Global Policy Journal - Comment & Opinion

The Economics of Isolation and the Role of Aid

Paul Collier — Thu 16 Feb 2012

In the past month I have visited South Sudan, Sierra Leone and Rwanda. Although radically different in many important respects, these three low-income countries face the common problem that their econ...Read more

Is the Euro Socially Sustainable?

Paul Collier — Tue 22 Nov 2011

The fate of the Euro will be determined not in Brussels, Frankfurt or Berlin, but in households and firms across Europe. In effect, the countries of the Eurozone have returned to the Gold Standard. Th...Read more

Economics for Dangerous Times

Paul Collier — Mon 12 Sep 2011

These are dangerous economic times. The Keynesian framework within which the policy response to the Great Recession was forged in 2009 is no longer adequate. The OECD may have reached the limits of cr...Read more

Slums into Suburbs

Paul Collier — Thu 14 Jul 2011

I have just held an annual Roundtable for African central bankers. One of our themes was housing finance. Africa’s future is urban: cities facilitate productivity. But cities require huge invest...Read more

Army Salami: How to Dump a Dictator

Paul Collier — Tue 21 Jun 2011

And now Yemen: in recent months there has been a remarkable collapse in the ability of dictators to maintain power. The dictator model has been straightforward: control the army. In turn this involved...Read more

Commodity Prices and Investor Opportunities

Paul Collier — Wed 18 May 2011

Since the crisis, global investors have been searching for a new safe haven. In the core industrial OECD economies both the public and private sectors face dangerous structural challenges. Fiscal d...Read more

Information is Power: But Where Will It Lead?

Paul Collier — Thu 14 Apr 2011

New information technology has radically shifted the balance of power between governments and their citizens. This empowerment has worked through two distinct routes. One –exemplified by Wiki...Read more

Paul Collier - Implications of Egypt for Autocrats

Paul Collier — Sun 13 Feb 2011

Two decades ago the ‘end of history’ supposedly arrived: democracy was the only conceivable future. Instead, during the past decade China’s success rehabilitated autocracy. Now th...Read more

Paul Collier - The World Food Crisis, Mark II

Paul Collier — Wed 12 Jan 2011

The FAO index of world food prices has now surpassed the peak reached in 2008. Then a price spike was punctured by the global economic crisis; this time there will be no such demand reduction. The ...Read more

The Lessons of Cote d'Ivoire

Paul Collier — Fri 17 Dec 2010

In Wars Guns and Votes I argued that without effective checks and balances elections do not resolve problems but rather intensify them. I chose Cote d’Ivoire as the book’s case study. C...Read more

Should Africa Get Back Into Debt?

Paul Collier — Fri 12 Nov 2010

Africa has only recently been forgiven debt that it could not pay back. Why should it contemplate borrowing again? The answer is that it needs to borrow because it is not investing enough to preven...Read more

Why Investor Risk Now Matters in Africa, And How to Address It

Paul Collier — Thu 14 Oct 2010

The Annual Meetings of the World Bank and IMF convene both investors and governments. This year investors are interested in Africa. Partly, this is for want of anything better: Opportunities in the...Read more

Development Models Revisited: European Democracy vs. Asian Autocracy

Paul Collier — Tue 14 Sep 2010

Dysfunctional governance is central to why some countries remain poor. Since 1991 Europe has attempted to improve governance by promoting democratisation. Yet the distinction between democratic and...Read more