Economics & Business Archive

One of the most dramatic socio-economic experiments in the world is unfolding in Saudi Arabia, where exactly one year ago, a young prince launched an ambitious plan to transform his conservative, oil-rich kingdom. The reform program, named Vision 2030, seeks to wean the country from its near-total reliance on oil revenue and government largesse, turning it into one that is more balanced, more modern and more sustainable by the year 2030. But last week, near the anniversary of the modernization plan’s unveiling last April, the kingdom announced it was rolling back some of its key austerity measures. The reversal raises […]

In 2015 and 2016, Denis Sassou Nguesso—who has served as president of the Republic of Congo for two stints totaling more than 30 years—orchestrated a constitutional referendum and election that allowed him to stay in office. However, his latest term has been marred by more than a year of instability in the southeastern Pool region and elsewhere. The International Federation for Human Rights released a report this month denouncing “massive human rights violations” in the region, including arbitrary arrests and torture. In an email interview, Brett Carter, a Central Africa expert at the University of Southern California, explains what’s fueling […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about workers’ rights in various countries around the world. Like in other Gulf countries, the United Arab Emirates’ small population leaves it dependent on migrant labor to execute an ambitious development program. In order to address criticism of how migrant laborers are treated there, authorities have adopted a series of reforms in recent years. In an email interview, Zahra Babar, associate director for research with the Center for International and Regional Studies at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar, explains the specific problems these reforms were […]

On Dec. 17, 1972, American astronaut Eugene Cernan paused to look up at Earth. At over 240,000 miles away it was small enough to be blotted out by an outstretched thumb. A few moments later he would enter the lunar lander, close the hatch and blast off to begin Apollo 17’s journey back to Earth. Cernan was the last person to leave footprints on the moon. Since then, humans have never ventured farther than 240 miles from Earth’s surface, let alone return to its only natural satellite. History has come to judge the Apollo program as a freak alignment of […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about China’s One Belt, One Road infrastructure initiative, also known as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. Traditionally, China has preferred to pursue bilateral deals when investing in Central Asia, but its ambitious plans for the One Belt, One Road initiative will require a more integrated approach. In an email interview, David Lewis, a Central Asia expert and senior lecturer at the University of Exeter, describes the political and other challenges China will need to grapple with to make this phase of the […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about China’s One Belt, One Road infrastructure initiative, also known as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. Relations between China and Myanmar have been deeply affected by Myanmar’s ongoing political evolution, though China nevertheless sees Myanmar as a key player in its One Belt, One Road initiative. In an email interview, Yun Sun, senior associate with the East Asia Program at the Stimson Center, traces how bilateral ties have changed in recent years and how One Belt, One Road could potentially serve leaders […]

A few years ago, a trio of competing multilateral infrastructure development projects sought to advance economic interconnectedness in Central Asia, a region that, by most measures, is perhaps the least-integrated in the world. Washington proposed a “New Silk Road Initiative” to tether Central Asian states with one another and with Afghanistan. Moscow, meanwhile, launched the Eurasian Union, which was to serve, as Russian President Vladimir Putin said, as the foundation of a new “epoch” for the post-Soviet states. And China, in 2013, announced plans for its “Silk Road Economic Belt” (SREB), expanding railway and, most especially, pipeline networks in the […]

The United States shapes, monitors and reacts to events around the world every day—developments that require minor, and sometimes major, military and foreign policy actions to implement the established U.S. strategy. But some developments call for more than just decisions to implement the current strategy. They require an adjustment to a new strategy. The current trajectory of military-technological change is one such development making a strategic adjustment necessary. Proponents of all of the major strategic alternatives for the United States agree that events that happen elsewhere can affect our security and prosperity at home. The key question they disagree on […]

On Sunday, April 2, Ecuadoreans returned to the polls to elect their president in a second round of voting after a highly contentious campaign season. During the first-round ballot, former Vice President Lenin Moreno won 39.2 percent of the vote, just shy of the 40 percent required to avoid a runoff. His challenger in the second round was banker Guillermo Lasso, who won approximately 28 percent of the first-round vote. The campaign for the second round was divisive and at times became a referendum on controversial outgoing president, Rafael Correa. Voters struggled to muster excitement for either candidate. In fact, […]

Stories abound in the U.S. press about the hollowing out of the State Department. Employees at Foggy Bottom have relocated from work desks to cafeteria tables to spend their newfound free time over paperbacks and coffee. But there is one table that U.S. diplomats could find themselves absent from this fall—the negotiating table at the next international climate meeting in Bonn in May. U.S. President Donald Trump’s skepticism of climate change guarantees that his administration will cede leadership on the issue. “We’re not spending money on that anymore,” Mick Mulvaney, the director of the Office of Budget and Management, said […]

A year ago, Jamaican voters, tired of years of severe austerity measures, unexpectedly ushered in a new government. The left-leaning People’s National Party (PNP), which had held power for much of the past 25 years, was widely predicted to win. Instead, the conservative Jamaican Labour Party (JLP) won by a slim margin, buoyed by a campaign platform of “prosperity for all,” in part through a promised tax break for a large swath of lower-income workers. The biggest concern at the time was that the JLP would derail Jamaica’s hard-won gains in repaying debts to the International Monetary Fund for short-term […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about workers’ rights in various countries around the world. Throughout Greece’s economic crisis, workers’ rights have been a sticking point in bailout negotiations, with creditors pushing for reforms that increase flexibility in the labor market. In an email interview, Dimitri A. Sotiropoulos, an associate professor of political science at the University of Athens, discusses how the crisis has affected workers’ rights, what further reforms might be on the way and the extent to which the actions of organized labor have been helpful or harmful. WPR: What has been the […]

On Monday, President Donald Trump signed a congressional resolution to overturn internet privacy protections adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) under President Barack Obama. Broadband internet service providers will now remain authorized to track and sell customers’ online data without obtaining explicit consent from consumers—a practice that Obama’s policy would have blocked had it taken effect in December 2017 as planned. Trump’s move honors longstanding Republican opposition to the Obama-era rules, approved in October, which would have applied to providers like Verizon and Comcast but not internet companies like Google and Facebook, which are regulated by the Federal Trade […]

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — A resident in Rio de Janeiro’s largest favela, Rocinha, Jose Martins is worried. Earlier this year, Rio’s city council voted to sell the state-owned water and sanitation company, CEDAE, a move that Martins believes puts access to water and sanitation at risk for almost 50,000 residents in Rocinha alone. “The state has a social obligation, so many of us here pay a symbolic price,” he says. “I don’t imagine that a business will allow people to pay as little. If this happens, people won’t be able to pay. If they can’t pay, the company will […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about China’s One Belt, One Road infrastructure initiative, also known as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. China has been a consistent partner for Egypt despite the latter’s years of instability going back to the Arab uprisings of 2011. It should come as no surprise, then, that Egypt is part of Beijing’s ambitious One Belt, One Road initiative. In an email interview, Kyle Haddad-Fonda, an expert on China’s relations with the Arab world, explains how Egypt’s role in OBOR shows that the initiative […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series about China’s One Belt, One Road infrastructure initiative, also known as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. Under former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sri Lanka was an eager player in China’s One Belt, One Road initiative, hoping to use Chinese capital to execute a massive postwar infrastructure upgrade. But OBOR has run into a number of problems in Sri Lanka. The country has reportedly borrowed more than $6 billion for infrastructure projects, mostly from China, and officials now say the loans are too expensive. […]

As the worldwide movement to combat climate change gets underway in earnest following the 2015 Paris Agreement, oil-rich Saudi Arabia finds itself in an awkward position. The world’s largest producer of fossil fuels, the kingdom needs to pump ever-increasing amounts of oil to support a rapidly expanding population in a new era of relatively low global oil prices. But the hot, arid country is one of the most vulnerable to the effects of rising temperatures. There is the distinct possibility that if the emission goals of the Paris Agreement are not met, some areas of the Arabian Peninsula, including Mecca, […]