Institution
World Bank
Other•Washington D.C., District of Columbia, United States•
About: World Bank is a other organization based out in Washington D.C., District of Columbia, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poverty. The organization has 7813 authors who have published 21594 publications receiving 1198361 citations. The organization is also known as: World Bank, WB & The World Bank.
Topics: Population, Poverty, Free trade, Productivity, Commercial policy
Papers published on a yearly basis
Papers
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors define empowerment as a person's capacity to make effective choices; that is, as the capacity to transform choices into desired actions and outcomes, and demonstrate how to measure empowerment at both the intervention level and the country level, as part of poverty or governance monitoring.
Abstract: This paper presents an analytic framework that can be used to measure and monitor empowerment processes and outcomes. The measuring empowerment (ME) framework, rooted in both conceptual discourse and measurement practice, illustrates how to gather data on empowerment and structure its analysis. The framework can be used to measure empowerment at both the intervention level and the country level, as a part of poverty or governance monitoring. The paper first provides a definition of empowerment and then explains how the concept can be reduced to measurable components. Empowerment is defined as a person's capacity to make effective choices; that is, as the capacity to transform choices into desired actions and outcomes. The extent or degree to which a person is empowered is influenced by personal agency (the capacity to make purposive choice) and opportunity structure (the institutional context in which choice is made). Asset endowments are used as indicators of agency. These assets may be psychological, informational, organizational, material, social, financial, or human. Opportunity structure is measured by the presence and operation of formal and informal institutions, including the laws, regulatory frameworks, and norms governing behavior. Degrees of empowerment are measured by the existence of choice, the use of choice, and the achievement of choice. Following the conceptual discussion and the presentation of the analytic framework, this paper illustrates how the ME framework can be applied, using examples from four development interventions. Each example discusses how the framework guided analysis and development of empowerment indicators. The paper also presents a draft module for measuring empowerment at the country level. The module can be used alone or be integrated into country-level poverty or governance monitoring systems that seek to add an empowerment dimension to their analysis.
505 citations
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TL;DR: Dasgupta et al. as mentioned in this paper analyzed the effects of regulation, plant-level management policies, and plant and firm characteristics on environmental performance in Mexican factories, focusing especially on management policies: the degree of effort to improve environmental performance and the type of management strategy adopted.
Abstract: Strengthened enforcement raises the price of pollution and provides an incentive to reduce it. A cost-effective complement to stricter enforcement is effective environmental management and training programs within plants. Using new survey evidence, Dasgupta, Hettige, and Wheeler analyze the effects of regulation, plant-level management policies, and plant and firm characteristics on environmental performance in Mexican factories. They focus especially on management policies: the degree of effort to improve environmental performance and the type of management strategy adopted. They index effort with two variables: adoption of ISO 14000-type procedures for pollution management and use of plant personnel for environmental inspection and control. Proxies for strategic orientation are two indices of mainstreaming: assigning environmental responsibilities to general managers instead of specialized environmental managers, and providing environmental training for all plant employees, not just specialists. Detailed survey data let them test the performance impact of such factors as ownership, scale, sector, trade and other business relationships, local regulatory enforcement, local community pressure, management education and experience, and workers` general education. Their findings: Process is important. Plants that institute ISO 14000-type internal management procedures show superior environmental performance. Mainstreaming works. Environmental training for all plant personnel is more effective than developing a cadre of environmental specialists, and assigning environmental tasks to general managers is more effective than using special environmental managers. Regulatory pressure works. Plants that have experienced regulatory inspections and enforcement are significantly cleaner than those that have not. Public scrutiny promotes stronger environmental policies. Publicly traded Mexican firms are significantly cleaner than privately held firms. Size matters. Large plants in multiplant firms are much more likely to adopt policies that improve environmental performance. OECD influences do not matter. It is generally assumed that plants linked to OECD economies show superior environmental performance, but they find no evidence that OECD links-including multinational ownership, trade, management training, or management experience-affect environmental performance. New technology is not significantly cleaner. They find no evidence that plants with newer equipment perform better environmentally (once other factors are accounted for). Education promotes clean production. Plants with more highly educated workers show significantly better environmental management efforts and performance. This paper - a product of the Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to understand the determinants of environmental performance in developing countries. The study was funded by the Bank's Research Support Budget under the research project The Economics of Industrial Pollution Control in Developing Countries (RPO 680-20).
505 citations
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University of Cambridge1, Florida Institute of Technology2, Fauna & Flora International3, Zoological Society of London4, National Autonomous University of Mexico5, Simon Fraser University6, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University7, World Wide Fund for Nature8, Georgia State University9, State Street Corporation10, Conservation International11, University of Maine12, United Nations Environment Programme13, The Nature Conservancy14, University of Oxford15, World Bank16, Wetlands International17, International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources18, Imperial College London19, Natural Environment Research Council20, Clemson University21, George Mason University22, University of Queensland23, Bangor University24, BirdLife International25, World Resources Institute26, Wildlife Conservation Society27, Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research28, Center for International Forestry Research29, Ocean Conservancy30, National University of Singapore31, Temple University32, Oregon State University33, University of East Anglia34
TL;DR: 100 scientific questions that, if answered, would have the greatest impact on conservation practice and policy are identified and are expected to help identify new directions for researchers and assist funders in directing funds.
Abstract: We identified 100 scientific questions that, if answered, would have the greatest impact on conservation practice and policy. Representatives from 21 international organizations, regional sections and working groups of the Society for Conservation Biology, and 12 academics, from all continents except Antarctica, compiled 2291 questions of relevance to conservation of biological diversity worldwide. The questions were gathered from 761 individuals through workshops, email requests, and discussions. Voting by email to short-list questions, followed by a 2-day workshop, was used to derive the final list of 100 questions. Most of the final questions were derived through a process of modification and combination as the workshop progressed. The questions are divided into 12 sections: ecosystem functions and services, climate change, technological change, protected areas, ecosystem management and restoration, terrestrial ecosystems, marine ecosystems, freshwater ecosystems, species management, organizational systems and processes, societal context and change, and impacts of conservation interventions. We anticipate that these questions will help identify new directions for researchers and assist funders in directing funds.
505 citations
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TL;DR: The relationship between ownership structure and corporate performance has been the subject of intense research in both transition and market economies as discussed by the authors, and the Czech Republic's mass-privatization program provides an unique opportunity to investigate this relationship.
503 citations
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors examined whether the degree of spillovers from foreign direct investment is affected by the foreign ownership share in investment projects and found that the presence of partially foreign-owned projects is correlated with higher productivity of domestic firms in upstream industries suggesting that domestic suppliers benefit from contacts with multinational customers.
501 citations
Authors
Showing all 7881 results
Name | H-index | Papers | Citations |
---|---|---|---|
Joseph E. Stiglitz | 164 | 1142 | 152469 |
Barry M. Popkin | 157 | 751 | 90453 |
Dan J. Stein | 142 | 1727 | 132718 |
Asli Demirguc-Kunt | 137 | 429 | 78166 |
Elinor Ostrom | 126 | 430 | 104959 |
David Scott | 124 | 1561 | 82554 |
Ross Levine | 122 | 398 | 108067 |
Barry Eichengreen | 116 | 949 | 51073 |
Martin Ravallion | 115 | 570 | 55380 |
Kenneth H. Mayer | 115 | 1351 | 64698 |
Angus Deaton | 110 | 363 | 66325 |
Timothy Besley | 103 | 368 | 45988 |
Lawrence H. Summers | 102 | 285 | 58555 |
Shang-Jin Wei | 101 | 415 | 39112 |
Thorsten Beck | 99 | 373 | 62708 |