This article in the journal Public Administration and Development "...critically examines propositions driving the exportation of western whistleblower concepts into the developing world...Specifically it attacks the prevailing view that public interest disclosure is somehow a culture-free, or at least a culture-muted phenomenon, governed by a set of rules and conventions detached from local histories and practices. The article concludes that this exportation is in the spirit of neo-colonialism and issues a note of warning about the dangers of dispersing western conceived forms of corruption reporting to Africa."

The BBC is asking for comments on corruption. Few people's lives in Africa are free of the effects of corruption, from corrupt politics at national level to everyday bribes at a personal level. Corruption undermines economic growth, creates institutional mismanagement and hurts society by holding back economic development at all levels.

The donor community has asked the government to strengthen the fight against corruption or miss further donations. Representing the donor community on Monday [31 October] during the launch of the corruption week at the Constitution Square, the royal Danish ambassador, Mr Stig Barling, said Uganda had failed to minimize corruption though it had a framework to minimize it. "As Uganda's development partners, we will not tolerate corruption. Any score below four is unacceptable by the development partners. We have zero tolerance on corruption and impunity when it comes to corruption. We have zero patience on such issues. The government institutions should act or will miss donations in future," he said.

Ghana would soon ratify the United Nations and African Union (AU) Conventions on Preventing and Combating Corruption and related offences following Parliament's receipt of Government's documents on the issue. So far only 10 nations, including Nigeria, Burundi, Lesotho, Libya, Madagascar and Mali have ratified the African Convention but 15 nations are required to make it operational and enforceable. On the other hand, only five African countries - Libya, Madagascar, Namibia, Tanzania, and Uganda - have ratified the UN document.

Ethiopia is concerned about the UN pullout from some bases along the tense border with Eritrea, saying Tuesday that the peacekeepers help ensure war doesn't break out again. After saying its work had been hampered by new restrictions imposed by Eritrea, the U.N. Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea said Monday it was pulling peacekeepers from 18 of 40 posts in the buffer zone and strengthening operations at other positions.

Less than six months into his job at the helm of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz has announced that tackling poverty and deprivations in Africa is going to be the World Bank's top priority. "I think the situation of sub-Saharan Africa is not acceptable. It has to be the first priority of the World Bank," he told members of the Parliamentary Network on the World Bank (PNoWB) meeting at the Finnish Parliament over the weekend. However, Wolfowitz added that the efforts of the World Bank and the development community must be supplemented by African leaders in order to achieve rapid results.

Cameroon has signed an agreement with the IMF for a new three year Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) programme to the amount of US$26.8million. Cameroon's last PRGF arrangement expired in December 2004 and the IMF has been monitoring Cameroon's performance since then under a 'staff-monitored programme'. According to the IMF, Cameroon has made progress in improving economic policies and 'implementation of the program resulted in a substantial fiscal adjustment, especially in non-oil revenue, and improved public financial management and reporting.

An email discussion on community radio for development takes place 23 January - 18 February 2006. To join the discussion, send an email to [email protected] with the message: subscribe communityradio firstname lastname

Lake Chad has shrunk by almost 90 per cent, while water levels in Lake Victoria - Africa's biggest freshwater lake - have fallen by a metre since the early 1990s. Niger has lost more than 80 per cent of its freshwater wetlands in the past 20 years. The dramatic and, in some cases damaging environmental changes sweeping Africa's lakes are brought into sharp focus in a new atlas. Produced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the Atlas of African Lakes compares and contrasts spectacular satellite images of the past few decades with contemporary ones.

Nearly two years after the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) took up the question in Geneva, the international community is yet to arrive at a consensus on creating a framework to manage the Internet. All countries today recognise the fundamental and growing role of the Internet as a facilitator of governance, commerce, and communication. Many nations want a multilateral model of management for the Internet and also see a role for themselves in it.

Exactly how much wealth does Africa lose every year? Third World repayments of $340 billion each year flow northwards to service a $2.2 trillion debt, more than five times the G8's development aid budget, notes Patrick Bond. In addition Africa’s citizens experience depletion of assets like forests and mineral resources, and suffer the impact of pollution as a result of mining. In this context, Bond argues that those who claim international integration can enrich Africa are wrong.

There is a timeless line of argument from Walter Rodney's 1973 book 'How Europe Underdeveloped Africa': 'The question as to who and what is responsible for African underdevelopment can be answered at two levels. Firstly, the answer is that the operation of the imperialist system bears major responsibility for African economic retardation by draining African wealth and by making it impossible to develop more rapidly the resources of the continent.'

'Secondly, one has to deal with those who manipulate the system and those who are either agents or unwitting accomplices of the said system.'

Sub-Saharan Africa today still suffers the dispossession of wealth, along two trajectories: South-North resource flows, and adverse internal class formation. In the former case, the central processes are associated with exploitative debt and finance, phantom aid, capital flight, unfair trade, distorted investment, ecological exploitation and the 'brain drain'.

In the latter case, instead of accumulation and class formation via an organic middle class and productive capitalist class, Africa has seen an excessively powerful 'comprador'-oriented ruling elite whose income is based upon financial-parasitical accumulation and political-bureaucratic patronage power, which in turn is then subject to vast capital flight.

Although remittances from the Diaspora now fund development and even a limited amount of capital accumulation, capital flight is far greater. At more than $10 billion/year since the early 1970s, collectively, the citizens of Nigeria, the Ivory Coast, the DRC, Angola and Zambia have been especially vulnerable to the overseas drain of their national wealth. A major factor during the late 1990s was the relisting of the primary share-issuing residence of the largest South African firms, from Johannesburg to London.

In Washington, perhaps the most highly regarded of African elites is South African finance minister Trevor Manuel, who until late last month served as chair of the World Bank/IMF Development Committee. Having failed for four years to get even partial democratisation of the Bretton Woods Institutions onto the committee's agenda, Manuel gloried in the return of attention to Africa: 'Right now, the macroeconomic conditions in Africa have never been better. You have growth across the continent at 4.7%. You have inflation in single digits. The bulk of countries have very strong fiscal balances as well.'

These statements are true only if we take misleadingly narrow economic statistics seriously. Fortunately we don't need to because even the Bank is occasionally compelled to confess how Africa is drained of 'genuine savings' through depletion of minerals and forests, and other eco-social factors which ostrich-like economists invariably ignore.

Manuel's riff sounds impressive. Indeed, because of structural adjustment austerity, African states reduced their early-1990s deficit rates of around 6% of annual output, to just under 4% today. However, the fastest growing economies actually increased their deficits by a full percentage point over the last decade, suggesting that Keynesianism still works as well for African elites as it does for George Bush.

Meanwhile, monetary policy was tightened, interest rates soared and African central banks - typically run by IMF or ex-IMF staff - were discouraged from printing money (which sometimes fuels inflation). Price increases were reduced from double-digit rates prior to 2004 to an average of 9% this year. However, that level is far too low for a developmental trajectory, former Bank chief economist Joseph Stiglitz argued in his 'Post-Washington' critique of economic orthodoxy.

Bank president Paul Wolfowitz - architect of the Iraq War - was in a sporting mood at Manuel's Development Committee press conference on September 25: 'The path has been cleared to complete debt relief, and at the risk of a dangerous metaphor, I think Trevor has given us the ball right in front of the goal, and the goalie has tripped, and all we have to do now is kick it in.'

A dangerous move indeed, for Manuel warned of at least one more hurdle: 'a legal challenge because countries may feel that some have been favoured against others. My understanding is that both Rodrigo [Rato, IMF managing director] and Paul will go before their boards, sort out what the equality of treatment principle would be in each of the instances, and ensure that there is equality of treatment.'

It seems the InterAmerican Development Bank and Asian Development Bank won't participate in the debt relief pantomime. So 14 African countries favoured by the G8 - and four others in Asia and Latin America - will get a few crumbs of relief, costing the G8 less than $2 billion per year to service (on $40 billion in outstanding debt).

But because their leaders have ceased putting up a fuss, the debt of these 18 is reduced: not to nothing, but to levels where the Bank and IMF retain macroeconomic control, so that capital flight and ultra-cheap commodities can continue their outward flow.

None of the trade reforms proposed for the Hong Kong WTO meeting in December will alter the basic calculus of long-term decline for their (non-oil) primary commodity prices. Christian Aid recently estimated the damage done to African countries by trade liberalisation at $272 billion since 1980.

Even in the face of those 'internal contradictions and conflicts' - including vast overcapacity, wars, real estate bubbles, hurricane repairs, debt crises and balance of payments problems - men like Wolfowitz can afford to make small concessions. After all, Third World repayments of $340 billion each year flow northwards to service the $2.2 trillion debt. This is more than five times the G8's development aid budget (and ten times the level of Northern donations once we subtract the 'phantom aid' which never reaches the masses).

As Brussels-based debt campaigner Eric Toussaint concludes, 'Since 1980, over 50 Marshall Plans worth over $4.6 trillion have been sent by the peoples of the Periphery to their creditors in the Centre'.

Consider, as well, the South as ecological creditor. According to ecologist Joan Martinez-Alier, 'The notion of an ecological debt is not particularly radical. Think of the environmental liabilities incurred by firms under the United States Superfund legislation. Although it is not possible to make an exact accounting, it is necessary to establish orders of magnitude in order to stimulate discussion.'

Martinez-Alier and Jyoti Parikh of the UN International Panel on Climate Change argue that based upon the Third World's role as a carbon sink, an estimated annual subsidy of $75 billion flows South to North. Africans are most exploited because non-industrialised economies have not begun to utilise more than a small fraction of what should be due under any fair framework of global resource allocation such as carbon emissions.

The amounts involved would easily cover financial debt repayments. Instead, the G8 Gleneagles scam keeps poor countries down in several ways. According to Jubilee South: 'The multilateral debt cancellation being proposed is still clearly tied to compliance with conditionalities which exacerbate poverty, open our countries further for exploitation and plunder, and perpetuate the domination of the South. Even if the debt cancellation were without conditionalities, the proposal falls far too short in terms of coverage and amounts to demonstrate a bold step towards justice by any standard.'

However, almost by accident another Bank document began to do the rounds just prior to the Bank/IMF Annual Meetings: 'Where is the Wealth of Nations?' Here at least, World Bank environmental staff recognise that foreign investors may diminish overall wealth and savings, once resource depletion and pollution are factored in.

(To be sure, the Bank adopts a minimalist definition based upon current pricing - not potential future values when scarcity becomes a more crucial factor, especially in the oil sector. Nor do Bank economists yet deign to calculate the damage done to local environments, to workers' health/safety, and especially to women and vulnerable people in communities around mines. And unpaid household and community work is still left out of national statistical accounts, reducing women's labour to a nil value.)

What investments are most important, then? Dating to the mid-1990s, foreign direct investment has flowed mainly into oil rigs in the West African Gulf of Guinea and Angola's offshore Cabinda field, aside from an ill-fated South African privatisation spree in 1997.

Meanwhile, corrupt host regimes waged war against their people, not only in Angola (where formal conflict ended after a rightwing Unita guerrilla movement faded following Jonas Savimbi's death). In addition, as Amnesty International pointed out last month, the Bank was meant to finance the multi-billion dollar Chad-Cameroon pipeline to add human rights sensitivity, but deepening repression is the actual result.

Other Africans suffering oil depletion under dictatorial or militarised conditions include citizens of the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Nigeria and Sudan.

South Africans are also implicated in a kind of subimperial looting of oil. At the country's annual Political Science Association conference in KwaZulu-Natal last month, senior government researcher John Daniel shifted from claiming in 2003 that 'non-hegemonic co-operation has in fact, been the option embraced by the post-apartheid South African state.'

After reviewing the record of the African National Congress (ANC) in the continent's energy sector, especially Sudan and Equatorial Guinea, he conceded, 'The ANC government has abandoned any regard to those ethical and human rights principles which it once proclaimed would form the basis of its foreign policy.'

Big Oil celebrated this state of power relations at the World Petroleum Congress in Johannesburg last month. Opponents also came together, invited by the excellent NGO groundWork. The Ogoni people, for example, demanded reparations not only for the thorough destruction of their Delta habitat, but also for the depletion of what economists call 'natural capital'.

How much natural capital value is removed from Africa? In South Africa, the value of minerals in the soil fell from $112 billion in 1960 to $55 billion in 2000, according to the UN, while Africa as a whole suffers negative net annual savings.

Adding not just oil-related depletion but other subsoil assets, timber resources, nontimber forest resources, protected areas, cropland and pastureland, the Bank calculates that Gabon's citizens lost $2,241 each in 2000, followed by people in the Republic of the Congo (-$727), Nigeria (-$210), Cameroon (-$152), Mauritania (-$147) and Cote d'Ivoire (-$100).

In addition to mineral depletion worth 1% of national income each year, the Bank acknowledges that South Africans lose forests worth 0.3%; suffer pollution ('particulate matter') damage of 0.2%; and emit C02 that causes another 1.6% of damage. In total, adding a few other factors, the actual 'genuine savings' of South Africa is reduced from the official 15.7% to just 6.9% of national income.

These analyses, documents and calculations are new and fresh, and should shame those who claim international integration can enrich Africa. The opposite is more true.

Unlike Trevor Manuel, African justice activists like those who met at groundWork's conference know it. They wrote to officials of the World Petroleum Congress: 'At every point in the fossil fuel production chain where your members "add value" and make profit, ordinary people, workers and their environments are assaulted and impoverished. Where oil is drilled, pumped, processed and used, in Africa as elsewhere, ecological systems have been trashed, peoples' livelihoods have been destroyed and their democratic aspirations and their rights and cultures trampled.'

The letter concluded, 'Your energy future is modeled on the interests of over-consuming, energy-intensive, fossil-fuel-burning wealthy classes whose reckless and selfish lifestyles not only impoverish others but threaten the global environment, imposing on all of us the chaos and uncertainty of climate change and the violence and destruction of war. Another energy future in necessary: yours has failed!'

Indeed the Southern African Social Forum in Harare earlier this month generalised this sentiment to the entire set of economic relations that dispossess Africa of all kinds of wealth.

* The author is based at the University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society. This work is part of a larger study carried out in collaboration with the Johannesburg-based Southern African Centre for Economic Justice and Harare-based Equinet, and participants at their 10-12 October workshop in Harare are thanked for feedback. Comments are welcomed, at [email protected]

* Please send comments to [email protected]

Two weeks ago in an article for Pambazuka News, Carol Chehade explored the “seamless borders of genocide” in the Democratic Republic of Congo (http://www.pambazuka.org/index.php?id=29835). In this article Yav Katshung Joseph weighs into the discussion about the DRC with an exploration of the security and resource issues fuelling conflict in the Great Lakes Region. Internal normalisation, the establishment of the rule of law, reconciliation and reconstruction on a regional level are key to bringing peace and security to millions of citizens, he argues.

Several interconnected elements have shaped the conflict in the Great Lakes Region: neighbouring countries’ interests, economic resources, security concerns, ethnic division and so on. That is true for all core countries of the Great Lakes region (Burundi, DRC, Rwanda and Uganda) and it has been established by many observers and analysts that the root causes of the conflicts are insecurity, issues of identity, poor governance, political opportunism with its military options, and selfish economic interests (See J. Cartier-Bresson, Revue Tiers-Monde, n°174, Tome XLIV, avril–juin 2003).

In this regard, if realistic possibilities for conflict transformation are to be developed, the resources and security concerns will need to be addressed. Therefore, this article will focus only on these two issues: resources and security. I will offer my perspective on the how to transform conflicts by using resources and security as tools of reconciliation and reconstruction in the Great Lakes Region.

Security and Resources as sources of conflict in the Great Lakes Region

Security concerns

The question of security throughout the region has continued to be a major issue. The cycle of violence in the Great Lakes region began with the 1993 civil war in Burundi, which was followed by the 1994 Rwandan genocide targeting ethnic Tutsi and moderate Hutus. Both conflicts resulted in large numbers of refugee flows into neighbouring Zaire (now the DRC). The conflict then spread into Zaire, as both Tutsis and Hutus reside there in significant numbers.

Rwanda, citing the need not only to protect its own citizens from attacks by Hutus, but also to protect Tutsi-Congolese, launched incursions into eastern DRC in 1996.

In the beginning of the war in the DRC (1996), Rwanda and Uganda formed an alliance with the Congolese rebel movement led by Laurent Kabila. However, this “triple K” alliance (Kampala-Kinshasa-Kigali) fell apart in 1998, because of the number of security concerns cited by Uganda and Rwanda. Uganda maintained that it needed to stop insurgents (the Lord’s Resistance Army and the Allied Democratic Forces) from attacking Uganda through southern Sudan and eastern DRC. The Rwandan government invoked the right to “self-defence” against cross-border incursions into its territory by DRC-based Hutu militias. In reaction to the growing hostilities, Angola, Namibia, and Zimbabwe justified their military intervention in the DRC by stating that they were seeking to preserve the unity of a Southern African Development Community (SADC) member state (Chad also provided a small number of troops at the DRC government’s request).

Political and security justifications for their intervention notwithstanding, the opportunity to exploit the DRC’s lucrative natural resources also provided an impetus for the military intervention of some states of the region. However, while the clamour for economic resources may well have proved to be an obstacle to peace in the DRC, the conflict has been triggered by the security concerns of neighbouring states such as Rwanda and Uganda, who argue that it is necessary to stop the incursions into their territories, of various armed groups based in the Congo.

Resource concerns

One of the most perplexing issues in the DRC conflict has been and remains that of the exploitation of the DRC’s natural resources. Illegal exploitation of the mineral resources of DRC has been a constant feature in the discussion about the war in DRC in general, and especially in the eastern part of the country. A main dividing line in different analysis has been between those highlighting the exploitation of mineral resources as a main aim for the foreign armed forces, and others seeing their use of existing resources mainly as a way of financing the war efforts. It has long been established that the exploitation of these resources, including coltan, gold, and diamonds in eastern Congo, and diamonds, copper, cobalt, and timber in central DRC, contributed to and exacerbated the conflict in the DRC. Concerned with reports of pillaging of resources by the foreign forces, the UN Security Council mandated an independent panel to investigate these allegations. The panel has produced a series of reports, detailing the circumstances of this exploitation.

Regional actors have been accused of aggression and “foreign adventurism” with regard to Congolese territory and natural resources. In other words, while parties to the conflict in the country may have been originally motivated by security concerns, their continued presence in the DRC is attributable to economic gains derived from the DRC. The report further stated that criminal groups linked to the armies of Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe and the Government of the DRC have benefited from such micro-conflicts. This has been the conflict, and by extension any envisaged conflict resolution mechanism, an intricate affair requiring a multifaceted and comprehensive approach. This is critical for the peace process, because, according to reports, these “groups will not disband voluntarily... They have built up a self-financing war economy centred on mineral exploitation” (See Final report by the UN Panel of Experts).

The rationale for intervention by the neighbouring states became self-enforcing and the localised conflicts became regional. As such, the conflicts within and between the countries of the Great Lakes require regionally based and targeted solutions, along with the cooperation of relevant neighbouring states.

Transforming Security and Resources as sources of conflict to options for reconciliation and reconstruction in the Great Lakes Region

Reconciliation and reconstruction are essential elements of peace building. The key to transforming conflicts is to build strong equitable relations where distrust and fear were once the norm (Louis Kriesberg, Constructive Conflicts: From Escalation to Settlement. (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 1998), 322-335).

In the Great Lakes Region as in many African countries, violent conflict has become the “normal” state of affairs. Control of economic resources has become an important factor in motivating and sustaining armed conflicts. Complex political economies, which often hide behind the outward symbols of statehood and national sovereignty, have grown up around conflict. The challenge therefore is to transform regional and national political economies that are served by violent conflict into healthy systems based on political participation, social and economic inclusion, and respect for human rights and the rule of law.

Accordingly, attempting to transform conflicts for reconciliation and reconstruction in the Great Lakes Region, all countries should try to stimulate positive developments in the region that will enable them to conclude that their security and economic interests are better served through fostering stability at home and improving relations with their neighbours than by allowing their neighbours’ turmoil to deflect them from their chosen path of peace, reconciliation, democracy, and economic development.

Moreover, on security, ignoring the tensions and misunderstanding between Burundi, DRC, Rwanda and Uganda will have far reaching implications to the stability and social economic development of the Great Lakes Region with resources being diverted from human and economic development to warfare. For this reason it is important for them to work together for the restoration of peaceful dialogue and cordial relations between them. In this regard, allegations of hosting and/or training of rebel forces by neighbouring states for planned aggression must be investigated and stopped. Incursions of the forces of one state into another can lead to rising tensions and inter-state armed conflicts which if not promptly addressed will affect the well-being of the socio-economic development of the populations. If rebel groups in Burundi, DRC, Rwanda and Uganda are not neutralized, rebel incursions prevented, inter-state aggression arrested and territorial integrity secured, the result can be renewal of interstate conflicts and destabilization or even their disintegration.

Further, on the issue of resources, the Great Lakes Region is rich in natural resources, which are at stake for many actors in the conflict. However, resources are also a potential for post conflict rehabilitation and development. Therefore, reduction in the exploitation of mineral and other natural resources for the purposes of war, countries should work to examine ways of limiting the exploitation of such resources for the purpose of conflict. They should also seek to identify and promote the means by which such resources are safeguarded and managed in a way that reduces conflict and ensures that they benefit the population. Equally, there is a need to develop institutions and frameworks that both integrate/transform the informal to a formal economy, governed by a reasonable rule of law, transparency and efficiency, without marginalizing local and regional actors.

Concluding remarks

While the conflict dynamics in the Great Lakes region are complex and involve a multiplicity of interlocking regional and international actors, we should recognise that the region has made some progress in overcoming instability, but several threats remain.

In other words, each of the countries in the region has surely known and has pursued its own process of internal normalisation. Nevertheless, it is clear that the reconciliation process in one country is strongly linked to that of the others. Any viable solution must have a regional character. It is therefore important that the region’s constituent states understand that their security and economic interests are better served through fostering stability at home and improving relations with their neighbours than by allowing their neighbours’ turmoil to deflect them.

On the regional integration level, it is important to use a forum like the International Conference on the Great Lakes to speed up the normalisation process between all these states and to define strategies for political and economic integration of the region. The resumption of activities of the Economic Community of the Great Lakes Countries (CEPGL) would be a vital step. Other institutions of a social, cultural and scientific nature can also contribute to deepening the progress.

Moreover, countries in the GLR should work for the establishment of the rule of law. This implies the democratisation of power, good governance, respect for human rights and the end of impunity at every level through the creation of effective and independent courts and tribunals. Efforts can be made to set up functional Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (There are attempts in Burundi and in the DRC) and other traditional mechanisms such as Gacaca courts in Rwanda to address issues of accountability for atrocities and reconciliation.

Further, in order to build a sustainable peace, countries in the region should work on political cohabitation and border security. The security of borders must be guaranteed and checkpoints ensured in common. To reach these objectives, it is necessary to strengthen the capacities of real republican armies in every country in the region and to strengthen measures for checking small arms trafficking at the borders. It is also important for countries to strengthen peaceful coexistence between themselves by respecting the territorial integrity and national sovereignty of neighbouring countries.

In brief, and as one third of all ended civil wars in Africa restart, I would like to see post-conflict reconstruction and reconciliation efforts in Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and the DRC satisfactorily completed. I would hope that peace and stability become realities for the millions of citizens in this region as we move from crises and conflicts to security and stability.

* Yav Katshung Joseph is a Lecturer in Law, at the Faculty of Law, University of Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo. He is also the Executive Director of CERDH (Centre d’Etudes et de Recherche en Droits de l’Homme, Democratie et Justice Transitionnelle/Centre for Human Rights, Democracy and Transitional Justice Studies), and Coordinator of the UNESCO Chair for Human Rights, Peace, Conflict resolution and Good Governance/University of Lubumbashi. He holds an LL.B and LL.M from the University of Lubumbashi; another LL.M from University of Pretoria, South Africa, and a Diploma in Transitional Justice from the Transitional Justice Fellowship Programme (ICTJ & IJR joint programme), South Africa. He is also an Advocate of the Court of Appeal of Lubumbashi. Mr. Yav Katshung Joseph has published numerous articles on human rights, law and transitional justice in scholarly journals. For contact: [email][email protected] or [email][email protected] Phone: +243 9 970 21 758

* Please send comments to [email protected]

Every year, the World Bank releases its World Development Report, which is supposed to provide a guide to the economic, social and environmental state of the world. The 2006 version of the report represents a slight improvement on previous years, but still fails to impress Sanjay Reddy, who highlights data inadequacies, selective history and unhelpful prescriptions as its main weaknesses. It might be time for the World Bank to take its own medicine and open up the report to competition by allowing centres in developing countries to produce the report, he suggests.

A tempting first reaction to the World Development Report 2006 (henceforth WDR 2006), entitled ‘Equity and Development’, is that it represents a significant advance. Whereas previous WDRs (in particular WDR 1990 and 2000/01) had concerned themselves with the need to reduce the absolute disadvantages experienced by countries and by persons, WDR 2006 is the first WDR centrally to be concerned with relative inequalities between nations and between persons. Relative inequalities are viewed in WDR 2006 as concerns in themselves. The report defines equity as the requirement that “individuals should have equal opportunities to pursue a life of their choosing and be spared from extreme deprivations in outcomes” (p.2). It thus combines the emphasis of recent normative reasoning on ‘starting gate equality” with an insistence that outcomes that fall beneath a threshold of minimal adequacy must be deeply disvalued. This construction is rather clunky and appears to be the product of a political compromise rather than a foundational philosophical view, but is workable.

In many respects, WDR 2006 reflects the most progressive face of the World Bank (henceforth Bank). The report is concerned with absolute and relative disadvantages in their many dimensions (including health, education, political power, and real income). The report recognizes that disadvantages in these dimensions are often related. The report notes that self-perpetuating low level equilibrium traps are often associated with severe absolute deprivations or large relative inequalities and that there are often deep historical origins for these traps. The report also recognizes that inter-generational social mobility is often low and that specific policies are necessary to increase it. These features of the report are significant, and are worthy of praise. It can be argued that the report constitutes a landmark in terms of the breadth of its analysis and the choice of its theme.

However, from the standpoint of the developing countries, the report also possesses central inadequacies. Three of the classes into which inadequacies can be placed are the following:

1. Data and Inferential Inadequacies

The authors of the report cannot be blamed for making use of flawed data, as it may have been the best available to them. However, they can be blamed for failing to recognize the implications of the inadequacies in existing data for their ability to draw meaningful conclusions. For example, the choice of the specific PPPs for many countries (including large ones, such as such as India and China), used to compare real incomes across countries and to form global assessments, is highly questionable. Many countries have not recently, or in some instances ever, participated in benchmark surveys of the International Comparison Program, on the basis of which PPPs are identified. The implications of alternative choices of PPPs for assessments of global deprivations and inequalities are enormous, and must be centrally confronted [See e.g. Reddy and Minoiu (2005a, 2005b)]. Similarly, the report places great store in assessments that there have been reductions in global income poverty, deriving from the World Bank’s money-metric ($1 and $2 per day) approach to poverty assessment. These assessments are open to questioning on the basis both of their foundational assumptions and estimation techniques [See e.g. Reddy and Pogge (2003)].

2. Selective History and Analysis

The report recognizes the role of historical phenomena (for example, the imprint of slavery and colonialism) in shaping existing patterns of inequality and deprivation within and across countries. The report also recognizes that within-country inequalities have risen in many countries in the recent period. However, it fails to recognize that the policies recommended by the Bretton Woods Institutions may have been among the major reasons for the increases in relative inequality observed in these countries in recent years.

Structural adjustment policies and their successors may have among the central causes of widening relative income inequalities in many countries, contrary to what had been anticipated on the basis of simple trade models (and in particular the Stolper Samuelson theorem, which in its most simple variant predicts that trade liberalization in particular will lead to decreases in relative income inequality in developing countries). A considerable body of respectable technical literature (much of it focusing on Mexico’s experience in the aftermath of NAFTA) has in recent years concerned itself with explaining possible theoretical explanations for the apparent unexpected impact of trade liberalization in developing countries [See for example the work of Robert Feenstra, Gordon Hanson, Ann Harrison, James Galbraith, Zadia Feliciano, Pinelopi Goldberg, Nina Pavcnik and Ana Revenga, cited in the references]. This literature is not even mentioned in the WDR’s treatment of the effects of trade liberalization in Mexico (p.195).

Similarly, there is reason to think that financial liberalization and labor market liberalization may each have contributed to widening relative inequalities within countries. Arguments of this kind, which assert that at least some of the reason for widening inequalities within countries may be the implementation of policies recommended by the Bretton Woods institutions, do not appear adequately to be recognized and confronted. The role of policies eagerly promoted by the Bretton Woods institutions in the past (for example, the implementation of user fees in the health sector) respectively in increasing absolute disadvantages within nations and widening relative inequalities between nations (at least relative to the counterfactual in which these policies were not pursued), has not been forthrightly examined.

The report often relies on questionable indicators and analytical tools. For example, more secure property rights, as judged by foreign investors, are used as a proxy for the quality of institutions. A blithe footnote (p.108) avers without offering further evidence that “These data…are imperfect as a measure of the relevant institutions because they pertain to investments by foreigners only. Even so, they seem in practice to capture how stable property rights are in general”.

The report seeks too often to place the diverse phenomena that it confronts into an accustomed lens. For example, it describes domestic violence as an “inefficiency” (p.54). Although domestic violence is abominable, the reason that it is so is surely not that it constitutes an “inefficiency”. Language of this kind is indicative of the lack of commitment of the authors of the report to a conceptual framework in which human beings are foregrounded over abstract ends such as “efficiency” which are employed in an obscurantist manner.

3. Weak, Questionable or Unhelpful Prescriptions

It is perhaps not surprising, in view of the partial nature of the history provided and the analysis undertaken in the report that the recommendations for policies that may decrease absolute disadvantages and relative inequalities are also perhaps overly restrictive. There are some excellent innovative proposals in the report, some of which may be in the interests of developing countries (for example, the proposal to create a “generic drug region” in which “inventors in developed countries make legally binding commitments to their own governments not to enforce patent rights in certain pharmaceutical markets” (pp. 224-5)).

Similarly, the report correctly emphasizes the role of certain agricultural policies in developed countries (for instance, cotton subsidies) in depressing opportunities in poor countries. The report rightly takes note that aid should be targeted where it is most needed as well as where it is most effective. It recognizes that there has been an influential move to target aid toward countries that are perceived to possess “good policies” but is perhaps not adequately critical of the recent attempts within the Bretton Woods institutions to articulate this view, which have often taken a very narrow view of what constitute “good policies” and appeared to recommend that countries which do not possess such policies (which centrally emphasize liberalization and privatization) should not be beneficiaries of development aid at all. [See e.g. Burnside and Dollar (2000)].

The policies recommended in the report are more often than not accustomed policies which have been recommended in the past. It is a miracle that the same set of policies appears to be the prescription for all ills. For example, labor market deregulation (in particular reduction in the cost to employers of firing and hiring) is once again held up as being in general a highly desirable policy, and “overly generous unemployment benefit and social assistance systems, which discourage[s] job search” (p.192) are decried in blanket terms. Although there may occasionally be some merit in such recommendations, the reader is given the sense that alternative views have not been seriously considered.

Increased competition in domestic financial markets is similarly advocated as a general policy. The need to identify policies that specifically benefit the poor or relatively disadvantaged is too often glossed over in favor of broad prescriptions the primary effect of which may be to serve other interests entirely. For example, the epilogue to the report concludes that the “twin pillars” of a national development strategy aimed at increasing “equity” are a “better investment climate” and “empowerment”. It is stated that “for most people in the developing world, and certainly for the poor, it is not possible to have one without the other”. Many actual and potential conflicts of objectives are glossed over here; a better investment climate for the poor may not always be what makes for a better investment climate for relatively wealthy domestic or foreign investors, at least in the short run. The report notes, for example, that it is possible (p.228) that “the government…will not enforce tax collection, rather than build rural roads”, presumably because underlying conflicts of interests are resolved in favor of the relatively wealthy, whether at home or abroad. How potential conflict of this kind should be handled is not addressed.

In this and other respects, the report presents an account of political economy that is naïve. The general invocation of the need for a “better investment climate for all” without any effort to address such conflicts can have at most limited value in the formulation of policies that reduce absolute deprivations and relative inequalities. The treatment of property rights protections in the report is in this respect especially incoherent. Sound institutions are equated with those that protect property rights. However, land reforms including “expropriating with compensation” (p.167) are treated favourably, and the reader is told that (p.122) “The key to China’s equitable development was the combination of initial conditions and the economic reforms” without apparent recognition that China’s favourable “initial conditions” were the consequence of an earlier and comprehensive economic and social revolution, in which established property rights were overturned. One need not take a view on the merits of that revolution to recognize its historical importance.

Conclusion:

The WDR 2006 is a commendable effort in comparison to many of its predecessors. However, it is still dissatisfying. Its intellectual basis is often weak, its contents are not adequately complete and its prescriptions are often either questionable or of limited practical value.

A question that must be asked is: “Who does the WDR serve?” The substantial resources expended each year in the production of the WDR could perhaps better be used by supporting independent competitive research institutes (located in developing countries to the extent feasible) charged with the task of generating development research that is autonomous, intellectual rigorous and globally relevant. Competition can be beneficial in policy analysis, just as it is alleged to be beneficial in labor, capital and product markets. Perhaps this is the lesson that should be learned in this third decade of the WDR.

* Sanjay Reddy is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Barnard College, Columbia University.
([email protected]) This review was originally prepared for the Inter-Governmental Group of 24 on International Monetary Affairs and Development, a group of developing countries. This article first appeared in Economic and Political Weekly,
India,

* Please send comments to [email protected]

REFERENCES

Burnside, Craig and David Dollar (2000), “Aid, Policies and Growth”, American Eonomic Review, Vol. 90, No. 4.

Feliciano, Zadia. 1993. "Workers and Trade Liberalization: The Impact of Trade Reforms in Mexico on Wages and Employment." Mimeo, Harvard University.

Robert Feenstra & Gordon Hanson, 2001. "Global Production Sharing and Rising Inequality: A Survey of Trade and Wages," NBER Working Paper 8372, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

Feenstra, Robert C & Hanson, Gordon H, 1996. "Globalization, Outsourcing, and Wage Inequality" American Economic Review, vol. 86(2), pages 240-45.
James Galbraith and Vidal Garza Cantú, "Exporting Inequality? Recent Changes in industrial wage inequality in Canada, Mexico and the United States," Income and Productivity in North America, Commission on Labor Cooperation, Washington, 2001, 27-54.
Goldberg, P. and N. Pavcnik, “Trade, Inequality, and Poverty: What Do We Know? Evidence from Recent Trade Liberalization Episodes in Developing Countries”, Brookings Trade Forum, 2004.

Hanson, G. (2003). "What Has Happened to Wages in Mexico since NAFTA?" NBER Working Papers 9563, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

Hanson, G. and A. Harrison (1999), “Trade Liberalization and Wage Inequality in Mexico”, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, vol. 52, No. 2.

Reddy, S. and C. Minoiu (2005a), “Has World Poverty Really Fallen?”, available on www.socialanlysis.org

Reddy, S. and C. Minoiu (2005b), “China’s Poverty Reduction Experience in the 1990s”, available on www.socialanalysis.org .

Reddy, S. and T. Pogge (2003), “How Not to Count the Poor”, available on www.socialanalysis.org

Revenga, Ana. (1997). “Employment and Wage Effects of Trade Liberalization: The Case of Mexican Manufacturing.” Journal of Labor Economics, Vol. 15, No. 3, pp. S20-S43.

Please find available through the link below instructions for paying money into the Chinwuba, John & Justice Fund.

The latest edition of e-Africa, the electronic publication of the South African Institute of International Affairs focuses on the development potential of television. "Television is one of the most misused, but potentially positive forces for change. It has the potential - through news, discussion shows, dramas, and various forms of educational programmes - to get Africa talking about its most pressing problems and needed solutions. And by showing that it is okay to talk about problems, television can help foster faster progress."

The African National Congress needs to find a "far more dignified" way of dealing with the succession issue, business magnate and former party heavyweight Tokyo Sexwale said October 23. "What we are seeing with the [Jacob] Zuma/Thabo Mbeki debacle is less than dignified," he told an Institute for Justice and Reconciliation symposium in Cape Town. "I think we can do better. Beware also the law of unintended consequences. Things may just snap." He said he thinks the ANC needs to give better guidance to the nation about its transition and succession policies.

With less than two weeks to go before a presidential run-off, soccer legend George Weah and former finance minister Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf are vying for the backing of the 20 candidates eliminated in the first round. And their supporters. Under the watchful eye of UN peacekeepers and Liberian police, electoral officials on Wednesday announced the final results of the 11 October ballot and confirmed that no-one had won the required absolute majority.

Some 1,110 Rwandans who have sought refuge in northern Burundi urgently need relief aid, an official of Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Tuesday. "They left the Gatsinda site in Ngozi [Province] as the head of the zone requested it considering their security was threatened," Catherine Lune-Grayson, the UNHCR public relations officer, said. "They are now at a site where there is not much for them."

Please follow the link for more detailed information on the following memorial services planned...

1. ACTIONAID Nigeria

a)Memorial service in Abuja, Nigeria on Saturday, 5 November
b)Family Support Fund
c)Reflections of Three Patriots on Development:
d)Collection of Tributes
e)Burial ceremonies
f)Programme at Nigeria Social Forum

2. ACTIONAID International and SANGOCO
a)Memorial Service in Johannesburg on Thursday, 27 October

The Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP) community in Africa has been devastated by the deaths of ActionAid International Nigeria activists Chinwuba Egbe and John Moru, and GCAP Nigeria National Coordinator Justice Egware in the Bellview flight that crashed after take off from Lagos Airport in Nigeria on Saturday, 22 October. Tributes have been pouring in all week via the GCAP email listserve. Below are details about the three activists from the www.whiteband.org website and summaries of the tributes that have been sent. The full tributes can be read by following the link provided.

CHINWUBA EGBE

Chinwuba Egbe (34) was an Education Team Leader and Co-ordinator of Stepping Stones and REFLECT (STAR) with ActionAid International Nigeria (AAIN). In their media release, AAIN called him a “grassroots man to the core who was ‘at home’ amongst the poor and excluded, discussing and helping to shape issues of common interest and empowering them through participatory approaches.” Egbe had contributed to many poor peoples’ livelihood through the Reflect Project in more than 30 communities in Nigeria.

JOHN MORU

At 34, John Moru had already made his mark as an activist who was dedicated to the fight against pervading poverty in the midst of plenty in Nigeria, denial of political and human rights to the people, and the threats of international capitalism. Moru contributed to the emergence of a strong governance team in ActionAid International Nigeria (AAIN) and the initiation of the Nigeria Social Forum (NSF).Together with Egware, he was in the forefront of the Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) campaign in Nigeria. He is survived by a wife and a daughter.

JUSTICE EGWARE

Justice Egware (36) not only sustained the growth of the National Coalition on Education (CSACEFA) but also contributed to the building of the organisation as a strong force in educational issues in Nigeria with a view to bringing the ‘voice’ of civil society into national discourse. In addition, Justice was in the forefront of the struggle for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Nigeria through the MDG Campaigns and as GCAP Nigeria Coordinator. Activists across Africa will remember him as a powerful voice during the Africa Standing Tall against Poverty concert in Accra in the days before the World Summit. They will recall how motivational he was at the World Summit and in the days thereafter at the International Facilitation Group. He is survived by a wife and son.

Any person who watched the Standing Tall against Poverty concert in Accra on television or who attended the concert will remember the powerful and immortal words of Justice Egware on September 3 when he said, “Today, we are standing tall together to say No to Poverty. Africa is not a poor continent and we all agree that we are a generation that believes that poverty can be eradicated.”

Tributes:

- Dear fellow campaigners and friends,

It is with great sadness and deep shock that we bring you this news. Justice Egware, co-ordinator of GCAP Nigeria and John Moru of Action Aid Nigeria are believed to have been on the fateful Bellview flight 110 that crashed after take off from Lagos airport on Saturday night. 117 people were on board. There were no survivors. Justice and John were returning to Abuja from Lagos where we launched the Nigeria GCAP publicity campaign at the Galleria media Centre. Other campaigners arrived from Abuja and we are trying to acsertain who else was on board that fateful airline. We are totally devastated and we pray that the gates of eternity shall open gently as their spirits rise across the African skies with all our dreams, all our hopes....blow in the winds, glow in the darkest room and in all our hearts. - Kwesi Owusu

- The Centre for Democracy and Development wishes to sympathise with and extend our condolences to those who lost their loved ones in the incident and pray that they find the endurance and strength to bear the grief of these irreparable losses.

- AWEPON kindly conveys our sincere condolence and prayers to the families of our dear campaigners.

- On my personal behalf and The Civil Society Movement-Sierra Leone we express our unreserved sympathy for the demise of friends and brothers.

- Coalition Jubilee 2000 Angola wishes to extend sincere prayers and condolences for all the families bereaved in this tragic air accident.

- On behalf of the Global Sustainability Watch Network, it is with shock and sadness that we receive the terrible news. Heart felt condolences to the families and friends.

- Deepest condolences from Charles Nyambe.

- Really sorry about the death of Justice and John. They were great people and will be missed a lot. - Christine Misiko

- Girl Child Network and the Women`s Coalition are in great shock and we share the loss.

- It is with shock and sadness that MWENGO receives the terrible news. Heart felt
condolences to the families and friends.

- Condolences to their families and G-CAP fraternity from Julius Kapwepwe.

- Please accept SANGOCOs sincerest condolences and support to family and friends, regarding this great tragedy and loss.

- Helen Tomobo is sending her solidarity to the families and friends. We have lost the best folks among us.

- On behalf of the MDG/GCAP Campaign in Uganda, this is to convey our deeply felt condolences to the families of Justice Egware and John Moru, to GCAP Nigeria and all GCAP campaigners.

- Heart felt condolences and support to the families and friends of Justice Egware and John Moru on behalf of Erasmo Mabunda.

- Sincere condolences from Gerald Mwale of the University of Zambia.