies presented objective, accurate, and critical analyses of urban water management practices in eight Asian cities over a 10-year period. Other local leaders throughout the developing world can use …
The Left in India seems to be in complete disarray. It does not look as if it can reinvent itself and make significant contributions to natio-nal politics. At the heart of the problem is its ‘success’ in West Bengal, where it has ‘ruled’ for over three decades. The most distinctive …
