President Obama’s emphasis on “smart power” diplomacy has thrust the need for international volunteer service into the global spotlight. On June 23, Global Economy and Development at Brookings and Washington University’s Center for Social Development (CSD) will host a forum examining how international volunteer service can address multiple global challenges simultaneously and build international cooperation. The forum will frame international service as an effective tool for increasing international social capital as well as building sustainable cross-cultural bridges.

This event begins with an address by service champion, Ambassador Elizabeth Frawley Bagley, who leads the Department of State’s Global Partnerships Initiative. Bagley is well poised to foster innovative public-private partnerships, an approach she describes as “Ubuntu Diplomacy: where all sectors belong as partners, where we all participate as stakeholders, and where we all succeed together, not incrementally but exponentially.” The need for multilateral approaches to development has been analyzed by Brookings scholars Jane Nelson and Noam Unger, who explore how the U.S. foreign assistance system works in the new market-oriented and locally-driven global development arena.

This spirit of cross-sector collaboration will carry the June 23^rd forum, beginning with a research panel releasing beneficiary outcome data from a Peace Corps survey completed with over 800 host country nationals, including community members, direct beneficiaries, and collaborators. Peace Corps colleagues, Dr. Susan Jenkins and Janet Kerley, will present preliminary findings from this multi-year study measuring the achievement of “helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women” and “promoting a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served”. Aggregate data about respondents’ views of Americans before and after their interaction with the Peace Corps will be discussed.

This work complements the release of new data on the impact of international service on volunteers, which is supported with funding from the Ford Foundation and a joint Brookings-Washington University academic venture capital fund. Washington University’s CSD has studied international service over the last decade. The current research, first in a series from the quasi-experimental study, compares international volunteers’ perceived outcomes to a matched group who did not volunteer internationally: volunteers are more likely to report increased international awareness, international social capital, and international career intentions.

Building on the demonstrated potential of international service, policymakers and sector leaders will then discuss options for enhancing international service, and provide recommendations for bringing international service to the forefront of American foreign policy initiatives. This policy plenary will introduce and discuss the Service World policy platform: a collaborative movement led by the Building Bridges Coalition, National Peace Corps Association and the International Volunteering Initiative at Brookings. This powerhouse of sector leaders aims to scale international service to the levels of domestic volunteer service with increased impact through smart power policy proposals. What Service Nation did to unite Americans around domestic service as a core ideal and problem-solving strategy in American society, Service World hopes to do on a global scale.

Next week in New York City, the Points of Light Institute and the Corporation for National and Community Service will convene to further spotlight the Service World Platform at the 2010 National Conference on Volunteering and Service. This event will bring together more than 5,000 volunteer service leaders and social entrepreneurs from around the world, including local host Mayor Bloomberg. Michelle Nunn, CEO of Points of Light Institute noted in Huffington Post that “demand, idealism and presidential impact are leading American volunteerism to its…most important stage – the movement of service to a central role in our nation’s priorities.”

Nunn’s statement illustrates the momentum and power that make the voluntary sector a unique instrument in the “smart power” toolbox. According to successive polling from Terror Free Tomorrow, American assistance, particularly medical service, is a leading factor in favorable opinions toward the United States. A 2006 survey conducted in Indonesia and Bangladesh showed a 63 percent favorable response among Indonesian respondents to the humanitarian medical mission of “Mercy,” a United States’ Navel Ship, and a 95 percent favorable response among Bangladeshi respondents.

Personifying the diplomatic potential of medical service abroad is Edward O’Neil’s work with OmniMed. In the Mukono District of Uganda, OmniMed has partnered with the U.S. Peace Corps and the Ugandan Ministry of Health as well as local community-based organizations to implement evidence-based health trainings with local village health workers. Dr. O’Neil is now working with Brookings International Volunteering Initiative and Washington University’s CSD on a new wave of rigorous research: a randomized, prospective clinical trial measuring the direct impact of over 400 trained village health workers on the health of tens of thousands of villagers. 

In the words of Peace Corps architect and former U.S. Senator Harris Wofford, the pairing of new data and policy proposals on June 23^rd will support a “quantum leap” in the scale and impact of international service, advancing bipartisan calls to service from President Kennedy to Bush 41, Bush 43, Clinton and Obama.

      

It was fifty years ago that President Kennedy famously launched the Peace Corps, bringing international volunteerism to its true prominence in this country. Today, a diverse set of international volunteer efforts are supported by federal, state and local governments and through partnerships with NGOs. These efforts have been particularly effective at engaging two segments of our population: students or recent graduates; and retirees or those pursuing second careers.

But the segment that holds perhaps the greatest promise for global development has – for the most part – been underserved. We’re referring to mid-career employees at corporations: particularly large, globally-integrated enterprises. These corporate employees have what is most required for a successful international service engagement: cutting edge skills, deep expertise and relevant strategic knowhow.

Why has this resource largely gone untapped? Because a clear connection to business strategy and return on investment has been made in only a few cases.

There exists a triple benefit from corporate-sponsored international volunteerism. Local communities receive premier business and consulting services. Employees enrich their skill sets by working in international markets and leadership experience from working with diverse teams of colleagues and local partners. And corporations gain experienced leaders, insights into new markets, and brand and reputation enhancement that can ultimately create new global business opportunities.

IBM’s Corporate Service Corps (CSC) was developed with those benefits in mind. Often referred to as a “corporate peace corps,” CSC provides IBM employees with unique opportunities to develop and explore their roles as global citizens. Through one month deployments, IBM’s top talent works in teams of roughly 12 to provide in-depth business and IT consulting support to local entrepreneurs and small businesses, nonprofit organizations, educational institutions and governmental agencies. Already in its third year, Corporate Service Corps has deployed 700 IBM employees from 47 countries on 70 teams to 14 countries including China, Nigeria, Romania, Poland and Vietnam. The result is a leadership development program that has made strides in answering the economic, social and environmental sustainability challenges faced by many emerging markets.

We’re pleased to see that other organizations are adopting similar programs. In fact, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has announced a partnership with IBM to accelerate international volunteerism by leveraging the Corporate Service Corps model. USAID and IBM are creating an Alliance for International Corporate Volunteerism Program to help smaller companies and organizations eager to implement their own corporate peace corps, but lacking the resources and scale to do so.

As we look to help expand international service opportunities, there are several best practices to share based on IBM’s experience.

• In the case of executives, keep the duration of the projects relatively short. This allows for better access to a company’s top talent because rather than interrupting a career, you are asking someone to make service an integral part of it.
• Continue the relationship. While the duration of an individual’s participation may be short, your involvement with the region should be long-term and sustainable. It is not a vendor relationship; it is a partnership.
• Identify the right projects. The most successful development efforts take time and effort to scope out and plan. Partner with NGOs early and often to find the best local opportunities for growth and impact.
• Carefully mix and match skills when forming a team of service participants. This allows them to deliver results quickly and build capacity on the local level.
• Take advantage of technology. Technology can be a powerful tool to help train and prepare service participants. Technology like social networking can also help build a community of service participants and allow them to share their experiences.

The world has changed significantly over the last 50 years. Corporate-sponsored international volunteerism is now building upon the government’s original architecture of the Peace Corps. The same conditions and capabilities that have made the world “flat”, allowing its systems to become smarter, are also opening up new paths for citizen diplomacy. Those seeking out international volunteer service opportunities are no longer limited to government guidance and other official avenues into long-term engagements.

In an interconnected world, citizens have the choice of participating more directly in service through short-term assignments that will not disrupt their careers but enrich them. And it is these mid-career volunteers who possess the skills to make such assignments successful. Forward-thinking corporations with a clear understanding of the benefits of international volunteer programs can empower meaningful citizen diplomacy, contributing to sustainable development practices and building partnerships in a globalized world.

      

David Caprara, a Brookings nonresident fellow and expert on volunteering, says that John F. Kennedy’s call to service a half-century ago led to the founding of dozens of international aid organizations, and leaves a legacy of programs aimed at improving health, nutrition, education, living standards and peaceful cooperation around the globe.

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Volunteer, civil society and governmental delegates from 22 nations gathered in Johannesburg this month for the Southern Africa Conference on Volunteer Action for Development. The conference was co-convened by United Nations Volunteers (UNV) and Volunteer and Service Enquiry Southern Africa (VOSESA), in observance of the 10th anniversary of the United Nations International Year of Volunteers (IYV).

Naheed Haque, deputy executive coordinator for United Nations Volunteers, gave tribute to the late Nobel Laureate Wangari Mathai and her Greenbelt tree planting campaign as the “quintessential volunteer movement.” Haque called for a “new development paradigm that puts voluntarism at the center of community-centered sustainable development.” In this paradigm, human happiness and service to others would be key considerations, in addition to economic indicators and development outcomes including health and climate change.  

The international gathering developed strategies to advance three key priorities for the 15 nations in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC): combating HIV/ AIDS; engaging the social and economic participation of youth; and promoting regional integration and peace. Research data prepared by Civicus provided information on the rise of voluntary service in Africa, as conferees assessed strategies to advance “five pillars” of effective volunteerism: engaging youth, community involvement, international volunteers, corporate leadership and higher education in service.

VOSESA executive director, Helene Perold, noted that despite centuries of migration across the region, the vision for contemporary regional cooperation between southern African countries has largely been in the minds of heads of states with “little currency at the grassroots level.” Furthermore, it has been driven by the imperative of economic integration with a specific focus on trade. Slow progress has now produced critiques within the region that the strategy for integrating southern African countries cannot succeed on the basis of economic cooperation alone. Perold indicated that collective efforts by a wide range of civic, academic, and governmental actors at the Johannesburg conference could inject the importance of social participation within and between countries as a critical component in fostering regional integration and achieving development outcomes. 

This premise of voluntary action’s unique contribution to regional integration was underscored by Emiliana Tembo, director of Gender and Social Affairs for the Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA). Along with measures promoting free movement of labor and capital to step up trade investment, Tembo stressed the importance of “our interconnectedness as people,” citing Bishop Desmond Tutu’s maxim toward the virtues of “Ubuntu – a person who is open and available to others.”

The 19 nation COMESA block is advancing an African free-trade zone movement from the Cape of South Africa, to Cairo Egypt. The “tripartite” regional groupings of SADC, COMESA and the East Africa Community are at the forefront of this pan-African movement expanding trade and development.

Preliminary research shared at the conference by VOSESA researcher Jacob Mwathi Mati noted the effects of cross border youth volunteer exchange programs in southern and eastern Africa. The research indicates positive outcomes including knowledge, learning and “friendship across borders,” engendered by youth exchange service programs in South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania and Kenya that were sponsored Canada World Youth and South Africa Trust.   

On the final day of the Johannesburg conference, South Africa service initiatives were assessed in field visits by conferees including loveLife, South Africa’s largest HIV prevention campaign. loveLife utilizes youth volunteer service corps reaching up to 500,000 at risk youths in monthly leadership and peer education programs. “Youth service in South Africa is a channel for the energy of youth, (building) social capital and enabling public innovation,” Programme Director Scott Burnett stated. “Over the years our (service) participants have used their small stipends to climb the social ladder through education and micro-enterprise development.”

Nelly Corbel, senior program coordinator of the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy and Civic Engagement at the American University in Cairo, noted that the Egyptian Arab Spring was “the only movement that cleaned-up after the revolution." On February 11^th, the day after the resignation of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, thousands of Egyptian activists  removed debris from Tahrir Square and engaged in a host of other volunteer clean-up and painting projects. In Corbel's words: “Our entire country is like a big flag now,” from the massive display of national voluntarism in clean-up projects, emblematic of the proliferation of youth social innovation aimed at rebuilding a viable civil society.

At the concluding call-to-action session, Johannesburg conferees unanimously adopted a resolution, which was nominated by participating youth leaders from southern Africa states. The declaration, “Creating an Enabling Environment for Volunteer Action in the Region” notes that “volunteering is universal, inclusive and embraces free will, solidarity, dignity and trust… [creating] a powerful basis for unity, common humanity, peace and development.”  The resolution, contains a number of action-oriented recommendations advancing voluntarism as a “powerful means for transformational change and societal development.” Policy recommendations will be advanced by South African nations and other stakeholders at the forthcoming Rio + 20 deliberations and at a special session of the United Nations General Assembly on December 5, the 10^th anniversary of the International Year of the Volunteer.

      

INTRODUCTION

Over the past decade, the focused attention of African nations, the United States, U.N. agencies and other multilateral partners has brought significant progress toward achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in health and malaria control and elimination. The potential contribution of these strategies to long-term peace-building objectives and overall regional prosperity is of paramount significance in sub-regions such as the Horn of Africa and Western Africa that are facing the challenges of malaria and other health crises compounded by identity-based conflicts.

National campaigns to address health Millennium Development Goals through cross-ethnic campaigns tackling basic hygiene and malaria have proven effective in reducing child infant mortality while also contributing to comprehensive efforts to overcome health disparities and achieve higher levels of societal well-being.

There is also growing if nascent research to suggest that health and other humanitarian interventions can result in additional benefits to both recipients and donors alike.

The social, economic and political fault lines of conflicts, according to a new study, are most pronounced in Africa within nations (as opposed to international conflicts). Addressing issues of disparate resource allocations in areas such as health could be a primary factor in mitigating such intra-national conflicts. However, to date there has been insufficient research on and policy attention to the potential for wedding proven life-saving health solutions such as malaria intervention to conflict mitigation or other non-health benefits.

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As the United States approaches the fiscal deadline looming early next year, it is also time to assess the future – and “return on investment” – of American humanitarian assistance around the world.

There is a growing body of research to suggest that U.S. humanitarian aid to developing nations results in substantial benefits to the U.S. itself.

Beyond the self-evident worth of compassion toward those in need, global humanitarian assistance serves the self-interest of the U.S. and other donor countries by substantially improving public attitudes about the giving nation, justifying such help in an era of growing budgetary constraints and slow economic growth.

First, there is clear evidence that large-scale disaster assistance can dramatically move public attitudes, as found in surveys by Terror Free Tomorrow, a nonprofit research organization in Washington.

For instance, two-thirds of Indonesians favorably changed their opinion of the U.S. because of the generous American response to the tsunami in 2004. The highest percentage of that group was among those under age 30. Even 71 percent of self-identified Osama bin Laden supporters adopted a favorable view of the United States.

Second, more significant changes in public opinion can occur when American aid is targeted and focused on directly helping people in need and not foreign governments.

Moreover, as a direct result of the American effort, support for Al Qaeda and terrorist attacks dropped by half in Indonesia – the world’s largest Muslim country. Even two years later, 6 in 10 Indonesians continued to state that American humanitarian aid made them favorable to the United States.

The U.S. Navy ship Mercy is a fully equipped, 1,000-bed floating hospital, which while docking for several months in local ports in 2006, provided medical care to the people of Indonesia and Bangladesh. Nationwide polling in Bangladesh following the Mercy’s visit found that 87 percent of those surveyed said that the activities of the Mercy made their overall opinion of the US more positive.

In fact, Indonesians and Bangladeshis ranked additional visits by the Mercy as a higher priority for future American policy than resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In light of the U.S. war in Afghanistan and the American armed drone strikes inside Pakistan, anti-American attitudes in that country are among the strongest in the world. Yet while the favorable impact of intense disaster assistance following the 2005 earthquake declined in subsequent years among Pakistanis throughout the country, U.S. assistance had a long-lasting effect on attitudes at the local level among those directly impacted by the aid.

A survey conducted four years after the earthquake found that Pakistanis living near the fault-line were significantly more likely to express trust in Americans and Europeans than those who were living farther away.

When it’s wisely conceived and delivered, humanitarian aid saves lives and often improves quality of life. It can also favorably change public opinion toward the U.S. and other donor countries. Data further indicate the tantalizing possibility that humanitarian aid can lead to far more significant changes in values, from increasing understanding across borders; lessening inter-tribal, religious, and regional conflict; and enhancing support for free markets, trade, and democracy.

In this time of limited government resources, the effectiveness of American foreign humanitarian help must be rigorously examined. Not only should measurable outcomes of the aid itself be looked at, but also whether the aid can lead to changes in values and trust. A full understanding of humanitarian aid can show that it helps all, donors and recipients alike.

       

At the recent celebration of the 50^th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s March on Washington, Dr. King's daughter, Rev. Bernice King, cited Syria and called for international approaches rooted in love and embodying her father's commitment to nonviolence.  It is truly ironic that, after President Obama lauded King's legacy on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, the administration announced its plans for unilateral military action to address the Syrian government’s horrific use of chemical weapons.

The situation in Syria causes us to ask:  Have all nonviolent alternatives been exhausted in accomplishing the president’s goal of responding to the brutal crimes of the Assad regime while averting a new regional (potentially global) war?

While, to date, public discourse has focused on the pros and cons of a punitive military strike, has adequate attention been given to the probability that a cruise missile strike will prompt retaliatory action—threatened by Syria, Hezbollah and Iran—against the state of Israel?  Have we considered adequately that the spiral could continue to an unthinkable escalation, keeping in mind Dr. King’s admonition that violence begets violence?  As United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon stated:  "Diplomacy should be given a chance and peace given a chance.”

In sum, before authorizing or taking military action, could Congress and the administration assure us that certain steps (such as the following) have been incorporated as part of a broader regional solution?

Engage nonmilitary options in a multilateral coalition—Rather than going it alone, has the U.S. exhausted all efforts to lead a multilateral coalition to stop and punish Syrian chemical weapons use by other means under international law?  Could the pending United Nations inspections report pave the way for further multilateral interventions, ranging from global sanctions on Syria to criminal prosecution of the Assad regime at The Hague?  Could a tough U.N. sanctions resolution in response to the regime’s criminal use of chemical weapons be issued in preparation for the U.N. General Assembly this month?

Make renewed attempts to engage Russia and China, together with Track II diplomacy partners—The Russians are as concerned as the U.S. about the delivery of materials of mass destruction into terrorist hands.  The International Institute for Sustained Dialogue (IISD), its Dartmouth Conference and other Track II partners could be engaged, along with multilateral and U.S.-Russia congressional exchanges (including China and our allies) to further diplomatic action and sanctions.   

Engage Middle East and global interfaith partners—The sectarian fault lines across the Middle East require serious interfaith dialogue guided by principles and values that are common to all the Abrahamic faiths, addressing the conflict through what has been called the “relationship paradigm" of sustained dialogue. Initiatives such as the U.S.-Islamic World Forum, interfaith endeavors by Pope Francis and the Saudi king’s new interfaith center should be tapped.  A Brookings research report with Terror Free Tomorrow on the soft power effects of interfaith engagement and service in hot spots like Nigeria and South Asia illustrates this largely untapped potential.

Executive Order on Track II diplomacy, interfaith and service initiatives—President Obama could issue an executive order directing the State Department, the Defense Department, the White House Offices on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and Social Innovation and Civic Participation, the Peace Corps and other agencies to report in 30 days on strategies and Track II partners that could further support regional solutions in the Middle East and other global hot spots.  Stepped-up multilateral emergency humanitarian aid for the mounting number of refugees from the Syrian conflict could also be marshaled with the United Nations, the Arab League, NATO and the U.S. 

In taking this “road less traveled” by charting a nonviolent direct action campaign and multilateral coalition to punish Syria and strengthen partnerships for peace, President Obama and Congress would establish a higher ground and marshal moral force with potential to break the cycle of violence, thus continuing the trailblazing legacy of Nelson Mandela, Dr. King and Gandhi.

       

2014 was a relatively friendless year for the Democratic Republic of Korea (DPRK or North Korea). It publicly lost its best friend and patron, China, to its erstwhile nemesis, the Republic of Korea (ROK or South Korea), when Presidents Park Geun-hye and Xi Jinping celebrated their growing friendship at the July summit in Seoul. Recently, retired PLA General Wang Hongguang wrote in the Chinese language site of Global Times, which is closely linked to the Chinese Communist Party, that China tired of cleaning up North Korea’s “mess” and would not step in to “save” North Korea if it collapses or starts a war.[1] And there is a vigorous debate in Beijing on whether the DPRK should be treated on a “normal” basis with China’s interests as the sole guide and purpose or be treated as a special case needing China’s indulgence and protection.[2] Since the Sony hack of November, North Korea has been under tighter scrutiny, both real and virtual, by Seoul, Beijing and Washington, accompanied by tighter sanctions in the new year. Bludgeoned by global condemnation of its atrocious human rights record, Pyongyang’s pariah status has intensified. Only Russia has been warming up to North Korea out of its own economic and political self-interest.

Is there any sizable country with good intentions for the region that is not giving up or beating up on North Korea? Is there any country Pyongyang likes and possibly even trusts? Mongolia stands out as the sole candidate, and it is friendly with both the East and the West.

Since the 2000s, Mongolia has played an increasingly constructive and steady role in in its bilateral ties with the DPRK and in its promotion of peace and cooperation in Northeast Asia. President Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj, who visited Pyongyang in 2013, was the first head of state to reach out to the DPRK since Kim Jung Un assumed power and helped author the “Ulaanbaatar Dialogue on Northeast Asia Security,” which held its first meeting in June, 2014. It is a unique forum that combines official (track one) and unofficial academic/think tank/NGO (track two) participants, on a variety of important regional issues. The goals are to decrease distrust among nations and increase cooperation and peace. Both the DPRK and the ROK (Republic of Korea or South Korea) were represented at the inaugural meeting, as were the United States, China, Russia, Japan, and some European nations.

The UB Dialogue, as a consultative mechanism, has the potential to bring together policymakers, international organizations such as the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), and civil society entities and facilitate a range of initiatives related to economic cooperation; military transparency; environmental issues; non-traditional security threats; regional stability, cultural and educational exchange among the participants, including the two Koreas. These are official agenda items and goals of the UB Dialogue. With the Six-Party Talks nearly defunct and inter-Korean relations unable to address regional issues that affect the peninsula, Mongolia may be able to serve as a “Geneva or Helsinki of the East” as some observers have suggested.

Mongolia’s expanding global presence

Mongolia is uniquely positioned as the only country in Northeast Asia that enjoys good relations not only with North Korea but also South Korea, the United States, China, Russia, and Japan.

Mongolia’ relations with the United States, Canada, and Western Europe have steadily improved and deepened since the late 1980s. In recent decades, both Democratic and Republication administrations in Washington have enjoyed mutually warm and collaborative relations with Mongolia. President George W. Bush was the first sitting U.S. president to visit the country in 2005; he thanked the Mongolians for sending troops to join U.S.-led forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and for supporting anti-terrorism initiatives. Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld also visited in the same year. In 2007, President Nambaryn Enkhbayar visited Washington to co-sign the Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact with President Bush. The next (and current) leader, President Elbegdorj, met U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House in 2011, as did the first civilian Minister of Defense, L. Bold. Vice President Joe Biden included Mongolia on a three-country Asia visit in August, 2011; China and Japan were the other two. A year later, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton took her turn in Ulaanbaatar. The most recent visit by top-level U.S. officials to Mongolia was by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel in April 2014.

Mongolia’s pursuit of the “third neighbor” policy allows the country to develop cooperative relations with the United States, Western Europe, ASEAN nations and others partly as “an air pocket” from its economic and security reliance on Beijing and Moscow. The softer side of this diplomatic push has been demonstrated by Ulaanbaatar’s membership in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and its previous chairmanship of the Community on Democracies.”[3]

Western experts on Mongolia applaud the way the country has developed a unique “peacekeeping niche” that facilitates participation in UN peacekeeping activities, international anti-terrorism measures, and humanitarian actions. For its small population of about three million, Mongolia takes on a heavy load of peacekeeping activities, ranking 26^th on the UN’s list of contributing nations.[4]

Since 2003, Mongolia annually hosts the “Khaan Quest” peacekeeping exercises for the purpose of tactical advancement and capacity building for its Mongolian Armed Forces (MAF) and for the improvement of regional confidence building. Although the United States and NATO play prominent roles, the Quest has attracted more diverse participants over the years so that by 2012, the number of interested parties expanded to include representatives from China and India as well as an array of developing nations such as Vietnam and Cambodia. These exercises are acknowledged as gatherings devoted to strengthening international cooperation and interoperability on peacekeeping initiatives around the world.[5]

On the economic side, Mongolia has been diversifying its external relations, with the maintenance of sovereignty and the related desire to reduce its overwhelming dependence on China as important goals. Expansion of economic relations is driven in part by a desire to participate in and benefit from global standards investment funds, and market access is a national priority. In that context, Mongolia’s relations with the West have been constructive and collaborative. For example, in 2013, the United States Trade Representative Michael Froman and Mongolia's Minister for Foreign Affairs, Luvsanvandan Bold, signed the Agreement on Transparency in Matters Related to International Trade and Investment between the United States of America and Mongolia. The Agreement commits the parties to provide opportunities for public comment on proposed laws and regulations and to publish final laws and regulations in Mongolian and English in order to facilitate access, openness, fairness, and procedural coherence in international trade and investment between Mongolia and other countries. “Additional commitments address the application of disciplines on bribery and corruption.” This type of administrative and legal modernization and the incorporation of measures to prevent and correct corruption are exemplary measures that could be helpful to the DPRK and other countries that are unfamiliar with or lagging in appropriate frameworks for doing business with diverse international actors.

Maintaining sovereignty between giants

China and Russia have vied for influence over Mongolia for many decades, from the time when Mongolia was in the Soviet sphere in influence to the present. Although 89 percent of foreign trade in 2013 was with China and Russia provides about 75 percent of Mongolia’s gasoline and diesel fuel and much of its electricity, Ulaanbaatar is assertively broadening and deepening its economic interests with the two big neighbors, especially greater transportation access and cheaper costs (vital to the landlocked nation), participation in the development of the New Silk Road corridor, and the construction of a Russian oil and gas pipeline through Mongolia that reaches China. All three countries have mutual interests and investments in developing Mongolia’s well-endowed mining industry.

But being sandwiched between two giants means Mongolia has to be prudent in preserving its sovereignty and independence, and Ulaanbaatar has done so in practical ways, balancing the two large powers’ interests with its own. The 2010 National Security Concept’s “One-Third Clause” sets a clear limit on the proportion of foreign direct investment from any one country: one-third. Legislation limits (foreign) state-owned companies from gaining control of strategic assets. And as numerous bilateral security and military cooperation agreements link Mongolia with China and Russia, UB has strategically and legally created elbow room for its autonomy. The government’s National Security and Foreign Policy Concepts outline a specific policy of not allowing foreign troops the use of its territory. Such preservationist measures to maintain sovereignty and independence in economic and security terms would be welcome examples to a North Korea which zealously prioritizes national sovereignty.

Mongolia and the Korean peninsula

Mongolia’s potential role as a non-nuclear peace broker in the region was further evidenced by its successful hosting of DPRK-Japan negotiations since 2012, which have yielded bilateral progress on longstanding abduction issues. In March 2014, Ulaanbaatar hosted the first-ever reunion between the parents of one of the abductees, Megumi Yokota (whom North Korea claims is dead), and her daughter, son-in-law, and their child who live in North Korea. Mongolia also served as a neutral venue for high-level talks on normalizing Japan-DPRK relations back in September 2007 as part of the Six-Party Talks framework. Asia Times reported that “arranging this recent meeting reflected Ulaanbaatar's ‘contribution to satisfy regional stability in Northeast Asia’ and how it could play a role in deepening understanding and normalizing DPRK-Japan relations.” President Elbegdorj's administration took particular care in staging the negotiations, including the use of the official state compound in Ikh Tenger as the meeting place. According to Alicia Campi, an American expert on Mongolia and the author of the AT article, Ikh Tenger was requested by the North Koreans.[6]

Mongolian President Elbegdorj is often described as an activist head of state, both for his focused efforts on developing Mongolia internally and advancing the country’s role and contributions internationally. One of his main foreign policy priorities is to promote regional economic integration and cooperation and peace and security. Dialogue and trust-building, two key components of his approach, coincide with ROK President Park Geun-hye’s emphasis on trustpolitik and the proposed Northeast Asia Peace and Cooperation Initiative (NAPCI). Both NAPCI and the UB Dialogue seek to chip away at distrust among Northeast Asian countries and increase collaboration and cooperation through multi-layered activities, including mutually reinforcing Track 1, 1.5 and 2 gatherings. Both emphasize multilateral cooperation on non-traditional security issues and people-to-people exchanges as ways to help build trust and resolve regional problems step by step. NAPCI held a track 1.5 forum in October 2014 in Seoul. In sharp contrast to its reaction to the first UB Dialogue of June that year, the DPRK flatly rejected the invitation to participate in the Seoul dialogue and criticized NAPCI as a cover for pressuring Pyongyang to relinquish its nuclear program and for reunification by absorption.[7]

There is no reason why the Ulaanbaatar Dialogue and NAPCI cannot be complementary and mutually reinforcing. Given that trust in inter-Korean relations is non-existent while Mongolia has gained deeper trust with both Koreas over the past two decades, NAPCI activities could benefit from Mongolia’s unique position in its relations with the DPRK. Ulaanbaatar potentially can serve as a neutral meeting ground, literally and metaphorically, for Pyongyang and Seoul. Moreover, given that the NAPCI seeks to maintain a cooperative relationship with other multilateral bodies and places emphasis on complementarity and inclusiveness, working with and supporting successful rounds of the UB Dialogues would be a principled move on the part of South Koreans. Moreover, engagement with North Korea through the UB Dialogue most likely represents an easier path to increasing inter-Korean trust than bilateral efforts and even easier than the NAPCI. South Korea’s domestic divisions and bitter left-right infighting tend to weaken the government’s position in approaches to the North. Seoul’s military standoff and competition with the North, its alliance with the United States, and participation in international sanctions regimes all cause suspicion in Pyongyang. In short, Seoul’s complex list of concerns and goals, some of which are contradictory to the spirit and practice of trust-building and cooperation with North Korea, create difficult conditions for progress through NAPCI alone.

In addition to lacking this baggage, Mongolia has unique standing with both North and South. It is a former Soviet satellite state that asserted full independence in 1990, and it is notable for successfully transitioning from a communist state to a vibrant democracy without civil war or bloodshed. President Elbegdorj’s 2013 speech in Pyongyang contained strong enunciation of the tenets of liberty. At the elite Kim Il Sung University in Pyongyang, he addressed students with these bold words: "No tyranny lasts forever. It is the desire of the people to live free that is the eternal power." And the Mongolian government has been keeping its border open to North Koreans who risk the arduous journey out of the DPRK and has permitted its airlines to transport them to South Korea.

Additionally, Mongolia has become a model of economic modernization and prosperous participation in the global economy. Although it faces some economic imbalances, its GDP rate was sky-high at 11.7 percent in 2013. There are good lessons to share with North Korea, and President Elberdorgj has made it clear that Mongolia would be very willing to work with the DPRK on economic development, IT, infrastructure, the management of mining precious earth resources and refineries. The two countries also engage in a worker exchange program, affording DPRK citizens the opportunity to breathe the air of freedom and to be exposed to South Korean television programming while they reside in Mongolia.

In recent years, Mongolia has pursued multiple types of people-to-people activities involving North Koreans, including academic exchanges, northeast Asian mayoral forums, and women’s parliamentary exchanges including female leaders from both Koreas. In June 2015, the second Track 2 conference of the UB Dialogue will convene in Ulaanbaatar with scholars from across the region and the United States with the theme of “Energy, Infrastructure, and Regional Connectivity.”

Sports and cultural initiatives in the past years have included international boxing matches in Ulaanbaatar with boxers from the DPRK, ROK, Mongolia, Russia and China. In 2013, Mongolia established an International Cooperation Fund which has supported children’s summer camps, basketball training and other exchanges with the DPRK in order to promote positive peace and people-to-people development in the region.

In the humanitarian arena, food aid to the DPRK has been channeled through international organizations, and the two countries have cooperated on physician exchanges. Prior research by Caprara and Ballen, conducted in cooperation with United Nations Special Envoy for Financing the Health Millennium Development Goals and for Malaria, has noted the additional soft power benefits of cooperative service development projects.

A recent global development forum hosted at the United Nations Asia-Pacific headquarters in Bangkok launched an Asia Pacific Peace Service Alliance which could build on these bilateral and regional exchanges in the critical area of humanitarian action and development in North Korea. An International Youth Leaders Assembly has been proposed in Ulaanbaatar for June, 2015, which would further the role of youth in fostering track two initiatives of service and dialogue.

Dr. Tsedendamba Batbayar, Mongolia’s Director of Policy Planning in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, visited Washington in November, 2014 and noted the broad range of Mongolia-DPRK exchanges. Together with Mongolia Ambassador Bulgaa Altangerel, he emphasized his country’s desire to serve as a fair broker and mediator for the Northeast Asia region and to pursue prudent and practical measures to help build bridges of understanding between the people of North Korea and other parties.

But despite its uniquely constructive approach to dealing with the DPRK and other regional neighbors, Mongolia faces unique challenges in the mediator role it seeks to achieve. First, Ulaanbaatar has been able to gain Pyongyang’s trust because of the quiet diplomacy it has pursued, staying behind the scenes and out of the limelight. This has enabled a steady channel to the Pyongyang elite, and a focus on bilateral interests has been maintained. In short, drama has been avoided. But if Mongolia plays a more high-profile role with North Korea and multilateral actors, it will most likely be difficult to avoid some drama—posturing, rhetoric, and standoffs—emanating from various parties. Second, any increased or intensified involvement of China, Russia, and the United States in UB-led dialogue could come with the headache of big power arrogance and competition over leadership. The value of Mongolia’s role and activities for regional cooperation and peace stems from the fact that Ulaanbaatar does not assume airs or seek to dominate others. Whether China, Russia, and the United States would be able to refrain from seeking leadership and disproportionate influence in UB-led initiatives is highly questionable. Third, with respect to peninsular issues, for the UB Dialogues to gain more acceptance and credibility regionally and internationally requires that the DPRK become a consistent and collaborative presence at gatherings. Whether any nation or actor has the capacity to deliver consistent and collaborative participation by Pyongyang is an open question.

In addition, some observers believe that the impasse between North Korea and other nations is not simply the result of a trust deficit, but reflects mutually exclusive goals. While Mongolian mediation may not be able to solve the nuclear issue, it can be an effective channel – among others – for increasing communication, finding common ground, and beginning to ease tension.

Mongolia is the one Northeast Asian country that has kept its emotional cool and balanced policy interests with North Korea and other regional actors. It has not tripped over its own feet by politicizing historical grievances with its neighbors. Rather, it has exercised a calm can-do approach while its neighbors have engulfed themselves in hyper-nationalistic and ideological mire. And it has smartly used diplomacy and entrepreneurship to make friends and develop its own economy and people. These are significant assets that can be of benefit not only to UB but also to the region.

Recommendations

1. The Obama administration should actively support the Ulaanbaatar Dialogue process and encourage Seoul to find common cause in advancing greater regional dialogue and collaboration with the Mongolians through Track 2 and 1.5 processes. A precedent for this can be found in the case of Oman, which the current administration effectively tapped for back channel dialogue with Iran, kick-starting the present nuclear talks. Also, support by Washington would build on a prior exchange with Mongolia hosted by the Korea Institute for National Unification (KINU), where scholars noted potential benefits from three-way economic cooperation and the possibility of providing the North Koreans with a proven model of transformation from a closed statist system to a prosperous and more open system.

2. ROK President Park’s proposed regional cooperation mechanism should receive serious attention together with the Ulaanbaatar initiative. The two parallel efforts could benefit from being part of inter-connected strategies to defuse regional tension and forge greater trustpolitik.

3. The UN ESCAP headquarters can serve as an important multilateral bridge for humanitarian aid together with the multi-stakeholder Asia Pacific Peace Service Alliance (APPSA), which was launched at the UN headquarters in Bangkok last October. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) could partner with UN ESCAP and the World Food Program to establish a verifiable humanitarian aid regime, building on prior food aid oversight protocols developed during the Bush administration. Mongolia also would be an excellent candidate for the training of an international volunteer corps for potential disaster and humanitarian relief and economic development projects concerning the DPRK and the broader Northeast Asia region. Mongolia has excellent working relations with the U.S. Peace Corps, which also helped facilitate the recent launch of the APPSA.

4. In the context of peninsula unification planning, regional economic cooperation on private and multi-stakeholder investment projects and the enabling of market-friendly policies could be further explored with Mongolia and other Northeast Asian partners in areas such as infrastructure, energy, and technology.5. Cultural and educational exchanges between Mongolia and the DPRK could be expanded on a multilateral basis over time to include the ROK, China, Russia, Japan and ASEAN nations together with UNESCO to further cultural bases and norms of peace.

       

On the heels of the U.N.’s adoption in late September of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2030, an Asia Pacific volunteering alliance recently convened a forum for hundreds of youth and development partners from northeast Asia at the Korea Council on Foreign Relations in Seoul.

In his keynote address highlighting the role of volunteers in global development, Young-Mok Kim, president of the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), stressed the key role of Peace Corps volunteers and the Saemaul Undong village self-help model in Korea’s 50-year rise from a low-income to a high-income nation.

Since 1970, Korea’s Saemaul Undong (“New Community Movement”) has tested a combination of local self-help cooperative action with national development policy addressing poverty, relying on the spirit of rural communities. Local volunteering teams engaging youth and women have been tapped to guide and implement grassroots development projects and counter rural over-migration to urban areas, engaging in housing, local infrastructure and irrigation, credit unions, and cooperative businesses, among other holistic areas while enhancing an overall community spirit of ownership.

“As the first country to escape poverty and achieve economic and social development as well as democratization, the SDGs present us with an opportunity to expand our footprint and visibility in the development arena and live up to international expectations. In Korea, thanks to Saemaul Undong, the poverty rate was reduced from 34.6 percent to 6 percent and rural households’ income reached parity with that of urban households during the period from 1967 to 1984.” The Saemaul Undong model has been adapted in African and other developing nations and was featured in a special high-level forum on rural development during the recent U.N. General Assembly.

Kim stated: “It is important that we facilitate participatory engagement by harnessing the power of volunteerism to meet the key principle of the SDGs” and he indicated that the World Friends Korea (WFK) volunteer program learned from the nation’s experience with the Peace Corps. WFK has sent more than 50,000 volunteers abroad in service projects and to provide technical training. Kim noted KOICA ranks second in the world with regard to the number of volunteers sent to developing countries, sending 4,500 annually to 50 countries.

KOICA was a founding participant in the Asia Pacific Peace and Development Service Alliance (APPDSA) that was launched at the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) headquarters in Bangkok in October 2014 with the support of FK Norway, the Global Peace Foundation, KOICA, the Peace Corps and other partners. Kim hailed the effort “to form an alliance of upgrading our volunteer program and fostering the force of young people who can play crucial roles in the development cooperation arena.”

The multi-stakeholder platform forged in Southeast Asia is now engaging thousands of volunteers in climate-related projects, including massive river clean-up campaigns in Thailand and Nepal and ongoing “green Asia” tree-planting and eco-camps working to address desertification in Mongolia.   

After the Seoul convening, which launched the Northeast Asia volunteering initiative, I travelled to Kathmandu to assess the progress of the South Asia APPDSA Alliance hub for volunteerism. Convened in Nepal just prior to the April earthquake that took more than 9,000 lives, the Alliance’s South Asia convening provided a ready base of volunteers to implement the Kathmandu Call to Action after the disaster struck and served as a springboard for Rise Nepal, a youth-led relief and rebuilding initiative. To date, more than 1,600 young Nepali volunteers have helped nearly 3,000 households with emergency provisions, including food, and medical and hygiene supplies, and have constructed around 600 transitional homes.    

IBM stepped in to provide IT support, equipping youths with software and other technology to facilitate their efforts to rebuild their nation beyond short-term earthquake relief. Since the recent adoption of Nepal’s new constitution, this support is being broadened to include young leadership training in citizenship and service addressing longer-term goals, including SDGs across the South Asia region.

A recent Gallup article noted the power of the more than 1 billion people around the world who engage in volunteer service and the need to marshal their efforts to help countries meet their SDG targets by 2030. Since the Seoul forum, efforts are underway across the Asia-Pacific region to step-up specific volunteerism initiatives, provide technology that will further empower young volunteers, and document the results of ongoing environmental service projects such as the restoration of the Bagmati River in Nepal and counterpart efforts in Bangkok, Mongolia, and the Philippines.  

The growth of such multi-stakeholder volunteering alliances, coupled with KOICA’s experience in forging volunteerism-based community outcomes measurably addressing poverty, hold great promise in marshaling requisite human capital and innovation to help achieve the next generation development goals.

       

Volunteerism remains a powerful tool for good around the world. Young people, in particular, are motivated by the prospect of creating real and lasting change, as well as gaining valuable learning experiences that come with volunteering. This energy and optimism among youth can be harnessed and mobilized to help meet challenges facing our world today and accomplish such targets as the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

On June 14, young leaders and development agents from leading non-governmental organizations (NGOs), faith-based organizations, corporations, universities, the Peace Corps, and United Nations Volunteers came together at the Brookings Institution to answer the question on how to achieve impacts on the SDGs through international service.

This was also the 10th anniversary gathering of the Building Bridges Coalition—a multi-stakeholder consortium of development volunteers— and included the announcement of a new Service Year Alliance partnership with the coalition to step up international volunteers and village-based volunteering capacity around the world.

Brookings Senior Fellow Homi Kharas, who served as the lead author supporting the high-level panel advising the U.N. secretary-general on the post-2015 development agenda, noted the imperative of engaging community volunteers to scale up effective initiatives, build political awareness, and generate “partnerships with citizens at every level” to achieve the 2030 goals.  

Kharas’ call was echoed in reports on effective grassroots initiatives, including Omnimed’s mobilization of 1,200 village health workers in Uganda’s Mukono district, a dramatic reduction of malaria through Peace Corps efforts with Senegal village volunteers, and Seed Global Health’s partnership to scale up medical doctors and nurses to address critical health professional shortages in the developing world. 

U.N. Youth Envoy Ahmad Alhendawi of Jordan energized young leaders from Atlas Corps, Global Citizen Year, America Solidaria, International Young Leaders Academy, and universities, citing U.N. Security Council Resolution 2250 on youth, peace, and security as “a turning point when it comes to the way we engage with young people globally… to recognize their role for who they are, as peacebuilders, not troublemakers… and equal partners on the ground.”

Service Year Alliance Chair General Stanley McChrystal, former Joint Special Operations commander, acclaimed, “The big idea… of a culture where the expectation [and] habit of service has provided young people an opportunity to do a year of funded, full-time service.” 

Civic Enterprises President John Bridgeland and Brookings Senior Fellow E.J. Dionne, Jr. led a panel with Seed Global Health’s Vanessa Kerry and Atlas Corps’ Scott Beale on policy ideas for the next administration, including offering Global Service Fellowships in United States Agency for International Development (USAID) programs to grow health service corps, student service year loan forgiveness, and technical support through State Department volunteer exchanges. Former Senator Harris Wofford, Building Bridge Coalition’s senior advisor and a founding Peace Corps architect, shared how the coalition’s new “service quantum leap” furthers the original idea announced by President John F. Kennedy, which called for the Peace Corps and the mobilization of one million global volunteers through NGOs, faith-based groups, and universities.

The multi-stakeholder volunteering model was showcased by Richard Dictus, executive coordinator of U.N. Volunteers; Peace Corps Director Carrie Hessler-Radelet; USAID Counselor Susan Reischle; and Diane Melley, IBM vice president for Global Citizenship. Melley highlighted IBM’s 280,000 skills-based employee volunteers who are building community capacity in 130 countries along with Impact 2030—a consortium of 60 companies collaborating with the U.N.—that is “integrating service into overall citizenship activities” while furthering the SDGs.

The faith and millennial leaders who contributed to the coalition’s action plan included Jim Lindsay of Catholic Volunteer Network; Service Year’s Yasmeen Shaheen-McConnell; C. Eduardo Vargas of USAID’s Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives; and moderator David Eisner of Repair the World, a former CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service. Jesuit Volunteer Corps President Tim Shriver, grandson of the Peace Corps’ founding director, addressed working sessions on engaging faith-based volunteers, which, according to research, account for an estimated 44 percent of nearly one million U.S. global volunteers

The key role of colleges and universities in the coalition’s action plan—including  linking service year with student learning, impact research, and gap year service—was  outlined by Dean Alan Solomont of Tisch College at Tufts University; Marlboro College President Kevin Quigley; and U.N. Volunteers researcher Ben Lough of University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

These panel discussion directed us towards the final goal of the event, which was a multi-stakeholder action campaign calling for ongoing collaboration and policy support to enhance the collective impact of international service in achieving the 2030 goals.

This resolution, which remains a working document, highlighted five major priorities:

1. Engage service abroad programs to more effectively address the 2030 SDGs by mobilizing 10,000 additional service year and short-term volunteers annually and partnerships that leverage local capacity and volunteers in host communities.
2. Promote a new generation of global leaders through global service fellowships promoting service and study abroad.
3. Expand cross-sectorial participation and partnerships.
4. Engage more volunteers of all ages in service abroad.
5. Study and foster best practices across international service programs, measure community impact, and ensure the highest quality of volunteer safety, well-being, and confidence.

Participants agreed that it’s through these types of efforts that volunteer service could become a common strategy throughout the world for meeting pressing challenges. Moreover, the cooperation of individuals and organizations will be vital in laying a foundation on which governments and civil society can build a more prosperous, healthy, and peaceful world.

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

       

Event Information

Northeast Asia has seen significant leadership changes in recent months, with the election of Park Geun-hye as president of South Korea, Xi Jinping as leader of China’s ruling Communist Party, and Shinzo Abe as prime minister of Japan. As leaders of world-leading economies, these key players will no doubt bring about dynamic change in the region’s politics and economy, while balancing relations with the United States and its own newly re-elected president.

On November 28, 2012, the Center for Northeast Asian Studies (CNAPS) at Brookings, the Japan Center for Economic Research, and Nikkei held a one-day conference on “Managing Transitions in Northeast Asia, the Global Economy, and Japan-U.S. Relations.” Three panels, featuring Brookings scholars as well leading experts from across Asia, provided their views on issues of profound importance to the Northeast Asian region including leadership transitions, global economy and trade, global governance, and U.S.-Japan relations in the 21st Century.

Audio

• Part 1: Managing Transitions in Northeast Asia, the Global Economy, and Japan-U.S. Relations
• Part 2: Managing Transitions in Northeast Asia, the Global Economy, and Japan-U.S. Relations

       

My first response to the GDP report was “holy cow!”-- it’s not often that the U.S. economy contracts, and the headline says that this just happened in the final quarter of 2012. Many had expected weak growth; none had seen a contraction coming. But once you take a deep breath, read past the headline, and delve into the numbers, you’ll see that this is actually a pretty good (though not great) report. The internals are much better than the top-line belies. Under the hood, we see solid growth in both consumption and investment and as a result, private spending was humming along. Last quarter’s decline in U.S. GDP was all about inventories (which subtracted 1.3 percentage points from growth), as well as sharp cuts in defense spending. Neither of these are expected to persist.

And let’s not forget that this is the "advance" GDP estimate, which is only an early (an often inaccurate) guess as to what was happening. Typically, this estimate misses the mark by a full 1.3 percentage points.

I'm sure we will start seeing the use of the dreaded "R" word (recession). That's premature, and almost certainly wrong. The U.S. economy is growing, although probably slower than potential. Don’t let me overstate my sunny optimism though—the recovery is still precarious, and Congress could still blow it up.

Overall, there's nothing in today's GDP report to change my view: The U.S. economy was doing OK -- maybe even pretty well -- but definitely not great in the final quarter of 2012. While this morning's negative growth number is an attention grabber, realize it's for last quarter, it's an early guess, and it's contradicted by most other data which point to an economy that is still growing, although perhaps not fast enough.

And finally, a trivia question: When is the last time that the first big hint of bad economic news came from an advance GDP report? Answer: Never.

      

Paris and Rome may be famous for romance, but it’s Filipinos who get the most love. That, at least, is a conclusion that can be drawn from a global love survey conducted by the Gallup Organization.

In our latest column for Bloomberg View, we mine the unique Gallup data for insights into the nature of love and its relationship to nationality, age, money and economic development. The survey, conducted in 136 countries, posed the question: “Did you experience love for a lot of the day yesterday?”

In honor of Valentine’s Day, we thought readers might be interested in seeing the full ranking. So here goes. The first number after each country name is the percentage of respondents who said they had experienced love the previous day. The second (in parentheses) is the sample size for the country.

1. Philippines 93% (2193)
2. Rwanda 92% (1495)
3. Puerto Rico 90% (495)
4. Hungary 89% (1002)
5. Cyprus 88% (988)
6. Trinidad and Tobago 88% (506)
7. Paraguay 87% (1986)
8. Lebanon 86% (970)
9. Costa Rica 85% (1985)
10. Cambodia 85% (1961)
11. Nigeria 84% (1965)
12. Guyana 83% (486)
13. Spain 83% (998)
14. Mexico 82% (989)
15. Tanzania 82% (1941)
16. Ecuador 82% (2126)
17. Jamaica 82% (534)
18. Venezuela 82% (997)
19. Cuba 82% (978)
20. Brazil 82% (1038)
21. Laos 81% (1947)
22. Argentina 81% (1985)
23. Belgium 81% (1015)
24. Canada 81% (1006)
25. Greece 81% (996)
26. U.S. 81% (1224)
27. Denmark 80% (1003)
28. Portugal 80% (995)
29. Netherlands 80% (993)
30. Vietnam 79% (1901)
31. New Zealand 79% (1775)
32. Italy 79% (1000)
33. Colombia 79% (1994)
34. Madagascar 78% (998)
35. Uruguay 78% (1969)
36. Turkey 78% (985)
37. Dominican Republic 78% (1976)
38. United Arab Emirates 77% (961)
39. Saudi Arabia 77% (978)
40. Chile 76% (1982)
41. Malawi 76% (1997)
42. Ghana 76% (1986)
43. South Africa 76% (1968)
44. Australia 76% (1199)
45. Panama 75% (1995)
46. Zambia 74% (1971)
47. Kenya 74% (1965)
48. Namibia 74% (996)
49. Nicaragua 74% (1988)
50. Germany 74% (1214)
51. Ireland 74% (992)
52. Sweden 74% (993)
53. U.K. 74% (1200)
54. Switzerland 74% (986)
55. Montenegro 74% (800)
56. Austria 73% (984)
57. France 73% (1217)
58. Kuwait 73% (934)
59. Finland 73% (993)
60. El Salvador 73% (2000)
61. Pakistan 73% (2253)
62. Zimbabwe 72% (1989)
63. Honduras 72% (1947)
64. Peru 72% (1982)
65. Egypt 72% (1024)
66. Serbia 72% (1474)
67. Bosnia and Herzegovina 72% (1896)
68. Sierra Leone 71% (1986)
69. India 71% (3140)
70. Taiwan 71% (984)
71. Bangladesh 70% (2200)
72. Belize 70% (464)
73. Croatia 69% (958)
74. Macedonia 69% (1000)
75. Mozambique 69% (996)
76. Bolivia 69% (1948)
77. Liberia 68% (988)
78. Iran 68% (963)
79. China 68% (7206)
80. Slovenia 68% (1000)
81. Haiti 68% (471)
82. Norway 67% (992)
83. Sri Lanka 67% (1974)
84. Poland 67% (939)
85. Guatemala 67% (1988)
86. Uganda 66% (1961)
87. Sudan 66% (971)
88. Israel 66% (957)
89. Kosovo 65% (983)
90. Thailand 65% (2377)
91. Jordan 65% (998)
92. Albania 64% (855)
93. Guinea 62% (952)
94. Botswana 62% (999)
95. Angola 62% (957)
96. Burkina Faso 62% (1876)
97. Malaysia 61% (2115)
98. Mali 61% (984)
99. Niger 61% (1925)
100. Palestinian Territories 61% (991)
101. Romania 61% (937)
102. Senegal 61% (1805)
103. Indonesia 61% (2013)
104. Afghanistan 60% (1128)
105. Hong Kong 60% (789)
106. Cameroon 59% (1967)
107. Japan 59% (1138)
108. Nepal 59% (1965)
109. Bulgaria 59% (927)
110. Slovakia 58% (991)
111. Singapore 58% (3002)
112. Czech Republic 58% (992)
113. Mauritania 57% (1960)
114. Benin 56% (974)
115. South Korea 56% (2056)
116. Myanmar 55% (1047)
117. Latvia 54% (1942)
118. Togo 54% (988)
119. Estonia 53% (1800)
120. Lithuania 50% (1863)
121. Russia 50% (4667)
122. Chad 49% (1915)
123. Yemen 48% (959)
124. Ukraine 48% (1930)
125. Ethiopia 48% (1913)
126. Azerbaijan 47% (1824)
127. Tajikistan 47% (1847)
128. Moldova 46% (1937)
129. Kazakhstan 45% (1871)
130. Morocco 43% (1011)
131. Belarus 43% (1992)
132. Georgia 43% (1904)
133. Kyrgyzstan 34% (1969)
134. Mongolia 32% (928)
135. Uzbekistan 32% (962)
136. Armenia 29% (1954)

Note: This content was first published on Bloomberg View on February 13, 2013.

      

On Valentine’s Day, even a dismal scientist’s mind turns to love. It’s a powerful feeling, with a value that goes far beyond the millions of chocolate boxes and bouquets that will be delivered this Feb. 14.

Survey data from the Gallup Organization, where Justin works as a senior scientist, allow us to take a uniquely deep look at the state of love around the world. In 2006 and 2007, Gallup went to 136 countries and asked people, “Did you experience love for a lot of the day yesterday?” It’s the largest such dataset ever collected.

The good news: Ours is a loving world. On a typical day, about 70 percent of people worldwide reported a love-filled day. In the U.S., 81 percent felt love, as did 81 percent of Canadians and 79 percent of Italians. Germany and the U.K. were less loving, with slightly less than 3 in 4 people reporting feeling loved. Surprisingly, the same was true of the supposedly romantic French. And if you’re in Japan, please hug someone: Only 59 percent of Japanese said they had experienced love the previous day.

Across the world as a whole, the widowed and divorced are the least likely to experience love. Married folks feel more of it than singles. People who live together out of wedlock report getting even more love than married spouses -- an interesting factoid for conservatives worried about the effects of cohabitation. Women get more love than men, particularly in the U.S.

Young Love

If you’re young and not feeling all that loved this Valentine’s Day, don’t despair: You’re not alone. Young adults are among the least likely to experience love. It gets better with age, ultimately peaking in the mid-30s or mid-40s in most countries before fading again into the twilight years.

Money is related to love. Those with more household income are slightly more likely to experience the feeling. Roughly speaking, doubling your income is associated with being about 4 percentage points more likely to be loved. Perhaps having more money makes it easier to find time for love.

That said, the data aren’t necessarily telling us that money can buy you love. It’s possible that other factors correlated with income, such as height or appearance, are the real source of attraction. Or maybe being loved gives you a boost in the labor market.

What’s perhaps more striking is how little money matters on a global level. True, the populations of richer countries are, on average, slightly more likely to feel loved than those of poorer countries. But love is still abundant in the poorer countries: People in Rwanda and the Philippines enjoyed the highest love ratios, with more than 9 in 10 people providing positive responses. Armenia, Uzbekistan, Mongolia and Kyrgyzstan, with economic output per person in the middle of the range, all had love ratios of less than 4 in 10.

Fun facts aside, we think there is a deeper and more consequential purpose to the study of love. Think about what love means to you. To us, it means caring about others and being cared for. Love is valuable, even if it is absent from both our national accounts and our political discourse.

In the language of economics, love is a form of insurance. It involves bonds of reciprocity that provide support when we’re feeling down, when we’re sick and when times are tough.

More broadly, love has the power to mitigate the free-rider and moral hazard problems associated with social (and private) insurance. Bailing out a bank might encourage executives to take bigger risks in the future, but helping loved ones down on their luck has fewer incentive problems because our loved ones typically care for us in return. Such mutually beneficial relationships make us all more resilient in times of crisis. This is why the household remains one of the most powerful institutions for organizing not just families but also our economic lives.

If we can find more love for our fellow citizens, our society will function better. Hard as this may be to achieve in an era when trust in government, business and one another is low, it’s worth the effort. When you expand the boundaries of trust and reciprocity, you expand the boundaries of what is possible.

Note: This content was first published on Bloomberg View on February 13, 2013.

      

Many scholars have argued that once “basic needs” have been met, higher income is no longer associated with higher in subjective well-being. We assess the validity of this claim in comparisons of both rich and poor countries, and also of rich and poor people within a country. Analyzing multiple datasets, multiple definitions of “basic needs” and multiple questions about well-being, we find no support for this claim. The relationship between well-being and income is roughly linear-log and does not diminish as incomes rise. If there is a satiation point, we are yet to reach it.

Introduction

In 1974 Richard Easterlin famously posited that increasing average income did not raise average well-being, a claim that became known as the Easterlin Paradox. However, in recent years new and more comprehensive data has allowed for greater testing of Easterlin’s claim. Studies by us and others have pointed to a robust positive relationship between well-being and income across countries and over time (Deaton, 2008; Stevenson and Wolfers, 2008; Sacks, Stevenson, and Wolfers, 2013). Yet, some researchers have argued for a modified version of Easterlin’s hypothesis, acknowledging the existence of a link between income and well-being among those whose basic needs have not been met, but claiming that beyond a certain income threshold, further income is unrelated to well-being.

The existence of such a satiation point is claimed widely, although there has been no formal statistical evidence presented to support this view. For example Diener and Seligman (2004, p. 5) state that “there are only small increases in well-being” above some threshold. While Clark, Frijters and Shields (2008, p. 123) state more starkly that “greater economic prosperity at some point ceases to buy more happiness,” a similar claim is made by Di Tella and MacCulloch (2008, p. 17): “once basic needs have been satisfied, there is full adaptation to further economic growth.” The income level beyond which further income no longer yields greater well-being is typically said to be somewhere between $8,000 and $25,000. Layard (2003, p. 17) argues that “once a country has over $15,000 per head, its level of happiness appears to be independent of its income;” while in subsequent work he argued for a $20,000 threshold (Layard, 2005 p. 32-33). Frey and Stutzer (2002, p. 416) claim that “income provides happiness at low levels of development but once a threshold (around $10,000) is reached, the average income level in a country has little effect on average subjective well-being.”

Many of these claims, of a critical level of GDP beyond which happiness and GDP are no longer linked, come from cursorily examining plots of well-being against the level of per capita GDP. Such graphs show clearly that increasing income yields diminishing marginal gains in subjective well-being. However this relationship need not reach a point of nirvana beyond which further gains in well-being are absent. For instance Deaton (2008) and Stevenson and Wolfers (2008) find that the well-being–income relationship is roughly a linear-log relationship, such that, while each additional dollar of income yields a greater increment to measured happiness for the poor than for the rich, there is no satiation point.

In this paper we provide a sustained examination of whether there is a critical income level beyond which the well-being–income relationship is qualitatively different, a claim referred to as the modified-Easterlin hypothesis. As a statistical claim, we shall test two versions of the hypothesis. The first, a stronger version, is that beyond some level of basic needs, income is uncorrelated with subjective well-being; the second, a weaker version, is that the well-being–income link estimated among the poor differs from that found among the rich.

Claims of satiation have been made for comparisons between rich and poor people within a country, comparisons between rich and poor countries, and comparisons of average well-being in countries over time, as they grow. The time series analysis is complicated by the challenges of compiling comparable data over time and thus we focus in this short paper on the cross-sectional relationships seen within and between countries. Recent work by Sacks, Stevenson, and Wolfers (2013) provide evidence on the time series relationship that is consistent with the findings presented here.

To preview, we find no evidence of a satiation point. The income–well-being link that one finds when examining only the poor, is similar to that found when examining only the rich. We show that this finding is robust across a variety of datasets, for various measures of subjective well-being, at various thresholds, and that it holds in roughly equal measure when making cross-national comparisons between rich and poor countries as when making comparisons between rich and poor people within a country.

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The headlines seem pretty good. Unemployment fell a tick to 7.3 percent. And jobs growth continued, with payrolls expanding by 169,000 in August, which is just shy of the 175,000 new jobs that analysts were expecting.

But beneath the headline: blech!

The most important news was the revisions to what we had previously thought was a healthy and perhaps self-sustaining recovery. Instead, jobs growth in July was revised from 162,000, to a weak 104,000, and June was also revised downward. Taken together, this month's revisions means we've created 74,000 fewer jobs than previously believed. And the previous jobs report subtracted another 26,000 jobs through revisions. Moreover, for reasons that remain a mystery, revisions have tended to be pro-cyclical, meaning that the healthy recovery we thought we were having might have been expected to yield further upward revisions. All this means that analysts are hastily revising their views.

The other bad news comes from the household survey, where employment fell 115,000, leading the employment-to-population ratio to decline by 0.1 percentage points. So the decline in the unemployment rate isn't due to folks getting jobs; instead, it's due to people dropping out of the labor force.

I have two simple metrics I use to measure the "underlying" pace of jobs growth. The first puts 80% weight on the (more accurate) payrolls survey, and 20% weight on the noisier household survey. That measure suggests employment grew by only 112,000 in August. The alternative is to focus on the 3-month average of payrolls growth, which suggests we're creating slightly around 148,000 jobs per month.

Bottom line: This report says that we're barely creating enough jobs to keep the unemployment rate falling from its current high levels. Policymakers have been looking for a signal that the recovery has become self-sustaining. This report doesn't provide it. And until we're confident that the recovery will keep rolling on, we should delay either any monetary tightening, further fiscal cuts, and definitely postpone the legislative shenanigans that Congress is threatening.

       

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Forty years after its initial publication, Equality and Efficiency: The Big Tradeoff remains an influential work from one of the most important macroeconomists over the last century, Arthur M. Okun (1928-1980). Okun’s theory on market economies reminds readers of an engaging dual theme: the market needs a place, and the market needs to be kept in its place. Articulated in a way that remains relevant even during today’s discussions on broadening gaps in income inequality, Okun emphasized that institutions in a capitalist democracy prod us to get ahead of our neighbors economically after telling us to stay in line socially.

On May 4, The Brookings Institution Press re-released Okun’s classic work with a new foreword from Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers, in addition to “Further Thoughts on Equality and Efficiency,” a paper published by Okun in 1977. The event included opening remarks from Brookings Senior Fellow George Perry, with a keynote address from Larry Summers. Following these remarks, David Wessel moderated a panel discussion with former Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Greg Mankiw, Economic Studies’ Melissa Kearney and Justin Wolfers, and Washington Center for Equitable Growth's Heather Boushey regarding the history and impact of Okun’s work.

Download a copy of Lawrence Summers' opening remarks.

Ted Gayer, Vice President and Director of Economic Studies and Joseph Pechman Senior Fellow, reads Lawrence Summers's opening remarks.

David Wessel (right), Director of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy, moderates a panel discussion with N. Gregory Mankiw, Melissa Kearney, and Heather Boushey.

Janet Yellen, Chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, listens to the discussion from the audience. To Yellen's right is former Congressional Budget Office director, Doug Elmendorf.

 

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• 40 years later- The relevance of Okun’s "Equality and Efficiency: The Big Tradeoff"

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• 40 years later- The relevance of Okun’s "Equality and Efficiency: The Big Tradeoff"

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ABSTRACT

This study analyzes the willingness to pay for health insurance and hence the potential market for new low-cost health insurance product in Namibia, using the double bounded contingent valuation (DBCV) method. The findings suggest that 87 percent of the uninsured respondents are willing to join the proposed health insurance scheme and on average are willing to insure 3.2 individuals (around 90 percent of the average family size). On average respondents are willing to pay NAD 48 per capita per month and respondents in the poorest income quintile are willing to pay up to 11.4 percent of their income. This implies that private voluntary health insurance schemes, in addition to the potential for protecting the poor against the negative financial shock of illness, may be able to serve as a reliable income flow for health care providers in this setting.

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Education systems in many of the world's poorest countries are now experiencing the aftershock of the global economic downturn and millions of children are still missing out on their right to a quality education. After a decade of advances, progress toward the Education for All goals may stall or be thrown into reverse. Presenting a new estimate of the global cost of reaching the goals by 2015, the report challenges governments and the international community to act urgently to adopt targeted policies and practices to prevent a generation of children from being left without a proper education.

On January 20, the Center for Universal Education at Brookings hosted the launch of UNESCO’s 2010 Education for All Global Monitoring Report (GMR) with Kevin Watkins, director of the GMR. The report introduces a new, innovative tool to identify the "education-poor" who are excluded from accessing a quality education. A panel discussion followed featuring Elizabeth King of the World Bank; Barbara Reynolds of UNICEF; and Brookings Fellow Rebecca Winthrop. Brookings Senior Fellow Jacques van der Gaag moderated the discussion.

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On March 26, the Center for Universal Education at Brookings hosted an expert consultation on the development of the World Bank Group's new Education Strategy. The consultative meeting brought together a small group of experts from diverse fields. The purpose of the discussion was to gather input and suggestions aimed at strengthening the World Bank Group's work in the education sector.

Elizabeth King, Director of Education in the Human Development Network at the World Bank, opened the event by providing an overview of the Bank’s current approach to education, and how it has evolved over the last several decades. She described the Bank’s priorities as reconnecting education to the broader development agenda, supporting more equitable access, ensuring better learning, and strengthening education systems. The Bank’s main operating principals are taking a whole-sector approach, building the evidence base in education, and measuring the results and impact. Beginning with this extensive consultation process, the Bank is demonstrating its willingness to work with others in the development community to build a larger and more robust evidence base from which to draw lessons to improve the quality of limited staff to maximize the impact of Bank activities, to underscore its commitment to partnerships with other organizations and civil society groups, and to move toward improving the measurement of results so as to be able to further improve the Bank’s education programs around the world.

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INTRODUCTION—

Achieving universal education is a twofold challenge: to get children and youth into school and then to teach them something meaningful while they are there. While important progress has been made on the first challenge, there is a crisis unfolding in relation to learning. Around the world, there have been major gains in primary school enrollment partly due to the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals and the abolition of school fees by many national governments. However in many countries, students are spending years in school without learning core competencies, such as reading and writing. To address this learning crisis, the global community and national governments need to place a much greater focus on the ultimate objective of education—to acquire knowledge and develop skills.

This shift in focus away from just enrollment to enrollment plus quality learning requires measuring learning outcomes. However, the global education community is not yet systematically using effective instruments for measuring primary school learning in low- and middle-income countries. This policy brief reviews the global efforts among the primary donors to support the measurement of learning outcomes. It then suggests steps needed to transition global education policy into a new paradigm of enrollment plus quality learning, which includes: scaling up the implementation of national education accounts and national assessment systems; increasing attention to monitoring early learning during child development to improve readiness for school; and expanding the systematic use of simple assessments of basic cognitive functions in the early grades to help teachers improve their practice.

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Being able to read and write is the most basic foundation of knowledge accumulation and further skill development. Without literacy, there can be no quality education. Presently, 1 in 5 adults is illiterate, two-thirds of whom are women. At the current pace, over 700 million adults worldwide will still not be able to read in 2015. [1] In global education discussions, literacy rates are most often reported for adolescents and adults, an ex post facto measure of the failure of primary school systems to impart basic skills in the most formative schooling years. It is clear that much needs to be done to provide these adolescents and adults with access to successful literacy programs. But we must also ensure that children with access to schooling are not growing up to be illiterate.

Children enrolled and regularly attending school for the first three grades should be able to read basic text. Evidence shows that acquiring this ability to read sets students up for further learning, enabling them to read and comprehend progressively more advanced materials and acquire additional knowledge.

As explained in our earlier policy brief, data from numerous countries show that children in school are failing to acquire the most basic of skills, measured as the ability to read words of connected text. We called for a global paradigm shift that places learning at the center of the global education discourse. This shift requires the major bilateral and multilateral actors to refocus their own efforts on supporting learning in the classroom and measuring progress by increased learning outcomes. There has been some progress here, such as USAID’s goal to improve reading skills for primary school children in its new education strategy and the World Bank’s Education Strategy 2020, Learning for All: investing in people’s knowledge and skills to promote development.

This shift of focus also requires substantial changes on the ground, including encouraging and supporting a culture of literacy and learning at the community level. For example, Gove and Cvelich highlight some main factors contributing to low reading levels, including a lack of support for teachers, limited instructional time, poorly resourced schools, the absence of books in the home and policies regarding the language of instruction. [2] In Mali, a recent survey found that three-quarters of grade 2 students did not have a textbook and no student had supplementary reading books at school. [3] In The Gambia, the vast majority of students who demonstrated a level of reading fluency said that they had books at home. Globally, in both developed and developing economies, a relatively consistent proxy for “parental commitment to education” is the number of books in the home. A 20-year study of 27 countries found that children growing up in homes with many books get three years more schooling than their peers who come from homes without books. [4] There is no one-size-fits-all solution to improving the quality of education in developing countries. However, there is plenty of room for innovation to address some of the biggest barriers to improving reading levels, including availability of appropriate reading materials at school and at home. In disadvantaged communities, where there are relatively few books and even fewer books in local languages and that deal with culturally-relevant topics, innovation is needed to help develop a robust culture of literacy.

One such innovation is Worldreader.org’s iRead pilot in Ghana, which has put hundreds of e-readers into children’s hands. A lot has been written on similar classroom technology in developing countries, which cite examples of supplying hardware to schools without plans for its educational use, promoting technology from a single company, insufficient planning for sustainability, and inadequate investment in time to train teachers and administrators who will be the purveyors of the technology initiatives in the classrooms. [5]

However, the important difference between this e-reader program and similar projects focused on putting computers in classrooms is that e-readers usually operate on the mobile phone system, which has exploded in developing regions over the last few years. In Kenya, more than 80 percent of the population has mobile phone network coverage and more than half of the population has purchased a mobile phone subscription. The GSM compatibility of e-readers allows for downloading of new reading materials wherever there is mobile phone coverage and sufficient funds available to purchase new texts. E-readers also have relatively low levels of energy consumption (a one-hour charge can last more than a week). In addition to gaining the support of community leaders and teachers from the beginning, the pilot began with intense in-service training for teachers in how to use e-readers to complement their existing curricula. While Worldreader.org has not solved all of the challenges posed by technology initiatives in education, it has taken some important steps toward addressing the barriers to project success. [6]

The organization has also tackled specific challenges that are impeding reading success in the early primary grades:

• Additional support for emergent readers. E-readers provide additional support to teachers in teaching children how to read, an important supplement in primary school classrooms in low-income countries where there may be 40 or 50 students per teacher. In such cases, students are required to work independently or in small groups while the teacher is working with other students. The text-to-speech feature on e-readers can read books aloud to the student, exposing her to the written text as she hears it read aloud. Students can also use the downloaded dictionary while reading to look up unfamiliar words and continue to read without adult assistance.
  
• Students and teachers get to choose. While paper books donated by schools, libraries, and individuals from around the world have helped to get written materials into low-resource schools in developing countries, e-books allow students and teachers in developing countries to choose which books they teach and read. Although choices now are restricted by the dominance of English in the e-book market, the potential for the expansion of the digital market represents a step toward greater agency for teachers and students.
  
• Working with local publishers to increase access to books for emergent readers. Children learning to read need access to the types of books that engage their imagination and spark their interest. For children learning to read, this means stories with simple sentences in their local language. Yet, traditionally children’s books are not a good economic bet for publishers, particularly in developing countries. The high cost of printing the books are not recouped since so many families cannot purchase copies for their own household use. However, distributing books in e-reader format will actually allow publishers to reach more customers at a lower cost. To bring more books to the developing world through e-readers and e-books, Worldreader.org seeks to support a self-sustaining reading and publishing culture by working with local publishers to digitize books and materials to support local language curricula.
  
• Portability can increase reading opportunities. Anecdotal reports from classroom teachers in the Ghanaian pilot frequently reference how students would not stop reading, pulling out their e-readers in between lessons, during recess and lunch, and after school with friends, parents and siblings. An International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement study on reading literacy in 32 countries found that the amount of voluntary book reading that students did during out-of-school time was strongly positively related to students’ achievement levels. [7]

While the pilot is still in the early stages, the founders of the project are focused on the essential outcomes. Their USAID-funded impact study seeks to find out whether children are reading more than they were before the program and whether children read better than they were before the program. Measuring program success by understanding the impact on learning outcomes is a critical step for shifting the global education paradigm to one focused on learning.

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[1] UNESCO. (2010). EFA Global Monitoring Report 2010: Reaching the Marginalized. Paris: UNESCO.
[2] Gove, A., and P. Cvelich, (2010). Early Reading: Igniting Education for All. A report by the Early Grades Learning Community of Practice. Research Triangle Park, NC: Research Triangle Institute.
[3] Evans, 2010
[4] M.D.R. Evans, Jonathan Kelley, Joanna Sikora, Donald J. Treiman. “Family scholarly culture and educational success: Books and schooling in 27 nations.” Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 2010; DOI: 10.1016/j.rssm.2010.01.002
The study controls for education levels, occupations, and socio-economic status of the parents.
[5] For example, Trucano, M. “Worst practice in ICT use in education,” 2010, accessed at http://blogs.worldbank.org/edutech/worst-practice
[6] Some of the core challenges identified by Worldreader.org and others include the upfront costs of e-readers, need for on-going training and support to teachers, students, and communities, buy-in of school systems and local governments to deploy technology and content, insufficient relevant materials in e-book format, and consistent access to electricity and mobile networks.
[7] Elley, W.B. (Ed.). (1994). The IEA Study of Reading Literacy: Achievement and Instruction in Thirty-two School Systems. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

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Financial Data as Driving Force Behind Improved Learning

During the past decade, school enrollments have increased dramatically, mostly thanks to UNESCO’s Education for All (EFA) movement and the UN Millennium Development Goals. From 1999 to 2008, an additional 52 million children around the world enrolled in primary schools, and the number of out-of-school children fell by 39 million. In Sub-Saharan Africa alone, enrollment rates rose by one-third during that time, even with large population increases in school-age children.

Yet enrollment is not the only indicator of success in education, and does not necessarily translate into learning. Even with these impressive gains in enrollment, many parts of the world, and particularly the poorest areas, now face a severe learning crisis. The latest data in the EFA Global Monitoring Report 2011 reveal poor literacy and numeracy skills for millions of students around the world. In Malawi and Zambia, more than one-third of sixth-grade students had not achieved the most basic literacy skills. In El Salvador, just 13 percent of third-grade students passed an international mathematics exam. Even in middle-income countries such as South Africa and Morocco, the majority of students had not acquired basic reading skills after four years of primary education. Although the focus on children out of school is fully justified, given that they certainly lack learning opportunities, the failure to focus on learning also does a disservice to the more than 600 million children in the developing world who are already in school but fail to learn very basic skills.

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Editor’s note: In a presentation to the 2011 International Conference on Early Childhood Development in Beijing, China, Jacques van der Gaag makes the economic case for investing in young children. He references the seminal works by several Nobel laureates in economics to demonstrate how development hinges on investments in early childhood, including health, nutrition, and education.

Thank you for inviting me to the 2011 International Conference on Early Childhood Development. I am very grateful to the organizers from the China Development Research Foundation for giving me a chance to make the economic case for investing in young children. While I have been giving these types of presentations for more than two decades in over a dozen countries worldwide, I prefer to have some back-up from a number of serious economists who, over time, have made major contributions to a key finding in development economics: countries prosper if they invest in their people, and the well-being of all people improves in a prosperous country that values equality.

To begin with, I would like to introduce my fellow countryman Jan Tinbergen, who received the first Nobel Prize in Economics, in 1969, for his work on economic development. Being a physicist by training, he pioneered the use of mathematical models to mimic the working of a country’s economy. The equations he used to formulate these models will probably look very foreign to you, but the important point I want to make is that these early models already included people, in the form of labor. People were seen as an input in the production process. Since there was an abundance of people in the developing world, and a shortage of capital, the development process, it was argued, could be sped up by providing more capital to low income countries to invest in infrastructure, factories, and other forms of physical capital. And to invest in human capital -- people. The economy needs all forms of human capital, from unskilled labor to highly skilled labor, and therefore investment in people, through education, was considered an integrated part of the development process.

Another well-known economist (Theodore W. Schulz, Nobel prize 1979) emphasized an important difference between physical capital and human capital: people respond to incentives. Thus, when food prices are being kept artificially low (to allow wages in the cities to stay low), farmers may decide that it is no longer worth their while to produce food, and they may migrate to the cities to work in the new factories. In other words, it is important to invest in human capital to stimulate the economy, but the broad preferences of the (working) population should not be overlooked.
 
Robert W. Fogel (Nobel laureate in 1993) underscored the role of workers in the production process by emphasizing the importance of health and nutrition to enhance productivity. Indeed, he calculated that about half of the speedy growth of the British economy during the Industrial Revolution was the result of better health and nutrition conditions of the working population. In turn, of course, the economic growth made the improvements in sanitation and the increased availability of (better) food possible.

A major breakthrough in the thinking about development (note that I am no longer saying “economic development”) came with the work of Amartya Sen (Nobel prize winner in 1998). His work has led to a re-definition of the development process from one that focuses solely on economic growth to one in which the fruits of economic growth benefits the population in terms of higher literacy rates and education levels, better health and nutrition, higher levels of social cohesion and social skills, and more equality. These four broad dimensions of well-being, together with economic growth, are now the building blocks of the Human Development Index. Indeed, human development, as currently understood, has been further specified in the Millennium Development Goals that drive today’s development discussion and policies in every corner of the world.

Before I finish my very brief (and very selective) history of development economics, allow me to mention the work of one more Nobel laureate in economics: Jim Heckman (2000). Heckman understands, of course, the importance of investing in people to increase a country’s human capital. But he also understands both the economics of early childhood development (ECD) and its scientific underpinnings. In recent work, he has extensively referred to the scientific basis that shows the causal link between deprivations early in life and education, social and health outcomes later in life. His economic work on ECD confirms what others have been saying for decades: The highest economic returns to investments in people come from the investments that occur in the early years of life.  

In sum, with an increased understanding of the basic development process, in which people are both the driving force for development and its main beneficiaries, the importance of investing in very young children is now seen as a key factor in the broad human development process of a country.
Taking care of very young children has long been on the development agenda. Immunization programs have been pushed to improve the health status of young children, nutrition programs have been implemented to prevent malnutrition and hunger, schooling has been emphasized as important for prosperity later in life, and as a possible “equalizer” of society. What the recent literature on brain development, on the interaction of genes and the environment, on the importance of cognitive and non-cognitive skill development (“social skills”), and on the link between early deprivations and a variety of problems later in life (from health problems to increased delinquency) has added to these efforts, is a better understanding of the long-term economic implications of these interventions.
 
Simply stated, economists look at investments in human capital as a means to increase lifelong “productivity”. The easiest way to measure differences in productivity is by comparing differences in wage rates (in well functioning labor markets) among workers with different levels of education (skills). Higher levels of education (more and better skills) lead to higher productivity, and this advantage can be maintained during one’s entire (working) life. Of course, not everyone works for wages, but similar results (more educated workers are more productive) have been found in agriculture and other forms of self-employment. Indeed, even the productivity of people who do not work in the labor market can be improved by education. Case in point: women who finished secondary education are much better equipped to address the health and nutrition needs of their children than illiterate mothers (and they have fewer children and make sure that these children go to school).

When economist do the numbers, solely based on increased productivity in the labor market, the economic returns to ECD are impressive (see slides 21 and 22). Integrated ECD programs reduce infant and child mortality, increase children’s nutritional and health status, increase on-time school enrollment, decrease drop-out and repetition rates, and increase progression to higher levels of education. All this leads to a more productive labor force. The economic returns from these ECD benefits alone are estimated to be in the 7 percent to 12 percent range, with some estimates being much higher. When ECD interventions are properly seen as investments in the human development of a country, the benefits are very large indeed.
 
Chances are that you were a little surprised to get a lecture on the “the history of development economics” at a conference about early childhood development. But the organizers asked me to make the economic case for investing in young children. I decided that I could do this as forcefully as possible by invoking the help of no fewer than five Nobel laureates in economics. Development is now understood as a process by people for people. All the evidence shows that investment in the health, in nutrition, and in cognitive and non-cognitive skill development is crucial for a prosperous and equal society. Of all the investments in people one can make, investments in the very young have the highest economic returns.

I congratulate our organizers from the China Development Research Foundation for their work on ECD to benefit the children of poor minorities in western China, providing them with a chance to benefit from China’s impressive growth record. And I thank you again for the opportunity to address this distinguished audience on such an important topic.

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Despite the notable success in enrolling children in primary school over the past decade, the education agenda is unfinished as millions of children are still excluded from learning opportunities and millions more leave school without having acquired the essential knowledge and skills needed to participate in society.

On January 27, the Center for Universal Education at Brookings hosted a half-day conference that focused on the research examining “what works in education” to achieve improved learning opportunities and outcomes. In addition to hearing from researchers studying the effectiveness of various education strategies, participants discussed how to facilitate a future research agenda that could have the most meaningful impact on learning. Senior Fellow Jacques van der Gaag moderated the discussion.

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• Improving Education in the Developing World: Evidence from Randomized Evaluations Presentation (.pdf)
• Sociocultural Gradients for Language Scores by Country Slide (.pdf)
• School Resources and Educational Outcomes in Developing Countries Presentation (.pdf)
• Making Learning for All a Reality Presentation (.pdf)
• Addressing the Global Learning Crisis Presentation (.pdf)

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ABSTRACT

The AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa puts increasing pressure on the buffer capacity of low- and middle-income households without access to health insurance. This paper examines the relationship between health shocks, insurance status and health-seeking behaviour. It also investigates the possible mitigating effects of insurance on income loss and out-of-pocket health expenditure. The study uses a unique dataset based on a random sample of 1769 households and 7343 individuals living in the Greater Windhoek area in Namibia. The survey includes medical testing for HIV infection which allows for the explicit analysis of HIV-related health shocks. We find that the economic consequences of health shocks can be severe for uninsured households even in a country with a relatively well-developed public health care system such as Namibia. The uninsured resort to a variety of coping strategies to deal with the high medical expenses and reductions in income, such as selling assets, taking up credit or receiving financial support from relatives and friends. As HIV-infected individuals increasingly develop AIDS, this will put substantial pressure on the public health care system as well as social support networks. Evidence suggests that private insurance, currently unaffordable to the poor, protects households from the most severe consequences of health shocks.

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