Interesting paper by Francis Fukuyama for the CGD: What is Governance? Here the abstract: This paper points to the poor state of empirical measures of the quality of states, that is, executive branches and their bureaucracies. Much of the problem is conceptual, since there is very little agreement on what constitutes high-quality government. The paper suggests […]
What is Governance? A paper by Francis Fukuyama Read More »
Today I received an email from a friend and learned a new Italian word: oblatività. In English? Something like: altruism, selflessness, unselfishness. The origin of this word is in the Latin words such as oblativu(m), oblatus which means something like giving without the expectation of getting something back. If you Google it, you will find
A new Italian word I discovered today and the connections it made in my mind Read More »
Paul Krugman has written in his End This Depression Now! ‘In normal times, the latest academic research plays a very small role in real-world policy debates, which is arguably how it should be – in the heat of the political moment, how many policy makers are truly equipped to evaluate the quality of a professor’s
Evidence gone missing in the Italian election campaign show Read More »
The newspaper La Repubblica is conducting a investigation about the responsibilities within the Department of Civil Protection in the event of the earthquake at l\’ Aquila. Here is what is emerging from the investigation and analysis of the documentation (now public) collected by the judges: ‘It \’s the end of March 2009, the city of Abruzzo hostage for four months of shocks measuring up to 4.1 on the Richter scale
Six Italian scientists have been found guilty for having given insufficient warning to residents of L’Aquila about the seismic risks they faced ahead of earthquake that hit the city in the night of 6 of April 2009. The earthquake had a magnitude of 6.3 and caused 309 deaths, more than 1.500 injured and more than
Six years of jail to scientists for L\’Aquila earthquake. Trial against science? Read More »
I liked Michelle Obama at the Democratic Convention. I found it honest and truthful. Commentators said that she held the people at the Time Warner Arena in Charlotte in the palm of her hand. That can only happen if you speak from the hearth, with your feelings. What surprised me the most was the story of her father
Failed public state? Failed welfare society? Read More »
I have had a very interesting meeting and discussion this week with about 20 staff of the Asia Foundation in Manila. We talked about policy entrepreneurship and development entrepreneurship and discussed the differences and similarities between the two concepts. Development entrepreneurship has been introduced and has been described by the Asia Foundation in a recent
Download the report at the World Bank website: The Vietnam Development Reports (VDR) is a series of reports, which have been published by the World Bank resident mission since 2002, and focus on key development issues for Vietnam. The VDRs aim at tapping into existing knowledge, achieving an \’upstream harmonization\’ so that donors can engage with