SUMMARY

Replacing inefficient kerosene lighting with electric lighting or other clean alternatives can rapidly achieve development and energy access goals, save money and reduce climate warming. Many of the 250 million households that lack reliable access to electricity rely on inefficient and dangerous simple wick lamps and other kerosene-fueled light sources, using 4 to 25 billion liters of kerosene annually to meet basic lighting needs. Kerosene costs can be a significant household expense and subsidies are expensive. New information on kerosene lamp emissions reveals that their climate impacts are substantial. Eliminating current annual black carbon emissions would provide a climate benefit equivalent to 5 gigatons of carbon dioxide reductions over the next 20 years. Robust and low-cost technologies for supplanting simple wick and other kerosene-fueled lamps exist and are easily distributed and scalable. Improving household lighting offers a low-cost opportunity to improve development, cool the climate and reduce costs.

Download the full paper »

Downloads

• Download the full paper

Editor’s Note: An interactive feature, highlighting the key findings from this report, can be found here.

Over a billion people worldwide live on less than $1.25 a day. But that number is falling. This has given credence to the idea that extreme poverty can be eliminated in a generation. A new study by Brookings researchers examines the prospects for ending extreme poverty by 2030 and the factors that will determine progress toward this goal. Below are some of the key findings:

1. We are at a unique point in history where there are more people in the world living right around the $1.25 mark than at any other income level. This implies that equitable growth in the developing world will result in more movement of people across the poverty line than across any other level.

2. Sustaining the trend rate of global poverty reduction requires that each year a new set of individuals is primed to cross the international poverty line. This will become increasingly difficult as some of the poorest of the poor struggle to make enough progress to approach the $1.25 threshold over the next twenty years.

3. The period from 1990 to 2030 resembles a relay race in which responsibility for leading the charge on global poverty reduction passes between China, India and sub-Saharan Africa. China has driven progress over the last twenty years, but with its poverty rate now down in the single digits, the baton is being passed to India. India has the capacity to deliver sustained progress on global poverty reduction over the next decade based on modest assumptions of equitable growth. Once India’s poverty is largely exhausted, it will be up to sub-Saharan Africa to run the final relay leg and bring the baton home. This poses a significant challenge as most of Africa’s poor people start a long way behind the poverty line.

4. As global poverty approaches zero, it becomes increasingly concentrated in countries where the record of and prospects for poverty reduction are weakest. Today, a third of the world’s poor live in fragile states but this share could rise to half in 2018 and nearly two-thirds in 2030.

5. The World Bank has recently set a goal to reduce extreme poverty around the world to under 3 percent by 2030. It is unlikely that this goal can be achieved by stronger than expected growth across the developing world, or greater income equality within each developing country, alone. Both factors are needed simultaneously.

Download the full report »

Downloads

• Download the full report

In July 2013, the World Bank decided to phase-out lending for new coal-fired power plants in middle-income countries, except in rare circumstances where no financially feasible alternatives to coal exist. This decision was made for a combination of reasons including concerns about local air pollution and global climate change, as well as evidence that these projects have little trouble attracting private capital without World Bank involvement. Now, policymakers are considering whether the World Bank’s policy should also cover projects designed to retrofit existing coal-fired power plants in middle-income countries by adding scrubbers and other technologies that increase efficiency and reduce air pollution. 

There are several fundamental questions underlying this debate: Is financing coal power plant retrofits a good use of World Bank resources? If so, should the World Bank insist on the use of best available technologies when it finances these retrofits? These questions are vitally important, as retrofit technologies are designed to minimize toxic air pollutants, including soot and smog, which are both dangerous for human health and the world’s climate. Older coal plants without retrofit technologies are less efficient, and emit more pollutants per unit of coal burned than those with retrofits applied. Evidence shows that soot and smog can cause respiratory illness and asthma, especially in children and elderly people, and can diminish local agricultural production by reducing sunlight. Furthermore, in many countries coal plants are the single largest source of carbon dioxide emissions driving climate change. 

To help inform the policy debate, this analysis surveys the technologies in use in more than 2,000 coal-fired power plants currently in operation, under construction, or planned in middle-income countries. The findings reveal that roughly 70 percent of these power plants rely on old, inefficient technologies. Retrofitting these plants would reduce pollution, increase efficiency and save lives. In middle-income countries that do not mandate coal retrofits, the World Bank could play a helpful role in financing those improvements, particularly as part of broader policy reforms designed to reduce climate pollution and increase efficiency across the power sector.

Importantly, however, the data also show that important qualifications should be made. First, because coal is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions and retrofits are likely to keep coal plants operating longer, the World Bank should insist that retrofit projects occur within a context of national and local policy reforms designed to abate greenhouse gas pollution. Toward this end, the World Bank should continue to help countries build capacity to adopt and enforce climate pollution controls and other offsetting actions and policies. Second, the World Bank should insist that projects it finances use best available pollution control technologies. Already, the substantial majority of coal retrofits completed to date in middle-income countries have used best available technologies. These retrofits were almost universally financed exclusively by private capital. The World Bank should not use its capital to support inferior retrofit technologies that are below the standards already adopted by the private sector in middle-income countries.

Downloads

• Download the full report (PDF)

In the United States, the official poverty rate for 2012 stood at 15 percent based on the national poverty line which is equivalent to around $16 per person per day. Of the 46.5 million Americans living in poverty, 20.4 million live under half the poverty line. This begs the question of just how poor America’s poorest people are.

Poverty, in one form or other, exists in every country. But the most acute, absolute manifestations of poverty are assumed to be limited to the developing world. This is reflected in the fact that rich countries tend to set higher poverty lines than poor countries, and that global poverty estimates have traditionally excluded industrialized countries and their populations altogether.

An important study on U.S. poverty by Luke Shaefer and Kathryn Edin gently challenges this assumption. Using an alternative dataset from the one employed for the official U.S. poverty measure, Shaefer and Edin show that millions of Americans live on less than $2 a day—a threshold commonly used to measure poverty in the developing world. Depending on the exact definitions used, they find that up to 5 percent of American households with children are shown to fall under this parsimonious poverty line.

Methodologies for measuring poverty differ wildly both within and across countries, so comparisons and their interpretation demand extreme care.

These numbers are intended to shock—and they succeed. The United States is known for having higher inequality and a less generous social safety net than many affluent countries in Europe, but the acute deprivations that flow from this are less understood. A crude comparison of Shaefer and Edin’s estimates with the World Bank’s official $2 a day poverty estimates for developing economies would place the United States level with or behind a large set of countries, including Russia (0.1 percent), the West Bank and Gaza (0.3 percent), Jordan (1.6 percent), Albania (1.7 percent), urban Argentina (1.9 percent), urban China (3.5 percent), and Thailand (4.1 percent). Many of these countries are recipients of American foreign aid. However, methodologies for measuring poverty differ wildly both within and across countries, so such comparisons and their interpretation demand extreme care.

This brief is organized into two parts. In the first part, we examine the welfare of America’s poorest people using a variety of different data sources and definitions. These generate estimates of the number of Americans living under $2 a day that range from 12 million all the way down to zero. This wide spectrum reflects not only a lack of agreement on how poverty can most reliably be measured, but the particular ways in which poverty is, and isn’t, manifested in the U.S.. In the second part, we reexamine America’s $2 a day poverty in the context of global poverty. We begin by identifying the source and definition of poverty that most faithfully replicates the World Bank’s official poverty measure for the developing world to allow a fairer comparison between the U.S. and developing nations. We then compare the characteristics of poverty in the U.S. and the developing world to provide a more complete picture of the nature of poverty in these different settings. Finally, we explain why comparisons of poverty in the U.S. and the developing world, despite their limitations and pitfalls, are likely to become more common.

Downloads

• Download the full paper

Executive Summary

Cities are creations of their states. Their boundaries, their powers, and their responsibilities are all substantially prescribed by state law. With the advent of the new federalism—beginning in the 1970s and resurgent today—the devolution of power from Washington to state capitals has increased the importance of state decision making for cities.

Yet, this shift occurred precisely as cities were losing political clout in state legislatures due to population decline within city limits and rampant growth in suburban jurisdictions.

This paper argues that in response to shifting population distributions within states, cities need to build new coalitions to effectively achieve their legislative goals within state legislatures. Case studies—New York City, Chicago, Detroit, and the three largest cities in Ohio (Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Columbus)—are used to more closely examine coalition-building methods.

Overall, the authors find:

• Cities' dependence on state government has increased as the federal government has ceded more power to the states. As cities' populations have declined, they have become weaker in state legislatures that have grown more powerful due to federal policy. In the peak year of 1978, about 15 percent of city revenues came from the federal government. By 1999 that had decreased to 3 percent. Concurrently, the federal government has shifted a number of programs to the states, which control the rules and revenue mechanisms cities operate under.

• Traditional political coalitions cities have used to achieve their state legislative goals are no longer as effective. Partisan (usually Democratic) coalitions are less reliable as focus has shifted to suburban swing districts. Moreover, as their power has decreased, cities' agendas have become more reactive, aiming to preserve the status quo in funding, infrastructure projects, and autonomy.

• Older, inner-ring suburbs are a logical new partner for cities in state legislatures. Increasingly, these suburbs, and some outer ones, have common interests with central cities as they address immigration, fiscal stress, and infrastructure woes. Such alliances would also better address metropolitan-wide issues on a metropolitan basis.

There remain many obstacles to forging such coalitions, however, including longtime distrust among big cities and their neighbors, racial disparities, and in some cases, growing investment in central cities while surrounding suburbs languish. Nonetheless, for cities to effectively influence their state governments more creative approaches to coalition building must be found.

Downloads

• Download

For over 100 years, the driving force of Ohio’s economy has been the state’s so-called Big Eight cities—Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Toledo, Akron, Dayton, Canton, and Youngstown. Today, though, the driving reality of these cities is sustained, long-term population loss. The central issue confronting these cities—and the state and surrounding metropolitan area—is not whether these cities will have different physical footprints and more green space than they do now, but how it will happen.

The state must adopt a different way of thinking and a different vision of its cities’ future—and so must the myriad local, civic, philanthropic, and business leaders who will also play a role in reshaping Ohio’s cities. The following seven basic premises should inform any vision for a smaller, stronger future and subsequent strategies for change in these places:

• These cities contain significant assets for future rebuilding
  
• These cities will not regain their peak population
  
• These cities have a surplus of housing
  
• These cities have far more vacant land than can be absorbed by redevelopment
  
• Impoverishment threatens the viability of these cities more than population loss as such
  
• Local resources are severely limited
  
• The fate of cities and their metropolitan areas are inextricably inter-connected
  

These premises have significant implications for the strategies that state and local governments should pursue to address the issues of shrinking cities.

Full Paper on Ohio's Cities » (PDF)
Paper on Shrinking Cities Across the United States »

Downloads

• Full Paper

Should increasing exports be part of the solution to Greater Cleveland's -- and the nation's -- economic doldrums? Can export growth make this recovery job-filled rather than jobless?

That's a counterintuitive proposition, but one that is gaining traction in Northeast Ohio. Cleveland, Youngstown and other metros often see themselves on the losing end of globalization, as manufacturing has moved abroad and trade barriers and currency manipulations impede the entry of U.S.-made goods into foreign markets.

But exports bring tremendous benefits to workers, companies and the nation as a whole. Exporting companies tend to be more innovative. They pay higher wages across all skill levels. And they are a response to a new global reality: 95 percent of the world's customers live outside the United States.

Any successful export strategy, including the one that the Obama administration is developing, must start with where U.S. exports come from. Our major metropolitan areas are the nation's export hubs. In 2008, they produced about 64 percent of U.S. exports, including more than 62 percent of manufactured goods and 75 percent of services.

Northeast Ohio's major metros are leaders in exports, oriented toward global consumers in a way that most American regions are not. Exports contribute more than 12 percent of the gross metropolitan product in Akron, 13 percent in Cleveland, and a jaw-dropping 18 percent in Youngstown, compared to a national metro average of 10.9 percent.

Exports are also a source of much-needed jobs in these metros. As of 2008 (the most recent year for which we have data) there were 110,000 export jobs in the Cleveland metro and about 30,000 each in greater Akron and Youngstown. Every $1 billion in exports from the average metropolitan area in 2008 supported 5,800 jobs.

To leverage the powerful export activity already occurring in Cleveland and elsewhere, the Obama administration should connect its macroeconomic vision for export growth with the metro reality where the doubling will mostly occur.

For example, the president's export advisory council should include state and local leaders, and revamp export guidance and support to meet the needs of small firms, which find it hard to enter new markets.

But Northeast Ohio metros have their own work to do. The rate of export growth between 2003 and 2008 in Cleveland and Akron is lackluster when compared to the large metro average. U.S. companies dominate the global market in service exports, and the nation actually has a generous service trade surplus, but service exports' share of overall output in Northeast Ohio metros is smaller than the large metro average, and growth in service exports is slower.

Most troubling, Cleveland and its neighbors are underperforming when it comes to innovation, which is a critical ingredient for future international success. Metros that are manufacturing-oriented or export-intensive (or both) tend to create patents at a rate of just over five patents per 1,000 workers. But Cleveland, Akron and Youngstown fall short, with 2.8, 4.5, and 1 patent per 1,000 workers, respectively.

Northeast Ohio must accelerate its efforts to increase the region's innovation and export capacity, through regional organizations such as NorTech and JumpStart. Just as the president set an export goal for the nation, Northeast Ohio should embrace the opportunity to set its own aggressive export goals. Business groups, the Fund for Our Economic Future, universities and regional economic development organizations have made a start but need to devote more resources and collaborate to achieve those goals.

The region can make this happen. Organizations like the Manufacturing and Advocacy and Growth Network (MAGNET) and its partners, with support from the Fund and chambers, are working directly with companies to increase manufacturing innovation in Northeast Ohio, with increasing exports one of their major emphases.

Editors’ Note: Outgoing British Prime Minister David Cameron once proudly stated that "there is no country in the Western world more open to Chinese investment than Britain." What will happen to the Sino-British relationship now that the U.K. will almost certainly leave the EU? This post originally appeared in the Nikkei Asia Review.

One of the many side effects of the June 23 British referendum on the European Union is that it will put an end to a honeymoon that had barely started less than a year ago, when George Osborne, the U.K.'s chancellor of the exchequer, declared on the eve of Chinese President Xi Jinping's state visit to Britain: "Let's stick together and make a golden decade for both our countries." Much has happened since the visit, during which Xi was feted as a guest of honor by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace and at the British Parliament.

Over the past three years, British Prime Minister David Cameron and Osborne, (the man in effect running the country's China policy), seem to have partly anticipated the referendum's outcome by partnering with a few Asian countries outside the European Union—China especially—that would help finance some of the major infrastructure projects needed by the U.K., including nuclear plants, high-speed railways and airport infrastructure.

Now, in the turmoil following the referendum, Cameron is on the way out and Osborne's future remains uncertain. What will happen to the Sino-British relationship now that the U.K. will almost certainly leave the EU? Initial signals from China have been subdued. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying recently said she believed that the impact of Brexit will be at all levels—not only in relations between China and Britain.

"China supports the European integration process and would like to see Europe playing a proactive role in international affairs. We have full confidence in the outlook for the development of China-EU ties," she said. This is a far cry from the enthusiastic comments in Chinese media on the Sino-British relationship in 2015, when Britain decided—much to the chagrin of Washington, Tokyo, Berlin and Paris—to be the first Western country to join the China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and when it hosted Xi, hoping to attract massive Chinese foreign direct investment.

Cameron had proudly stated that "there is no country in the Western world more open to Chinese investment than Britain." The U.K. is currently Europe's top destination for Chinese FDI with a cumulative investment of $16.6 billion in the country since 2000 (including $3.3 billion in 2015 alone), and many memoranda of understanding signed during Xi's visit last fall. Will these be completed now that the British people have voted to leave the EU? A few months ago, Wang Jianlin, the head of China's Dalian Wanda Group—a commercial property and cinema chain operator—and a major investor in Europe warned: "Should Britain exit the EU, many Chinese companies would consider moving their European headquarters to other countries," adding that "Brexit would not be a smart choice for the U.K., as it would create more obstacles and challenges for investors and visa problems."

The Global Times, an English-language publication that is part of the Chinese Communist Party's People's Daily, was even less sympathetic to the British situation, writing in an editorial after the referendum, that the vote would "probably be a landmark event that proves Britain is heading in the direction of being a small country with few people, writing itself off as hopeless and acting recklessly."

The Beijing leadership—which uniquely went out of its way to support the Remain camp on several occasions—is puzzled by the referendum's result, which has not only created some disorder (an unbearable word in official party language) but also led to the resignation of the country's prime minister and the risk of further pro-autonomy referenda (namely, in Scotland). In the eyes of a communist party fully focused on retaining all its powers, Cameron made a serious mistake as the leader of a major country.

After all, China has no soft intentions toward the U.K. The two countries have had a complicated history. The Chinese still call the period starting in the mid-1800s— which included the British-led Opium Wars—the "century of humiliation." And it has only been 19 years since Hong Kong was returned to the motherland as a Chinese "special administrative region (SAR)." Not that the Cameron government has done very much to support its former territory: As the "golden decade" was unfolding, Hong Kong faced one of its most difficult times, with arrests of dissidents and the disappearance of some booksellers—including Lee Bo, who holds dual Sino-British citizenship and had published controversial books about Chinese leaders.

Now that British voters have spoken, chances of a backlash are running high. For a start, China is keen on keeping close involvement with the EU—its second-largest trading partner after the U.S., a source of technology transfers, and an ally in Beijing's "One Belt, One Road" projects in Europe and Asia, or in initiatives such as the AIIB and the country' Silk Road fund. In this respect China will almost certainly want to continue its close partnership with both EU institutions and individual countries, especially in Eastern and Central Europe where "One Belt, One Road" has been warmly welcomed. (Two countries recently visited by Xi, Poland and the Czech Republic, received substantial financial commitments from the Chinese president.)

London will, of course, continue to play a key role in finance as one of the world's top international trading platforms with Chinese treasury bonds issued in renminbi. Chinese visitors (including property buyers looking for fresh opportunities) will continue to flock to the city. But when it comes to being China's bridge to the EU, it is clear that Beijing will look for alternatives, particularly Germany, which is China's top economic partner in Europe. German Chancellor Angela Merkel recently made her ninth visit to China and managed to address a long list of key issues, including trade, investment and reciprocity, as well as human rights, new laws regulating nongovernment organizations and territorial claims in the South China Sea. In a powerful speech to Nanjing University students in Beijing on June 12, she stressed that the trust of the citizens can only be achieved by the rule of law, "rather than rule by law." It has been many years since British leaders have used this language in China. Even though some British politicians are now calling for a reassessment of the country's China policy, it is unlikely that the U.K. will do anything but accommodate China in order to preserve trade and investment in the post-Brexit uncertainty.

For all its openness, the "new U.K." will become less attractive market-wise. After Brexit, China will also lose a proponent of free trade within the EU—that is bad news as the 28-nation block is pondering the decision to grant market economy status to China, in accordance with an agreement under the World Trade Organization. Market economy status affects the way anti-dumping duties are used. Job-wise, the European steel industry is vulnerable. Since the adoption by the European Parliament of a nonbinding resolution against granting market economy status to China on May 12, many European politicians fear that more Chinese economic involvement in their home countries would lead to more cheap goods competing with European-made products and fewer jobs at home—hence a less favorable context for China. The chances of an EU-China free-trade agreement are becoming more remote now as the EU is more focused on finalizing a comprehensive agreement on investment with China. European companies have been lobbying for such a pact.

Although it will almost certainly make the most of an autonomous U.K. after conducting its own assessment, China does not like uncertainty—especially in turbulent times both at home and abroad. It worries about challenges against ruling parties, as well as an anti-globalization attitude that could affect its own image as a beneficiary of globalization. As for Europe, both Germany and France have strong relations with China. With their backing, the European Commission has just published an ambitious new strategy on China. It looks like the U.K. will not be part of it.

Premier Li Keqiang's government work report was a pragmatic and concrete one, pointing out challenges as well as strengths and opportunities, according to a US-based China scholar.

The report, delivered by Premier Li at the opening of the fourth session of the 12th National People's Congress (NPC) on Saturday, is now being deliberated by some 3,000 deputies.

Cheng Li, director of the John L. Thornton China Center of the Brookings Institution, said the report tells people that the Chinese economy is facing difficulties as a result of structural reforms, the need for better environmental protection and the impact of a sluggish global economy.

"It tells the public that such economic challenges will last for a period of time, so the report does not give the public an unachievable expectation," Cheng Li said.

Meanwhile, the report has also elaborated on China's strength, such as the potential to be unleashed in urbanization, the development of the service sector, the employment policy and the innovation policy, according to Cheng Li.

"So this is a report that neither gives the public too high an expectation nor disappointment," said Cheng Li, whose research has focused on the transformation of Chinese leaders and technological development in China.

Cheng Li believes that this is especially important during the coming two years, or the beginning years of the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020), when there won't be excessive high economic growth rate, something he said China also does not need.

In the work report, China's gross domestic product (GDP) growth in 2016 has been set between 6.5 percent and 7 percent. It is the first time since 1995 for the target to be in a range rather than one single number.

China's economy grew by 6.9 percent in 2015, the lowest in a quarter of a century, but it was still among the highest in the world.

According to the report, an average annual growth of at least 6.5 percent should be maintained in the coming five years in order to achieve the goals of doubling GDP and household income by 2020 from the 2010 levels.

It also says that by 2020, the contribution from scientific and technological advances should account for 60 percent of GDP growth.

Cheng Li said structural reforms will bring a lot of challenges, all of which would require dealing with by the Chinese government.

He described the goals in the work report as very specific. "There isn't much empty content and slogan type of things," he said.

"It is what the Chinese public wants to see... and it's a relatively balanced and good report, one quite pertinent to China's situation today," Cheng Li said.

He hoped that the report had emphasized more that many of the challenges are also opportunities. "It is just the beginning and the potential is huge," he said, citing how areas such as environmental protection could help job creation and business opportunities.

To Cheng Li, the potential opportunities will help small- and medium-sized companies, large companies, Chinese companies overseas and foreign-funded companies in China break new ground.

Cheng Li said the growth targets set in the 13th Five-Year Plan are quite reasonable. "More than 90 percent of what's in the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) had been achieved, and there is a better reason to achieve what's in the 13th Five-Year Plan," he said.

This piece was originally published by China Daily.

The most noticeable trend under the leadership of Xi Jinping since the 2012 National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been the continuing consolidation of power. In particular, the military has been a key forum in which Xi has strengthened both his personal power and his new administration’s authority. Xi has adopted several approaches and political tactics to achieve this, including purging the two highest-ranking generals under the previous administration for corruption and other charges; arresting 52 senior military officers on various charges of wrongdoing; reshuffling generals between regions, departments, and services; attempting to systematically reform the PLA’s structure and operations; and, last but not least, rapidly promoting “young guards” (少壮派) in the Chinese military.

These bold moves will have profound implications—not only for Xi’s political standing in the lead-up to the next leadership turnover in 2017, but also for the development of civilian-military relations in the country and for the trajectory of China’s military modernization. The third installment in this series focuses on personnel changes that have occurred during the early phase of military reform.

Who are the rising stars in the PLA following the recent reorganization and reshuffling? What are the distinguishing characteristics of the “young guards”? What are possible explanations for and implications of some of the highest-level personnel changes, such as the retirement of the heavyweight military figure General Liu Yuan and the marginalization of Xi’s confidant General Cai Yingting? How does Xi successfully perform the delicate balancing act in personnel appointments by aggressively promoting his own long-time protégés and new loyalists while avoiding making too many enemies?

This is part three of a series that will appear in the upcoming issue of the China Leadership Monitor. Download the article in full below. The first paper in the series can be found here: Promoting "young guards": The recent high turnover in the PLA leadership (Part 1: Purges and reshuffles), and the second paper here: Promoting “young guards”: The recent high turnover in the PLA leadership (Part II: Expansion and escalation).

Downloads

• Promoting "Young Guards": The Recent High Turnover in the PLA Leadership (Part III: Personal and Political)

Event Information

On December 1, the Center on the United States and Europe (CUSE) at Brookings hosted a discussion exploring Russian power throughout history and how two of its most pivotal rulers—Josef Stalin and Vladimir Putin—defined Russian leadership and its role in the world in the 20^th and 21^st centuries. The discussion featured remarks by Stephen Kotkin, professor at Princeton University and author of the authoritative new biography, Stalin Volume I: Paradoxes of Power, 1878-1928 (Penguin Press, 2014).

In his book, Kotkin reveals Stalin as a ruler who is both astute and blinkered, diligent and paranoid, cynical and true-believing, charming and vicious. However, Stalin is more than just an eminent biography; it is a book about Russian power in the world as well as Stalin’s power in Russia, recast as the Soviet Union. Ultimately, Stalin offers an analysis of power—where it comes from, how it is utilized or squandered, and what its human consequences are.

Brookings President Strobe Talbott offered introductory remarks and moderated the discussion.  Prior to assuming the leadership of Brookings, Talbott served in the U.S. State Department as ambassador-at-large for the former Soviet Union and then as deputy secretary.

Audio

• Putin and Russian Power in the World: The Stalin Legacy

Transcript

• Uncorrected Transcript (.pdf)

Event Materials

• 20141201_putin_russia_stalin_transcript

Editor's Note: The paper is part of a book entitled, “The G8-G20 Relationship in Global Governance.”

Future global growth faces many challenges. The first is securing economic recovery from the global financial crisis and reviving strong growth. The euro area has experienced a double-dip recession. Growth remains subdued in other advanced economies. Emerging economies (including the BRICS countries of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, as well as other major emerging economies) had been the driver of global growth, accounting for almost two thirds of global growth since 2008, but in 2013 they too were experiencing slowing growth. The second challenge is sustaining growth. Many countries have large and rising public debt, and face unsustainable debt dynamics (International Monetary Fund [IMF] 2012). Environmental stresses put the longer-term sustainability of growth at risk. The third challenge is promoting balanced growth. Large external imbalances between countries — China's surplus and the U.S. deficit being the most notable — put global economic stability at risk and give rise to protectionist pressures. Unemployment has reached high levels in many countries, and there are concerns about a jobless recovery. And economic inequality within countries has been rising. More than two thirds of the world's people live in countries where income inequality has risen in the past few decades.

Thus, promoting strong, sustainable, and balanced growth is central objective of the Group of 20 (G20). A core component of the G20 is the Working Group on the Framework for Strong, Sustainable, and Balanced Growth. Yet G20 policy actions since the onset of the global financial crisis in 2008 have focused mainly on short-term crisis response. Economic stabilization is necessary and risks to stability in the global economy, especially those in the euro area, call for firm actions to restore confidence. However, short-term stabilization only buys time and will not produce robust growth unless accompanied by structural reforms and investments that boost productivity and open new sources of growth. To be sure, several G20 members have announced or are implementing structural reforms. But the approach to strengthening the foundations for growth, meeting the jobs challenge, and assuring the longer-term sustainability of growth remains partial and piecemeal. Some elements of an approach are present, but the unrealized potential for a coherent and coordinated strategy and effort is significant. The G20 needs to move beyond a predominately short-term crisis management role to focus more on the longer-term agenda for strong, sustainable, and balanced growth. 

Download the paper »

Downloads

• Download the paper (PDF)

2015 is a pivotal year for global development; this fall is a pivotal moment. Meetings this fall will determine the global vision for sustainable development for 2030.

Three papers being released today—“Action implications focusing now on implementation of the post-2015 agenda,” “Systemic sustainability as the strategic imperative for the post-2015 agenda,” and “Political decisions and institutional innovations required for systemic transformations envisioned in the post-2015 sustainable development agenda”—set out some foundational ideas and specific proposals for political decisions and institutional innovations, which focus now on the implementation of the new global vision for 2030. This blog summarizes the key points in the three papers listed below.

Fundamentals for guiding actions, reforms and decisions

1) Managing systemic risks needs to be the foundational idea for implementing the post-2015 agenda.

The key political idea latent but not yet fully visible in the post-2015 agenda is that it is not a developing country poverty agenda for global development in the traditional North-South axis but a universal agenda based on the perception of urgent challenges that constitute systemic threats.

The term “sustainable development” by itself as the headline for the P-2015 agenda creates the danger of inheriting terminology from the past to guide the future.

2) Goal-setting and implementation must be effectively linked.

The international community learned from the previous two sets of goal-setting experiences that linking implementation to goal-setting is critical to goal achievement.  G-20 leader engagement in the post-2015 agenda and linking the success of the G-20 presidencies of Turkey (2015), China (2016), and Germany (2017) would provide global leadership for continuity of global awareness and commitment.

3) Focus on the Sustainable Development Goals must be clear.

Criticism of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as being too defuse and too detailed is ill-founded and reveals a lack of political imagination. It is a simple task to group the 17 goals into a few clusters that clearly communicate their focus on poverty, access, sustainability, partnership, growth, and institutions and their linkages to the social, economic, and environmental systemic threats that are the real and present dangers.

The Bretton Woods era is over. It was over before China initiated the creation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the BRICS New Development Bank (NDB). Never has it been clearer than now that maintaining a single global system of international institutions is essential for geopolitical reasons. For the implementation of the post-2015 agenda, all the major international institutions need to commit to them.

In a joint paper with Zhang Haibing from the Shanghai Institutes of International Studies (SIIS), we make five specific governance proposals for decision-makers: 

The implementation of the post-2015 agenda requires that nations internalize the SDGs by debating, adapting and adopting them in terms of their own domestic cultural, institutional, and political circumstances. It will be important for the U.N. declarations in September to urge all countries to undertake domestic decision-making processes toward this end.

2) Presidential coordination committees should be established.

To adequately address systemic risks and to implement the P-2015 agenda requires comprehensive, integrated, cross-sectoral, whole-of-government approaches.  South Korea’s experience with presidential committees composed of ministers with diverse portfolios, private sector and civil society leaders provides an example of how governments could break the “silos” and meet the holistic nature of systemic threats.

3) There needs to be a single global system of international institutions.

China’s Premier Li Keqiang stated at the World Economic Forum in early 2015 that “the world order established after World War II must be maintained, not overturned.” Together with a speech Li gave at the OECD on July 1st after signing an expanded work program agreement with the OECD and becoming a member of the OECD Development Center, clearly signals of China’s intention to cooperate within the current institutional system. The West needs to reciprocate with clear signals of respect for the increasing roles and influence of China and other emerging market economies in global affairs.

4) We must move toward a single global monitoring system for development targets.

The monitoring and evaluation system that accompanies the post-2015 SDGs will be crucial to guiding the implementation of them. The U.N., the OECD, the World Bank, and the IMF have all participated in joint data gathering efforts under the International Development Goals  (IDGs) in the 1990s and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in the 2000s. Each of these institutions has a crucial role to play now, but they need to be brought together under one umbrella to orchestrate their contributions to a comprehensive global data system.

By engaging in the post-2015 agenda, the G-20 leaders’ summits would be strengthened by involving G-20 leaders in the people-centered post-2015 agenda. Systemically important countries would be seen as leading on systemically important issues. The G-20 finance ministers can play an appropriate role by serving as the coordinating mechanism for the global system of international institutions for the post-2015 agenda. A G-20 Global Sustainable Development Council, composed of the heads of the presidential committees for sustainable development from G20 countries, could become an effective focal point for assessing systemic sustainability.

These governance innovations could re-energize the G-20 and provide the international community with the leadership, the coordination, and the monitoring capabilities that it needs to implement the post-2015 agenda.

The flight of humans from Syria has been rapid, massive and dynamic. The number of refugees has grown from 26,000 in the first year of the war to almost 4.2 million now, four years later. It is time for bold action from the world to support Turkey and the other countries of the region hosting the vast majority of refugees.

None of Syria’s neighbors – the primary hosts of refugees – expected the displacement to reach such a scale, nor for the crisis to last this long. Many believed in the early days of the Arab Spring that the oppressive regime of Bashar al-Assad would be replaced by a reformist-minded, popularly-elected government - mirroring the transition that had just taken place in Tunisia and Egypt. Instead, Syria became mired in a civil war between an ever-growing number of opposition groups and the regime, whose repression of civilians, regardless of any involvement in the crisis, has forced millions to flee in terror on either side of the country’s borders.

Until recently, the overwhelming majority of the refugees were fleeing the indiscriminate attacks of the Syrian government. More recently, ISIS has been a significant source of terror, while even more recently Russia’s entry into the conflict has triggered another wave of flight.

Today, the refugee populations registered in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey total more than 4 million souls. Managing the presence of such large numbers of refugees has been costly on host countries economically, socially and politically. What was expected to be a temporary refugee influx has become a protracted crisis. With no signs of a resolution of the conflict in the foreseeable future, the refugees’ hope to return is diminishing.

The massive influx of refugees into Europe, often via extremely costly and life-threatening channels, reflects the despair and harsh living conditions that many refugees feel. Syrians constitute the majority of the 800,000 migrants that have crossed into Europe this year. As the crisis spills beyond Syria’s immediate neighbors, the EU is experiencing major challenges in managing a response. It is clear that attending to refugees is not only a concern of the immediate neighborhood – but that of a much wider region.

In looking at the challenges to Europe, it is important to underscore that neighboring countries have shouldered most of the burden of caring for the refugees, with inadequate assistance from the international community. Resettlement has been extremely limited, and roughly only a third of the pledges to U.N. response plans have been met.

Now is the time to adopt a comprehensive approach that will offer a better future for refugees and their hosts. Attention must be paid to two areas in particular: Education and access to employment. In this regard, it will be critical to move beyond a strategy focused on humanitarian relief to one explicitly structured around sustainable development and empowerment of refugees.

We need a globally-funded Recovery Program for the Middle East that brings about immediate action to mitigate the impact of the crisis on the economies and services of Syria’s neighbors. As part of that, we need to recognize the skills and income that refugees could contribute to the Turkish economy, if they were only allowed to do so. This program could not be carried out by the Turks alone, but would need the engagement of a range of actors – from the U.N. to the World Bank to the private sector and other donors.

Turkey and its neighbors have generously cared for more than 4 million refugees: But as the displacement crisis enters its fifth year, this burden needs to be shared out much more fairly and effectively.

Sadly, despite the desperate need for peace in Syria, we need to respond to the reality that Syrian refugees will not be able to return home for a while yet. As simultaneously the host of the world’s largest Syrian refugee population as well as host to the G-20 Summit, Turkey is in an ideal position to bring this reality to the attention of G-20 member-states – and leverage more resources to assist it and its neighbors to cope with the crisis.

G-20 leaders must commit to sharing Turkey’s burden and place increased emphasis on empowering refugees to shape their own destinies and become productive members of their host societies.

And it must be remembered: The majority of Syrians want to go home. Eventually they want to be able to contribute to rebuilding a stable and democratic nation for themselves and their families. But peace cannot be served while al-Assad drops barrel bombs on his people and ISIS beheads journalists on the steps of Palmyra. Our leaders must focus on a sustainable political solution to this conflict as the end goal of any plan for the region.

This piece was originally published by Hurriyet Daily News.

For the past several years, international affairs have been analyzed through two lenses. One lens has focused on geopolitics: in particular, the question of how great power relations are evolving at a time of redistribution in the world’s economic and now also political power. The second lens considers the framework of global governance, especially the question of whether or not the existing formal and informal institutions have the tools and the ability to manage complex global challenges.

China's presidency of the G-20 bridges the issues of global governance and great power relations. At a basic level, the G-20 will set a tone for how major powers attempt to tackle the challenges that confront us all.

China’s assumption of the G-20 chairmanship in 2016 marks an important symbolic threshold. It is the first time a major non-Western power will chair the world’s premier body for international economic cooperation—not to mention one of the world’s most important geopolitical bodies, as well. China’s presidency comes at an important time in the substance of the G-20’s agenda, too, as a slowing Chinese economy is integral to the dynamics of an overall slowing global economy. As such, this event offers an opportunity to reflect on geopolitics and global governance—and the way forward. In short, what is the state of international order? 

Heading down a bumpy road?

There is little doubt that we are at an important inflection point in international order. For the past 25 years, the international system—with its win-win economic structures—has been relatively stable. But this order is under challenge and threat, and it is eroding. We risk the rise of a lose-lose international system, encompassing a deterioration of the security relations between great powers, and a breakdown of the basic structures of international cooperation. 

That may be the worst-case scenario, but it is a plausible one. Countries must be vigilant about preventing this outcome. Even though the established powers and the so-called emerging powers (clearly China is an emerged power) may not hold the same views about the content of international order, all sides have a stake in pursuing intense negotiations and engaging in debate and dialogue. It is imperative that parties find a middle ground that preserves key elements of the existing order while introducing some degree of adaptation, such that this order does not collapse.

For the past 25 years, the international system—with its win-win economic structures—has been relatively stable. But this order is under challenge and threat, and it is eroding.

A version of this kind of negotiation may occur later this year. Japan’s presidency of the G-7 will begin just ahead of China's presidency of the G-20, putting important issues into sharp relief. As the older, Western-oriented tool for managing global issues, the G-7 still focuses on global economics but increasingly tackles cross-cutting and security issues. The G-20 is the newer, multipolar tool through which both emerged and emerging powers collaborate—but, so far, members have limited their deliberations to economic issues. The two processes together will reveal the tensions and opportunities for improvement in great power relations and in geopolitics. 

Of particular note is where political and security issues fall on the dockets of these two bodies. Although the G-20 did tackle the Syria crisis at its St. Petersburg meeting in 2013, political and security issues have otherwise not been part of the group’s agenda. But these topics form an important part of the landscape of great power politics and global governance, and they are issues for which we find ourselves in very difficult waters. Tensions between the West—particularly Europe—and Russia are running high, just as disputes are mounting in Northeast Asia. The question of America’s naval role in the Western Pacific and China’s claims of a nine-dash line are serious flash points in the U.S.-China relationship, and we should not pretend that they are not increasingly difficult to manage, because they clearly are.

I believe it is shortsighted for the G-20 not to take up some of these tense security issues.

These are not part of the formal agenda of the G-20, but they should be. Although many economists may disagree with me, I believe it is shortsighted for the G-20 not to take up some of these tense security issues. The group’s argument has been to focus on economic issues, for which there are shared interests and progress can be made, which is a fair point. But history tells us that having difficult, tense issues involving a number of stakeholders leads to one of two scenarios: either these issues are managed in a credible forum, or tensions escalate and grow into conflict. There is no third option. Moreover, these are not issues that can be resolved bilaterally. They have to be settled in a multilateral forum.

In 2016, Japan will take up the issue of the South China Sea in the G-7—a scenario that is far from ideal, since key stakeholders will not be present. Even so, the G-20 refuses to take up security issues, leaving countries without an inclusive forum to deal with these tense security concerns. Of course, they could be raised in the U.N. Security Council, but that is a crisis management tool. We should be building political relations and involving leaders in preventing great power conflict, all of which, by and large, does not happen at the U.N. But it could happen at the G-20. 

With great power comes great responsibility

A better dynamic is at work with respect to the issues of climate change and global energy policy. The Paris climate accords are counted as a major breakthrough in global governance. To understand how the outcome in Paris was achieved, we have to look again at great power relations. What really broke the logjam of stale and unproductive negotiations was the agreement struck between President Xi and President Obama. Their compact on short-lived climate pollutants transformed the global diplomacy around climate change, yielding the broader agreement in Paris.

[G]reat power status primarily entails a responsibility to act first in resolving tough global challenges and absorbing costs.

Why did the U.S.-China agreement on climate change facilitate the Paris climate accords? The United States and China did not impose a framework, nor did they insist on a particular process or stipulate a set of rules. What they did was lead. They acted first and they absorbed costs. This is the essence of the relationship between great power politics and global governance.

Great power status confers a certain set of privileges, not least of which is a certain degree of autonomy. To that end, the United States has avoided multilateral rules more than other countries, and other countries may aspire to that status. But the larger point is that great power status primarily entails a responsibility to act first in resolving tough global challenges and absorbing costs. That is how great powers lead through a framework of global governance. In today’s world, where global governance will necessarily be more multipolar than in the past, we have to find new approaches to sharing the burdens of moving first and absorbing costs. That is, far and away, the most likely way to maintain a relatively stable but continuously adapting international order—one that is empowered to tackle global challenges and soothe geopolitical tensions.

INTRODUCTION 

Last year, President Obama delivered the first step in his promise to reach out to the Cuban people and support their desire for freedom and self-determination. Premised on the belief that Cuban Americans are our best ambassadors for freedom in Cuba, the Obama administration lifted restrictions on travel and remittances by Cuban Americans. The pent-up demand for Cuban American contact with the island revealed itself: within three months of the new policy, 300,000 Cuban Americans traveled to Havana -- 50,000 more than for all of the previous year.  Experts estimate that over $600 million in annual remittances has flowed from the United States to Cuba in 2008 and 2009 and informal flows of consumer goods is expanding rapidly.

The administration’s new policy has the potential to create new conditions for change in Cuba. However, if U.S. policy is to be truly forward looking it must further expand its focus from the Castro government to the well-being of the Cuban people. Recent developments on the island, including the ongoing release of dozens of political prisoners, have helped create the right political moment to take action.  The administration should institute a cultural diplomacy strategy that authorizes a broad cross-section of American private citizens and civil society to travel to the island to engage Cuban society and share their experiences as citizens of a democratic country.  Reducing restrictions on people-to-people contact is not a “concession,” but a strategic tool to advance U.S. policy objectives to support the emergence of a Cuban nation in which the Cuban people determine their political and economic future.

The President has the authority to reinstate a wide range of “purposeful,” non-touristic travel to Cuba in order to implement a cultural diplomacy strategy. Under President Clinton, the Baltimore Orioles played baseball in Havana and in return the Cuban national team was invited to Baltimore. U.S. students studied abroad in Cuba and engaged in lively discussions with their fellow students and host families. U.S. religious groups provided food and medicines to community organizations, helping them assist their membership.  However, in 2004, such travel was curtailed, severely limiting U.S. insights about the needs, interests and organizational capacities of community groups and grassroots organizations. Today, visitors traveling under an educational license, for example, number a meager 2,000 annually.

Downloads

• Download Full Paper