From Swagger to Self-Advocacy: India’s Postgraduate “Transition” in the World Bank

The International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank's facility for low-income countries, has granted India an unprecedented exception to its usual “graduation” policy—extending transitional support to its largest borrower, even though it has crossed the normal eligibility cutoff for IDA’s soft loans (based on per capita income). Before 2012, some Indian officials had called for a “graceful graduation,” believing that India did not need concessionary development assistance any longer. But with IDA graduation imminent in 2013 and facing a limit on borrowing from the Bank’s other window for middle-income countries, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, India successfully appealed for continued IDA access. This article draws on official interviews and documents to show how India secured post-graduation transitional support from IDA—suggesting that while India’s leaders seek to present their country as a rising power with influence in multilateral institutions, they can also be pragmatic in their status demands and quietly persuasive in their economic diplomacy.     

Climate business for poverty reduction? The role of the World Bank

The World Bank is increasingly active in the area of climate change mitigation. While it justifies this engagement with its poverty reduction objective and its capacity to pave the way for new business activities in developing countries, critics blame the World Bank as a ??climate profiteer?? and as an unfair competitor in private markets. Our econometric analysis of over 2,000 projects registered until May 2010 under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the Kyoto Protocol allows us to compare the activities of the Bank with those of other, primarily private actors. The results indicate that hardly any of the CDM projects can be considered as strongly pro-poor. Nevertheless, in comparison to the rest of the CDM projects, the Bank??s portfolio shows a relatively clearer orientation towards poor countries. Within these countries, however, the Bank does not show any particular pro-poor focus, and tends to implement those projects that are commercially most attractive. Moreover, there is no evidence of the Bank phasing out its activities once the market becomes fully operational, which goes against its professed pioneering and catalytic role in carbon markets.     

China’s Steady Progress in Building a Harmonious World

<正>I.Building a harmonious world is not an empty slogan The renowned 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China(CPC) was concluded in November 2012.One distinctive feature of the Congress is that it shows the entire world Chinese communists’ confidence in their path,theory and system,including their confidence in building a harmonious world.In the report of the 18th     

Harmonious World and China’s Road of Peaceful Development

The important concept of building a "harmonious society", a "harmonious Asia" and a "harmonious world" initiated by President Hu Jintao is of great theoretical and practical significance as it constitutes the comprehensive guiding principle for China's domestic politics and external strategies, and establishes the goal and orientation China pursues in the changing international system.     

The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. In need of a better performance?

Since the Mexican crisis in 1994, international financial markets are characterised by frequent turbulence. The two most important international organisations in that field, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, have been unable to provide sufficient stability. Surprisingly, the World Bank is in deeper trouble than the IMF. The decreasing importance of public capital flows has made the World Bank much less important than it used to be. Globalisation has led to increased private flows to the developing world, primarily in the form of foreign direct investment. In the long run, there will not be an important function for the World Bank any more. The opposite assessment has to be made for the IMF. The more globalisation progresses, the greater the need for an IMF. However, this does not mean that the Fund will survive in its current form. International financial markets have gained in importance, but they still lack many of the features that characterise the national financial sector. If globalisation shall be continued, we need those governance structures, e.g. a lender of last resort, at the international level. Markets need rules and regulations, and today these are often not existent at the international level. The need for an IMF will even rise, but it will have to be a different one.Abbreviations  CCL Contingent Credit Line - IMF International Monetary Fund - LTCM Long-term Capital ManagementSenior Research Associate, German Institute for International and Security Affairs, Berlin, and Associate Fellow, Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation, University of Warwick.     

Is two better than one? The effects of IMF and World Bank interaction on growth

We estimate the impact on economic growth of the joint participation in both IMF and World Bank programs. More specifically, using panel data for 128 developing countries over the period 1982?C2005, and employing 2SLS to control for the possible endogeneity of participation in an IMF/World Bank program, we find that the interaction between these two organizations has a positive and significant impact on growth. The paper then opens up interesting new research questions related to investigate further on the effects of Bank?CFund simultaneous action and, to the extent to which their stronger impact on growth may depend on Bank?CFund interaction, also ways to optimize their joint effect through greater cooperation.     

FIFA’s Hegemony: Examples from World Cup Hosting Countries

The hegemonic power of FIFA over countries hosting its capstone World Cup tournament is worth examining in the context of hegemony theory in International Relations literature. To understand FIFA’s hegemonic role on the global stage, it is best to place it within the context of two major shifts in the international system—power transition and diffusion. This study provides an insight into the dispute between transnational and national law in sports, which FIFA has used to strengthen its hegemony. This has empirical support as seen in four World Cup cases: previous Cups in Brazil (2014) and South Africa (2010) and the forthcoming tournaments in Russia (2018) and Qatar (2022). These cases reveal FIFA’s hegemonic power both through the overruling of national law in favour of transnational law, and by the questionable bidding processes to host the games in Qatar and the Russian Federation. In addition, this study examines whether Switzerland is capable of regulating or restricting FIFA’s hegemonic power. While removing FIFA’s legal status as a non-profit organisation seems not to be an option, the executed amendment of the Swiss anti-corruption law is a step forward. Furthermore, FIFA needs to continue its recently initiated internal reforms.     

China’s Economic Contributions to the World and East Asia

China’s continued high economic growth hasdrawn increasing attention of the world. However,it has received very different evaluations, withthe most representative and conflicting ones being“China threat theory”or “China harm theory”vs.“China opportu     

The Prospects of Obama Administration’s Foreign Policy

On January 20, 2009, Barack Obama sworn in as the first African-American President of the United States. More than two million people witnessed this unforgettable moment in American history in glacial wind. Obama took office with     

The EU’s Foreign Policy Under Debt Crisis

Under the impact of the sovereign debt crisis, the European Union pays less attention to its foreign policy and the Common Foreign Policy tends to be renationalized; the EU is again embracing geo-economics with an enhanced tendency of highlighting economic ties and trade in its external relations; EU countries have greatly cut their defence expenditures, making it more difficult to implement the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) in future. The author holds that the prospects of economic growth in the Eurozone countries, European integration under the pressure of structural changes in international relations, and competition and collaboration in a multiple structure of foreign policy establishments are combined to shape the EU’s foreign policy in the coming years.     

The European ‘Other’ in Poland’s Conservative Identity Project

Since taking office in November 2015, Poland’s conservative government has pressed for a sweeping reinterpretation of the past, and a re-envisioning of the future, of the political community. This conservative identity project idealises the allegedly fully sovereign Poland of the interwar period and repudiates the normative commitments underpinning Poland’s accession to the European Union. The worldview of the conservative government’s liberal critics, by contrast, represents a fusion of the inclusive nationalism asserted in opposition to communist rule with the affirmation of a European identity. The reawakening of historically resonant debates about the nature of Poland’s European-ness, emphasizing the centrality of the (Western) European ‘other’ in Poland’s national idea, carries significant implications for its relations within the international environment.     

The Development Trend in China’ s Surrounding Areas

China’s surrounding areas are in a special transition period necessitated by China’s peaceful rise and the adjustment of its Asian strategy.In2014,these neighboring areas inherited the development trend of the previous three years,coaxing out changes that we are beginning to see.Changes in world economic growth,America’s rebalancing strategy,and alterations in Sino-Japanese relations are direct results of China’s rise,and other development trends are in the offing.The high-speed growth stage for Asian emerging economies has come to an end.Moderate growth in parallel with reform is the new norm in Asian economy.Due to the collective slowing of emerging economies,     

The EU’s Korea relationship: enlargement effects

As the EU was expanding in 2004, a phase of new development between the EU and North Korea could have been expected. However, it was argued that the EU’s position towards North Korea is likely to remain unchanged. Most of the existing studies ascribed the reactive attitude of the EU to the distinctiveness of the recent enlargement. The accession of a large number of new members, which are considered to have diverse foreign policy interests and perception, is likely to add up to the already overwhelming number of problems in the governance of the EU. Thus, the EU’s policy towards North Korea would rather concentrate on a soft security approach. However, this paper contends that the existing explanation is not exhaustive, but that the implications relating to the conception of smallness, which is relevant to most of the new member states, should be included in the parameters of analysis in order to generate a more comprehensive and balanced view where the future relationship between the EU and North Korea is concerned. The preliminary draft of this paper was presented at the International Conference of the Korean Society of Contemporary European Studies, November, 25, 2005, at Seoul, South Korea. I appreciate all the comments and helpful advice made at the presentation.

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The Four Pillars of Russia’s Power Narrative

The Winter Olympic Games in Sochi and the annexation of Crimea were two major international events in which Russia engaged in early 2014. In spite of all the divergence in the logic underpinning each of them, four concepts strongly resonate in both cases. First, in hosting the Olympics and in appropriating Crimea, Russia was motivated by solidifying its sovereignty as the key concept in its foreign and domestic policies. Second, the scenarios for both Sochi and Crimea were grounded in the idea of strengthening Russia as a political community through mechanisms of domestic consolidation (Sochi) and opposition to unfriendly external forces (the crisis in Ukraine). Third, Sochi and Crimea unveiled two different facets of the logic of normalisation aimed at proving – albeit by different means – Russia’s great power status. Fourth, one of the major drivers of Russian policy in both cases were security concerns in Russia’s southern flanks, though domestic security was also an important part of the agenda.