Posts Tagged ‘economic development’
Marx and the lions
Last Friday, I saw « Marx reloaded » in a smallish, convivial cinema room at ICA in London. A thought-provoking documentary, starting straight from the right questions: now that we are facing the worst economic and financial crisis in 70 years, are we still sure our way of organising production and exchange is the best available? Alternatives […]
Filed under: Economic theory, Philosophy of economics, Sociology | Leave a Comment
Tags: Economic analysis, Economic crisis, economic development, Economic governance, Emerging countries, Globalisation, History of economics, Political theory, social theory, Sociology
The happiness of migrants
The Economist of last week (I’m late with my posting…) dedicated two articles to the benefits of migration. One, in Economics focus, was on the costs and benefits of migration and how the countries of origin of migrants, mostly in the developing world, gain from migration primarily through remittances. The other was a review of […]
Filed under: Economic sociology, Economic theory, Sociology | Leave a Comment
Tags: Economic analysis, economic development, poverty alleviation, Public policy analysis, social theory, Sociology, Well-being
Having just reviewed “Poor Economics“, a new book by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo (high on my reading list…), The Economist is hosting a debate inviting prominent economists to discuss the question of whether randomised trials can be regarded as the future of economics. The debate is definitely interesting and the viewpoints expressed quite relevant. […]
Filed under: Philosophy of economics, Social networks, Social science methodology | Leave a Comment
Tags: Economic analysis, economic development, economic methodology, Network Analysis, poverty alleviation, Quantitative methods, randomized trials, Social science data
Here are a few pictures taken during my visit of local branches of microfinance institutions, in the town of Villupuram in Tamil Nadu, the Union Territory of Pondicherry (both in South India), and the villages in the surrounding rural areas. Just a small hommage to their dedication to providing essential financial services to the poorer.
Filed under: Philanthropy and microfinance | Leave a Comment
Tags: economic development, Microfinance, poverty alleviation
Back from fieldwork in India, I feel relieved. There is hope that the sector will come out of the severe crisis in Andhra Pradesh, and the seeds have already been planted by microfinance institutions themselves. I did not visit Andhra but Tamil Nadu, a geographically close state of India and a comparably large and mature […]
Filed under: Philanthropy and microfinance | 1 Comment
Tags: economic development, Microfinance, Philanthropy, poverty alleviation, Public policy analysis
Development economics exhibits renewed interest for microfinance, particularly after the first results of impact evaluations through randomized trials (e.g. the work of A. Banerjee, E. Duflo and co-authors). Yet the final outcome does not only depend on individual microfinance institutions and the local context in which they operate, but also on the chain of inter-organisational […]
Filed under: Business networks, Economic theory, Philanthropy and microfinance | Leave a Comment
Tags: Economic analysis, economic development, Inter-organisational Networks, Microfinance, Models of markets, Networks and Markets, Philanthropy
The potential trade-off between commercial expansion and social goals is emphasised in comments of the current microcredit crisis in India –not least a well-informed FT article (subscription required) a few days ago. It has in fact been a recurrent theme in microfinance since the end of the 1990s. While consensus is that microfinance should strive […]
Filed under: Philanthropy and microfinance | Leave a Comment
Tags: economic development, Economic governance, Inter-organisational Networks, Microfinance, Philanthropy, poverty alleviation, Public policy analysis
A new blog post by Martin Ravallion of the World Bank proposes a new way in which research done there may support developing countries. Instead of a traditional “retailing model” under which researchers investigate a specific issue in a given setting and period of time, and produce findings for use in that context, he promotes […]
Filed under: Economic sociology, Economic theory, Philosophy of economics, Social science methodology | Leave a Comment
Tags: Economic analysis, economic development, economic methodology, Open access to scientific publications, Public policy analysis, Social science data, social theory
Antonio A. Casilli posted “Are social media deepening nutritional inequalities?” yesterday night. The post is about the launch of a joint initiative by CNN’s food blog Eatocracy and the location-based social networking service Foursquare. The idea is to support healthy eating by enabling users to check in local farmers markets and unlock “Healthy Eater” badges. […]
Filed under: Consumer behaviour, Socioeconomic studies of health | Leave a Comment
Tags: Behavioral economics, Eating behaviors, Eating disorders, economic development, Food choices, Obesity, poverty alleviation, Public policy analysis
A paper I have recently co-authored with Ana Marr, my colleague at the University of Greenwich, studies the “wholesale” lending relationships with which microfinance institutions (MFIs) obtain funding from various types of organisations -be they financial companies, official development agencies, or charities. We adopt an inter-organisational network approach and focus on three different settings, among […]
Filed under: Business networks, Philanthropy and microfinance | Leave a Comment
Tags: economic development, Inter-organisational Networks, Microfinance, Networks and Markets, Philanthropy, poverty alleviation
