Rule of Law
« Previous EntriesPutin President Again: A Wake-Up Call to the World?
Sunday, March 4th, 2012Vladimir Putin is about to be re-elected, yet again, as President of Russia. He already served as President twice, over the 2000-2008 period, to then immediately ease himself into the Kremlin’s Premiership for the past four years, awaiting his next term as President, which is about to begin. His new term is expected to last six [...]
Conviction of Spain’s Superjudge Garzon: An indictment of its own judiciary?
Wednesday, February 15th, 2012The recent conviction (ostensibly for ordering jailhouse witetaps) of Baltasar Garzón, the Spanish judge who took on corrupt officials, despots, terrorists and human rights violators during the Franco regime, casts a dark shadow on Spain’s judiciary and hints at a political witch-hunt. In October 1998, Judge Garzón catapulted to prominence when he broke with [...]
Russia and China Leadership Props Syria’s Assad
Tuesday, February 7th, 2012This past Saturday the world saw harrowing media accounts of the massacre perpetrated by the Syrian government’s bombardment of civilians in the city of Homs. The massive artillery barrage, which has continued since then, have left many hundreds of people dead, making it the most deadly attack of the year-long uprising. Homs had already [...]
Transparency, Conflict Minerals and Natural Resources: Debating Sections 1502 and 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Act
Tuesday, December 20th, 2011With a focus on conflict minerals and natural resource transparency, Sections 1504 and 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Financial Reform Act are unrelated to the U.S. banking system. Yet they have stirred up controversy. As is often the case with provisions that aim at changing the rules of the game, Sections 1502 and 1504 [...]
Transparency in Natural Resources and Conflict Minerals: What We May Not Know About Dodd-Frank
Friday, December 9th, 2011The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act is the very well known piece of legislation that intends to regulate the U.S. financial market. The debate over the act and its implementation continues and I have contributed to that discussion in previous postings. Yet, what is not so well known is how the Dodd-Frank [...]
Judge Rakoff Challenge to the S.E.C.: Can Regulatory Capture be Reversed?
Saturday, December 3rd, 2011Last Monday, Federal Judge Jed Rakoff issued a potentially precedent-setting challenge to the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) when he rejected the $285 million settlement between the agency and Citigroup. The bank is charged with negligence related to its misleading sale of toxic mortgage-backed securities, which ultimately cost investors nearly $700 million but earned the [...]
Africa’s Dawn or Doom?: From Premature Exuberance to Tempered Optimism
Sunday, August 28th, 2011Earlier this summer, President Obama welcomed one day apart Gabonese President Ali Bongo and Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan to the White House. Both countries share in common significant oil wealth, weak public institutions, and a large proportion of the population living in poverty. Nigeria is ahead of the laggard Gabon in terms of developing democratic institutions, and has made inroads compared with its misgoverned [...]
Congress’ Dismal Performance Need Not Be the Case: A Governance Perspective
Friday, July 29th, 2011According to a Gallup nationwide poll ten years ago, 55 percent of citizens approved of the way Congress was handling its job. That was in March 2001, before the surge in solidarity that resulted in Congressional approval ratings of 70-80 percent following the 9/11 terrorist attacks. By mid-2002, the approval ratings were back to pre-9/11 [...]
Amid Global Crises, Can Obama Make a Real Impact in Latin America?
Friday, March 18th, 2011President Obama’s tour of Latin America, including visits to Brazil, Chile and El Salvador, is starting this weekend. This visit is unlikely to constitute a historical watershed. It comes at a time when Obama faces three major crises— Libya’s ongoing civil conflict, Japan’s unfolding triple disaster, and the United States’ congressional impasse over the federal [...]
Qaddafi’s Corrupt Influence in the West: a case of International State Capture?
Monday, March 7th, 2011We know about the story in many countries of low level bureaucrats demanding a bribe to expedite the processing of a business license, or a driver’s permit, or to pay reduced taxes. For a long time, such administrative corruption has been the focus of research and measurement in the field of corruption. Administrative corruption is [...]
Libya’s Startling Failure: Unforeseen or Ignored?
Friday, February 25th, 2011A month ago, emboldened by the successful ousting of Tunisia’s Ben Ali, Egypt’s anti-government protesters took to the streets in Cairo demanding the resignation of Mubarak. And at that time, as pointed out in a previous post, many pundits wrote that the uprising in Tunisia was of a unique nature, that the reality in Egypt [...]
On Governance and Human Rights in China and Iran
Monday, October 11th, 2010So it goes: a few days ago the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010 was awarded to Liu Xiaobo, the jailed Chinese dissident, in spite of the active lobbying by the authorities in China (including threats on dire consequences on their relations with Norway)…
Governance improves, goes into reverse, and fails: WGI and Governance Matters released
Friday, September 24th, 2010We are releasing the new version of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI), covering 213 countries over the 1996-2009 period. All the data and resources ca be found at www.govindicators.org. It is accompanied by a new analytical report on the WGI, to be found here. prepared with my co-authors in this project, A. Kraay and M. Mastruzzi. And a synthesis [...]
On the state of Governance and the governance of States around the World: what will the WGI scorecard tell us?
Thursday, September 23rd, 2010In past writings we have emphasized the neglected link between good governance by wealthy and developing countries and the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Lately such link is getting a bit more attention in the media, as it is being emphasized by stars like U2′s Bono and his own NGO, named ONE. Of course, [...]
Will now FIFA finally ban North Korea from International Soccer, moving away from double standards?
Saturday, July 31st, 2010It is well known that a month ago Sepp Blatter, the president of the world’s soccer governing body, FIFA, was irritated, vociferous and quick to officially react when French politicians engaged on a debate about the performance of their national football squad at the South Africa World Cup. Imperiously, and consistent with the monopolistic power [...]
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