Refine Results
Sort By
From
To
Page 1
Page 1
Advances in Integrated Soil Fertility Research in sub-Saharan Africa : Challenges and Opportunities
Food insecurity is a central concern and a fundamental challenge for human welfare and economic growth in Africa. Low agricultural production, results in low incomes, poor nutrition, vulnerability to risks and lack of empowerment. Land degradation and soil fertility depletion are considered the major threats to food security and natural resource conservation in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Investments in technology, policy and institutional reforms are needed to increase agricultural productivity to ensure food security and sustained national economies. Past research has generated numerous soil fertility management technologies which if adopted could propel the African continent out of the poverty trap. However, these technologies have had little, if any, impact due to low adoption by the smallholder farmers.
African Land Reform Under Economic Liberalisation: States, Chiefs, and Rural Communities
This book offers unique in-depth, comprehensive, and comparative analyses of the motivations, context, and outcomes of recent land reforms in Africa. Whereas a considerable number of land reforms have been carried out by African governments since the 1990s, no systematic analysis on their meaning has so far been conducted. In the age of land reform, Africa has seen drastic rural changes. Analysing the relationship between those reforms and change, the chapters in this book reveal not only their socio-economic outcomes, such as accelerated marketisation of land, but also their political outcomes, which have often been contrasting.
Making European Merger Policy More Predictable
Making European Merger Policy More Predictable analyses European Merger Control with regard to its capacity to generate predictability among the concerned parties. Starting from the premise that predictability is of overwhelming importance for the functioning of market economies, Voigt and Schmidt ask to what degree European Merger Control has been predictable over the last couple of years. The authors show both theoretically and empirically that there have been serious shortcomings with regard to the predictability of competition policy. They identify the insufficient recognition of the consequences of globalization on the competitive processes as well as an often inconsistent application of economic theory as the root causes for the lack of predictability. The inconsistent application of economic theory is particularly relevant with regard to potential competition and the evaluation of collective dominance. The authors generate a substantial number of proposals that could help to improve predictability. On this basis, Voigt and Schmidt critically assess the recent reforms of European Merger Control.
Italian Institutional Reforms : A Public Choice Perspective
Using a public choice perspective, this book explains the evolution and political and economic impact of recent changes to the Italian institutional framework. Because these changes are so numerous and broad, their implementation serves as a case study for other Western governments. Particular attention is paid to the introduction of the EURO, the reform of voting from proportional to majoritarian rule, the impact of corporatism, constraints imposed by the Maastricht Treaty, and the switch from a highly centralized government to a federal organization.
Competition Policies in Emerging Economies : Lessons and Challenges from Central America and Mexico
Do small developing economies, or SDEs, need a specific competition policy to create competitive markets? Against the backdrop of globalization, protectionist policies that promote state ownership and heavy regulation of key industries are proving increasingly ineffective for driving growth. Countries around the world are instituting reforms to promote competition and business creation, yet the economic and political concentration of power, feeble judicial systems, and the scarcity of human and financial resources pose special challenges to SDEs. Competition Policies in Emerging Economies features an in-depth analysis of two strategic industries — telecommunications and banking — in several Central American nations which sheds light on the dynamics of the transition to deregulation and trade liberalization. Examining the lessons learned from these experiences and presenting discussion of political, legal, economic, financial, cultural, and organizational issues, the book provides unique perspectives on competition policy and economic development.
CGE models and capital income tax reforms : The case of a dual income tax for Germany
The book suggests a novel way how the effects of tax reforms especially in the field of capital income taxation can be measured by means of dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) models.
Business Education and Emerging Market Economies : Perspectives and Best Practices
Business Education in Emerging Market Economies discusses the impact of business education on emerging markets and explores curricular innovation, pedagogical approaches, and strategic alliances in the context of industrializing economies. Emerging markets consist of eighty percent of the world's population and some 75% of its trade growth in the foreseeable future according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. The potential economic growth of emerging markets has prompted a need to understand the dynamics of these markets, their business institutions, and their educational systems. The pressures of globalization and the recent economic reforms that swept across emerging, developing, and transitioning, economies have had a positive impact on the demand for business education and business knowledge from the developed and industrialized countries. As a result, many methods were developed to transfer know-how from the developed markets including learning through imitation, using western style pedagogical approaches, attending universities in industrialized countries, learning through experience and practice, and using information technology. The conclusion we reach is that business and management education in emerging markets is fast changing the way in which these markets operate and are perceived – business educators are catalysts for greater economic integration.
Banking Sector Liberalization in India : Evaluation of Reforms and Comparative Perspectives on China
Banking Sector Liberalization in India explores in detail the changes in the Indian banking sector over the last 20 years, and puts them into a comparative perspective with the Chinese banking sector. For this purpose, the author develops a detailed indicator-based framework for assessing the liberalization of a banking sector along various process steps based on financial liberalization and transformation studies. This framework, along with the indicators for the process and the results of liberalization, is applied to the banking sectors in India and China to test for the effects of liberalization on the sector and the macro level. The key finding is that while liberalization has improved the sectoral performance, it has so far had no effect on the macro level. The book features a detailed description of recent reforms in the Indian banking sector, a set of indicators for evaluating banking sector reforms, and a large number of graphs with key figures for the banking sectors in India and China.
50 Years of EU Economic Dynamics : Integration, Financial Markets and Innovations
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the European Union experts present their analyses of historical developments and new economic challenges for the EU. After a reflection on historical dynamics, the contributors point out the dramatic economic shifts between Europe, Asia and the US. Representatives from major central banks (including the ECB), other leading banks, and academia analyze the dynamics of the Eurozone and financial market integration in the context of globalization and economic growth. Furthermore, the authors discuss the challenges of information and communication technologies by means of various country analyses. Moreover, the Schumpeterian prospects for Europe and the Lisbon Agenda, the long-term challenges of EU pension reforms, emission trading systems in the EU, and options for a new EU constitution are highlighted. At the bottom line of this EU analysis are major implications for investors, managers, policy-makers and the public at large in both the EU and the global economy.
China: Bioethics, Trust, and The Challenge Of The Market
This volume provides a unique perspective on the market reforms currently taking place in Chinese health care. The authors come to grips with the changes taking place in Chinese health care and its effect on the traditional doctor-patient relationship, but also its positive effects on the availability and quality of health care particularly in urban areas. In doing so the various authors wrestle with moral, political and social issues deeply ingrained in Chinese culture as well as the perceived practical and moral difficulties associated with the change to a market oriented economy especially in area of health care.
Audacious Education Purposes : How Governments Transform the Goals of Education Systems
This book offers a comparative study of eight ambitious national reforms that sought to create opportunities for students to gain the necessary breath of skills to thrive in a rapidly changing world.
After Bourdieu : Influence, Critique, Elaboration
Intellectual origins & orientations We begin by providing an overview of Bourdieu’s life as a scholar and a public intellectual. The numerous obituaries and memorial tributes that have appeared following Bourdieu’s untimely death have revealed something of his life and career, but few have stressed the intersection of his social origins, career trajectory, and public intellectual life with the changing political and social context of France. This is precisely what David Swartz’s “In memoriam” attempts to accomplish. In it he emphasizes the coincidence of Bourdieu’s young and later adulthood with the period of decolonization, the May 1968 French university crisis, the opening up of France to privatization of many domains previously entrusted to the state (l’état providence), and, most threatening to post-World War II reforms, the emergence of globalization as the hegemonic structure of the 21st century.
25 Years of Transformations of Higher Education Systems in Post-Soviet Countries : Reform and Continuity
A result of the first ever study of the transformations of the higher education institutional landscape in fifteen former USSR countries after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. It explores how the single Soviet model that developed across the vast and diverse territory of the Soviet Union over several decades has evolved into fifteen unique national systems, systems that have responded to national and global developments while still bearing some traces of the past. The book is distinctive as it presents a comprehensive analysis of the reforms and transformations in the region in the last 25 years; and it focuses on institutional landscape through the evolution of the institutional types established and developed in Pre-Soviet, Soviet and Post-Soviet time. It also embraces all fifteen countries of the former USSR, and provides a comparative analysis of transformations of institutional landscape across Post-Soviet systems.
