Construction Time: The Shopping Mall-ization of Mecca?
In real-estate parlance, modern Mecca is a "mixed-use development." Our Muslim brethren ("brethren" is actually a gender-neutral term since the corresponding "sistren" i…
Showing posts with the label Neoliberalism
Mickey in GulagWorld: Enter Disney Shanghai
Wishing upon a CSR Death Star , you are. I was originally going to entitle this post "Totalitarianism and Theme Parks" but I thought the better of it. Some of you will of course still compl…
Party Like 2001: Argentina Again Headed for Default
There is no shortage of bad news these days...even The Captain and Tennille of "Muskrat Love" fame are calling it quits . In a sort-of related story, the Argentinian love affair with the re…
Pope Francis & Liberation Theology's Latin Shadow
Well, well, I suppose this is a halfway decent result: Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, is someone from the third world even if he is a child of (white) Italian immigrants. As I suggested,…
Thou Shalt Obey Thy Lord Mandy on Globalization
On paper, I am not supposed to favourably regard Peter Mandelson, the third architect of the UK's third way along with Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. While I regard the latter two as rather odious …
World's Top Central Bankers (Bernanke Isn't One)
In my never-ending quest to bring you, dear readers, the finest in political-economic commentary on what's out there--and believe me there is much--I've trawled through a multitude of sources…
Italy...If You Can't Beat Rating Agencies, Raid 'Em
Italy is often caricatured as a relatively lawless, cult of personality-type of republic in contrast to supposedly more enlightened states in the Eurozone. Certainly Silvio Berlusconi's antics do…
The Pinko Path: On Peru Joining Latin Left's Ranks
It's somewhat odd that the whitebread commentariat hasn't made more of this event, especially since it's happening in their own backyard. While dependencia theory of Latin American count…
Repairing the Adulterated IMF Post-Strauss-Kahn
I wonder what our colleagues at the Bretton Woods Project would make of this. Before going to sleep last night, I caught news that IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn was held in New York en…
PM Cameron to Block Gordon Brown Heading IMF?
The House has noticed the Prime Minister’s remarkable transformation in the last few weeks from Stalin to Mr Bean...Creating chaos out of order rather than order out of chaos - then-UK Shadow Chance…
Robert Wade on De-Neoliberalizing the World Bank
Here's yet another interesting article from the new LSE house journal Global Policy . It all started in the second issue of this publication when Robert Wade, a famously "heterodox" eco…
Singaporean PM Lee: PRC Revaluation a Win-Win
Well here's an interesting news item: China's model of authoritarian development is said to be based on the example of Singapore [ 1 , 2 ]. Whereas Deng Xiaoping's predecessors always der…
World Bank's Lin on Post-Crisis Industrial Policy
A few months back I featured Robert Wade's article in Global Policy concerning the prospects of industrial policy post-crisis. Yes, it was a bit of triumphalism about the follies of blind obeis…
IIE's Williamson: There Is No 'Beijing Consensus'
Whether he's found the attention for doing so welcome or not, John Williamson should be familiar to all concerned as the fellow who coined the "Washington Consensus." Although he takes …
Ha-Joon Chang Bids Capital Controls Farewell
And so the death knell for Washington Consensus-style policies tolls even louder. While it's certainly debatable whether the excesses of liberalization, deregulation, and privatization helped bri…