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Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been an increasingly important issue for private and non-government businesses to consider when investing in countries. The paper specifically addresses transnational corporations and how they can negatively affect the development of countries when socially irresponsible and notes the increasing consumer awareness of corporate irresponsibility. It argues that better relationships between governments and corporations need to be established to reduce low living standards, exploitation, poverty, and unemployment, which would contribute to overall sustainable development. The paper recommends having CSR indicators for measurement, addresses why CSR should matter to business corporations, and gives insight into how the ILO can act and relate to CSR. This paper was written as an insight into the work of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization 2004 that aims to provide a fairer globalization for all.

Using a large panel for 95 countries and the 1972–2014 period, this paper analyses the interactions among globalization, political & civil rights and economic convergence, through a simultaneous estimation technique. We use a multi-dimensional, de facto, and continuous measures of Freedoms and Globalization. We find a two-way positive relationship between civil liberties & political rights and economic, political and social Globalization, as well as significant two-way relationships with the economic convergence (using as a proxy the ratio of GDP per capita to the US). In this way, we extend the test for the two-way relationship between Democracy and Globalization put forward by Eichengreen and Leblang (Econ Politics 20(3):289–334, 2008). Overall, we also find a virtuous cycle between Globalization, Freedoms and Economic convergence, except for non-OECD countries at early intermediate stages of development. This positive systemic effect can be put into question by the recent negative shocks on Globalization and Freedoms related to the Covid-19 pandemic.

I revisit the 1918–20 pandemic and ask whether it led to a reversal in the rise of trade and financial globalization that preceded it. Using annual data for 17 countries for the 1870–1928 period, a variety of tests and techniques are used to draw some robust conclusions. Overall, the pandemic a century ago interrupted, but did not put an end, to the first globalization of the twentieth century. However, two blocs consisting of combatant and non-combatant countries, experienced significantly different consequences. Globalization was sharply curtailed for the combatant countries while there were few, if any, consequences for globalization in the non-combatant group of countries. That said, there was considerable resilience especially in trade openness among several of the combatant economies. Perhaps changes in the make-up of economic blocs, post-pandemic, is a fallout from shocks of this kind. While there are lessons for the ongoing COVID pandemics differences between the 1920s and today also play a role. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10368-021-00526-1.

This paper discusses epistemic aspects of populism – especially its link with radical uncertainty and the tribal construction of facts – that have so far received relatively little attention. We argue that populism is less a backward-looking phenomenon feeding off existing grievances than a narrative-based reaction to an increasingly unsettled future. Many economic factors isolated as causes of populism – especially rapid technological innovation, deregulation, and the globalisation of networks – entail a high degree of indeterminacy in social systems; and the corresponding uncertainty facing voters is a catalyst for many of the pathologies of populism isolated in the literature. In particular, uncertainty undermines the credibility of experts, while the disorientation and anxiety it induces increase reliance on simple narratives to structure expectations. The paper explores the role of narrative entrepreneurs, the relationship between narratives and power, and the dynamics of narrative coups designed to create alternative facts and perform a new reality.

The globalization of COVID-19 pandemic and its economic impacts is set to run havoc across all economies in the world, throwing many into recession and possibly economic depression. As the numbers of infected and death cases rise sharply and recovery from the pandemic remains uncertain even in developed countries, evidence of shocks across economies including China, the Europe, and the US are already emerging. The aim of this paper is to provide an overall understanding of the likely macroeconomic shocks of the pandemic, covering economic activities or areas including demand, supply, supply chain, trade, investment, price level, exchange rates, and financial stability and risk, economic growth, and international cooperation. The paper first presents a general and theoretical mapping of the likely macroeconomic impacts of the pandemic on an affected economy and then reviews the emerging evidence in relation to the impact mapping to understand the nature of the impacts. The paper then illustrates the likely impacts using a standard macroeconomic AD-AS model and outlines some necessary features that needs to be considered while designing policy responses by governments and international institutions in mitigating the economic shocks. Assessments of this paper are broadly in line with the limited studies available on the economics of COVID-19.

The rise of an extreme movement, which has consistently produced violence and hatred in Kosovar society for more than fifteen years, undoubtedly increases the curiosity of any researcher of social problems to deal with the study of this issue. Of course, the study of social problems is extremely complex, especially in this time of globalization and extraordinary social mobility, therefore, each time, the opportunities for debate remained open. The paper addresses a very problematic topic, but that belongs to the social topicality, and not only in Kosovar society as one of the societies in transition, but also quite prominent in the most developed countries, and with a long democratic tradition. It should be noted that Kosovo is not only going through an economic transition, but more than that, the political and cultural transition has taken a special place. It should be noted that society's approach to the state and politics is crucial and has a tremendous impact on the process of economic transition. The paper deals precisely with the tools and methods that Kosovar political parties have used and are using to seize power, where the focus is on populism and the spirit of hatred created during the two decades after the war in Kosovo.

The rapidly expanding corona pandemic in 2020 has largely brought the world to an economic stagnation. The impact on the environment, especially on air quality, from almost suspended air traffic, idle industry and economic lockdown is enormous, but also the economic and social consequences of the crisis. This state of stagnation hardly appears to be economically and socially sustainable. However, we should ask ourselves right now what we can learn from the situation in order to question globalization, better intercept future comparable crisis situations and take the step towards more sustainable development on an ecological, economic and social basis. The paper identifies the areas of externality management to improve environmental quality, digitalization and network expansion as well as basic income as central concepts that need to be addressed in and after the crisis. Concrete concepts are suggested and discussed at the end of the paper.

The globalization of COVID-19 pandemic is en route to produce a chain of economic impacts worldwide through distortions in global trade and supply chain. The globalization of production and trade shocks in relation to China generate substantial threat to world trade. The aim of this paper is to provide a preliminary and broad-based understanding of likely trade implications of the pandemic. Beginning with an assessment on likely implications for trade between China and the rest of the world, the paper uses a standard trade analysis framework to explain the implications for world trade. The paper then presents a theoretical mapping that shows likely progression and span of trade implications and reviews emerging evidence to identify if real-life outcomes follow the map. The paper concludes that the pandemic is likely to not only introduce new patterns of world trade but also affect trade relations and globalization, making some economies winners and some losers. Given the scarcity of scholarly work on COVID-19’s trade implications, the paper contributes by offering a novel broad-based understanding, which could serve as a basis for advanced analysis. Assessments of the paper could help policy-makers in preparing for a new world order of international trade.

De-globalization, now a distinct possibility, would induce a significant qualitative shift in strategies, structures, and behaviors observable in international business (IB). Coming to terms with this qualitative shift would require IB research to develop a much deeper integration of politics, the key driver of de-globalization. To support such integration, this paper introduces two relevant theories of (de-)globalization from political science, liberalism and realism. Both predict de-globalization under current conditions but lead to different expectations about the future world economy: liberalism suggests a patchwork of economic linkages, while realism predicts the emergence of economic blocs around major countries. This paper discusses the resulting opportunities in three areas of IB research: political strategies and roles of multinational enterprises (MNEs), global value chains, and the role of the national context. For political strategies and roles, there is a need to explore how regular business activities and deliberate political agency of MNEs affect the political sustainability of globalization. For value chains, questions include their future reach and specialization, changes in organizational forms, and the impact of political considerations on location decisions. Research opportunities on national contexts relate to their ability to sustain globalization and their connection with economic and military power.

This paper argues that megaprojects are inherently tied to the logic of growth, development, urban qualitative transformation, wealth creation, competitiveness and prosperity. Megaprojects constitute the infrastructure of globalization and neoliberalism and they actively contribute to a situation of increased planetary urbanization. The causal context of megaprojects – the logic of development and competitiveness – has consequences for their planning, design and management. In order to meet the goal of contributing to urban and national growth and development, megaprojects are usually shaped as public-private institutional arrangements participated by elites and pro-growth coalitions at various spatial scales that are able to gather the necessary political support, funding and expert knowledge to implement these complex structures. The close links between megaprojects, development and competitiveness, and the increasing role of megaprojects in the configuration of megaregions worldwide, have an architectural reflection in the prominent importance of iconicity in megaproject design and construction. Thus, the paper analyzes megaprojects in a dual, interconnected way: as spatial settings and infrastructure units that obey specific planning, design and management priorities, and also as reflections or expressions – as consequences or crystallizations – of larger socio-economic forces. Megaprojects have multiplied around the world as an urban response to pressures for development, competitiveness and innovation in a context of globalization and neoliberalism.

In this paper, we investigate how corporate social responsibility (hereafter CSR) practices of domestic Croatian mid and large size firms differentiate them on foreign markets. Still, in order for export organizations to realize benefits offered by CSR, export organizations need to identify their main stakeholder groups and interests, and adequately design their CSR activities. This paper provides an overview of the main CSR activities of export organizations in foreign markets and analyses their stakeholder’s management as well as the quality of relationships with their primary and secondary stakeholders on foreign markets. Results of empirical research on a sample of 78 medium and large Croatian export companies show that these export organizations invest significant efforts in implementation of different CSR activities, and into relationships with their primary stakeholders.

The rise of global cities has raised multiple questions regarding the governance of diversity. While they are often portrayed as spaces of ungovernable global flows and as catalysts of the disappearance of national identities, this paper aims to analyse these cities’ actions and strategies to govern their cultural diversity and defend a renewed conception of the national. I combine an analysis of outward-looking strategies that promote their cultural diversity on the global cultural field, and of inward-looking strategies that attempt to project their plural identity in the urban space. I compare two cities, Doha and Singapore, which have emerged as major centres of the global economy and offer a perspective that differs from the large Western cities where the notion of global city was initially coined. The affirmation of Doha and Singapore as global cities does not go along with a process of weakening of the nation-state, but on the contrary takes part in a logic of nation building and nation branding. The paper analyses how local actors negotiate this dialectic between the global and the national. Firstly, I show that they have put transnational regional networks and identities at the centre of the promotion of these cities as cultural hub. Secondly, I show that the recognition of these cities’ diverse heritage and its display in the urban landscape, go in parallel with an increasing spatial exclusion of recent migrants.

The growing requirement of India getting more integrated with the worldwide economy is pushing India’s engagement in International trade. India’s external sector continued to be buoyant and robust in 2017-18, as witnessed in the Economic Survey 2017-18. The cross border uncertainty in the financial markets has transmitted through the various channels such as trade, finance, and confidence. Due to globalization, the developing countries like India experiences detrimental pressure on its Balance of Payment (BoP). India’s balance of payments situation, which has been relaxed since 2013-14, sustained to be so in the first half of 2017-18, in spite of some growth in the Current Account Deficit (CAD) in the first quarter, with a relatively lower CAD in the second quarter. India’s CAD stood at US$7.2 billion (1.2 percent of GDP) in Q2 of 2017-18, narrowing sharply from US$ 15.0 billion (2.5 percent of GDP) in the preceding quarter. The objective of this study is to identify and analyze the factors that influence the country’s Current Account Deficit. Research Methodology - This paper is based on secondary data, which is collected through various sources like report of RBI, IMF, and Economic Survey etc. This paper also explains the link between trade imbalances factors and its effect on current and capital accounts of Indian Balance of Payment.

The introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in our contemporary society imposes historically unique challenges for humankind. The emerging autonomy of AI holds unique potentials of eternal life of robots, AI and algorithms alongside unprecedented economic superiority, data storage and computational advantages. Yet to this day, it remains unclear what impact AI taking over the workforce will have on economic growth. This paper therefore first establishes what AI is and provides a theoretical background on standard neoclassical and heterodox economics growth theories with particular attention to the Cambridge Capital Controversy’s argument to divide capital components into fluid, hence more flexible (e.g., petty cash, checking account), and more clay, hence more inflexible (e.g., factories and intransferable means of production), components. The contemporary trend of slowbalisation is described, as the slowing down of conventional globalization of goods, services and Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) flows; yet at the same time, we still see human migration and air travel as well as data transfer continuing to rise. These market trends of conventional globalization slowing and rising AI-related industries are proposed as first market disruption in the wake of the large-scale entrance of AI into our contemporary economy. Growth in the artificial age is then proposed to be measured based on two AI entrance proxies of Global Connectivity Index and The State of the Mobile Internet Connectivity 2018 Index, which is found to be highly significantly positively correlated with the total inflow of migrants and FDI inflow – serving as evidence that the still globalizing rising industries in the age of slowbalisation are connected to AI. Both indices are positively correlated with GDP output in cross-sectional studies over the world. In order to clarify if the found effect is a sign of industrialization, time series of worldwide data reveal that internet connectivity around the world is associated with lower economic growth from around 2000 on until 2017. A regression plotting Internet Connectivity and GDP per capita as independent variables to explain the dependent variable GDP growth outlines that the effect for AI is a significant determinant of negative GDP growth prospects for the years from 2000 until 2017. A panel regression plotting GDP per capita and internet connectivity from the year 2000 to explain economic growth consolidates the finding that AI-internet connectivity is a significant determinant of negative growth over time for 161 countries of the world. Internet connectivity is associated with economic growth decline whereas GDP per capita has no significant relation with GDP growth. To cross-validate both findings hold for two different global connectivity measurements. The paper then discusses a theoretical argument of dividing labor components into fluid, hence more flexible (e.g., AI), and more clay, hence more inflexible (e.g., human labor), components. The paper ends on a call for revising growth theories and integrating AI components into growth theory. AI entrance into economic markets is modeled into the standard neoclassical growth theory by creating a novel index for representing growth in the artificial age comprised of GDP per capita and AI entrance measured by the proxy of Internet Access percent per country. Maps reveal the parts of the world that feature high GDP per capita and AI-connectivity. The discussion closes with a future outlook on the law and economics of AI entrance into our contemporary economies and society in order to aid a successful and humane introduction of AI into our world.

International audience; In this paper, we investigate the effects of trade in foods on obesity in Mexico. To do so, we match data on Mexican food imports from the U.S. with anthropometric and food expenditure data. Our findings suggest that exposure to food imports from the U.S. can explain up to 20% of the rise in obesity prevalence among Mexican women between 1988 and 2012. Pro-obesity effects are driven by areas more exposed to unhealthy food imports. We also find evidence in favour of a price mechanism. By linking trade flows to obesity, the paper sheds light on an important channel through which globalisation may affect health. (C) 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the process of politicization of the highest levels of the global commercial connectivity network, during its formative decades. The paper highlights the role played by the differences among the national approaches, along with some of the key mechanisms driving the development of the maritime sector during the considered period. As the preferred instrument for the development of the national system of long-range maritime connectivity, the shipping subsidies were diffused almost everywhere. However, the interactions with the institutional, sociotechnical and commercial national environments produced very dissimilar outcomes in different countries, with direct reflections in the construction of the commercial connectivity conditions, acting indirectly also over the evolution of the geopolitical scenario.

The rise of the fourth industrial revolution (IR) is deeply embedded in a wider context of privatization of knowledge, rising costs of innovation and uneven distribution of capacity between countries. But debates on a ‘balanced’ policy framework to tackle these issues have until now floundered to address some of the fundamental dilemmas of our times. Will the fourth IR render the manufacturing-led model of economic development a thing of the past? Are there new boundaries for innovation and industry in the fourth IR? What should policy do in such an uncertain technological era? This paper addresses these crucial questions and makes a case for comprehensive digital industrial policies that are differentiated and rooted in the broader reality of development and globalization in the fourth IR. The paper maps the new boundaries for innovation and industrialization, after which, it elaborates in detail the market and institution failures in the platform economy that arise from the highly complex nature of technological change and a lack of effective policy oversight. It offers evidence to the effect that although manufacturing as we knew it – with its effects on low and unskilled labour and employment creation – might not continue to exist, it will continue to thrive using high technology skills and R&D, within a new model of industrialization where the knowledge-component of all sectors – agriculture, manufacturing, and services – will be on the rise. Countries, therefore, need a more nuanced and differentiated industrial policy 4.0 framework that can: (a) sustain overall industrial performance, (b) in a way that helps close the gap to the frontier in a constantly evolving technological landscape, (c) while mitigating the adverse consequences for society, in terms of employment, privacy and latent social fabric. The paper proposes the components of such an industrial policy 4.0 in detail in its concluding section.

In a large number of sectors, Chinese internet platform firms have grown to enormous size leveraging a rapidly growing, largely protected domestic market. This paper describes the formation and growth of the largest Chinese travel and tourism platform, Ctrip within the context to the changing Chinese economy. In 2018, Ctrip was one of the largest travel platforms in the world and, though still significantly smaller than the US travel and tourism platforms that dominate most of the rest to the world, it was growing far faster than them. Ctrip’s remarkable success is explained within the context to the rising tide of Chinese tourism. The paper explores Ctrip’s recent globalization strategies suggesting that it intends to expand beyond just serving the Chinese market or Chinese tourists in global markets. At this point, the globalization strategy appears to have two prongs: The first prong has been using its enormous cash flow to acquire or co-invest in local firms that dominate other developing country markets that are expanding rapidly. The two cases in point are its equity investment in the Indian travel giant, MakeMyTrip, and investments in Southeast Asia. The second prong is investing or acquiring firms/websites in developed nation markets that can either service the enormous flow of Chinese tourists it controls or provide services to Western travelers. For these investments, Ctrip can provide infrastructural and capital support to allow these operations to expand more quickly. It is uncertain how successful Ctrip’s initiatives in international markets will be. However, given that Chinese tourism is likely to continue its rapid growth and that Ctrip monopolizes this market, it has significant financial resources, enormous leverage in directing this flow of tourists for strategic advantage, and a rapidly developing capability in analyzing the enormous inflow of data that it receives. For the reasons we describe, Ctrip is likely to be an increasingly formidable competitor to the US global travel and tourism platform giants, Expedia, Priceline, and TripAdvisor.

Globalization led to an intricate set of interactive relationships between individuals, organizations and states. Unprecedented global interaction possibilities have made communication more complex than ever before in history as the whole has different properties than the sum of its increasing diversified parts. With growing globalization and quickening of transfer speed, information may impose unknown systemic economic risks on a global scale. Collective interaction effects lead to hard-to-foreseeable fallacy of composition downfalls. Emergent risks imbued in interaction appear to be inherent in global economic systems. In the light of growing tendencies of globalization, the demand for an in-depth understanding of how information echoes in socio-economic correlates has gained unprecedented momentum. In seeking to shed light on implicit system failures’ socio-economic consequences down the road and potentially-disastrous outcomes of cumulative actions triggering mass movements; the paper outlines unexpected dangers and insufficiently-described shadows of past market expectation corrections on future economic market performance. Overall, the following article innovatively paints a novel picture of the mass psychological underpinnings of business cycles based on information flows in order to recommend how certain communication strategies could counterweight and alleviate information failing market performance expectations that could potentially build disastrous financial market mass movements of booms and busts. This paper will study the role of information in building socially-constructed economic correlates, which promises to explain how market outcomes are developed in the social compound and can be guided by central agents’ communication. Classical theories of price will be reflected in regards to market expectations. Through the lens of the real competition paradigm, the following paper will then specifically unravel how central bank economic forecasts produce certain types of price expectations that form market patterns leading to collectively-shared economic outcomes that may echo in the real economy. An introduction to the history of economic cycles will lead to George Soros’ Theory of Reflexivity and Anwar Shaikh’s formalization in order to draw inferences for the analysis of the role of information in creating economic booms and busts in the age of globalization. Empirically, based on a central European central bank’s GNP projections and backtesting corrections, a pattern of central bank corrections communication and economic market performance will be unraveled for the first time to outline that central bank market prediction corrections are positively correlated with near future market performances and negatively correlated with distant future market performances. The collective reality of prices and the irrationality of the crowds perturbating markets will be discussed. Business cycles are argued to obey some kind of natural complexity, as for being influenced by econo-historic communication trends. Recommendations how to create more stable economic systems by avoiding emergent risks in communicating market prospects more cautiously will be given in the discussion followed by a prospective future research outlook and conclusion.

Following Brexit, the rise of populist Eurosceptics across the EU, Central Eastern Europe's flirtation with 'illiberal democracy' and the sovereign debt crisis, which essentially still remains unresolved ten years after it started, even some of the EU's most enthusiastic supporters are today wondering whether the EU could actually break apart. In the paper, I propose the scenario-planning method to address this question and to think about the future of the EU in a structured way. While the method is already well established in the study of socio-technical systems, the paper tests its transferability to the political economy of the EU. Along two drivers, the material struggle to tame globalization and the ideational struggle to fill the void that is resulting from the deconstruction of neoliberalism, the paper maps four plausible pathways into alternative futures. I conclude with a discussion of the potential of scenario-planning to improve the transfer of knowledge from academia into practice.

This paper aims to provide a critical overview of the drivers that the relevant theoretical and empirical literature suggests being crucial in dealing with the challenges an emerging country may encounter in its attempts to further catch-up a higher income status, with a particular focus devoted to the implications for the domestic labour market. In the first part of the paper, attention will be focused on structural change, capability building and technological progress, trying to map - using different taxonomies put forward by the innovation literature - the concrete ways through which an emerging country can engage a successful catching-up, having in mind that developing countries are deeply involved into globalised markets where domestic innovation has to be complemented by the role played by international technology transfer. In the second part of the paper, the focus will be moved to the possible consequences of this road to catching-up in terms of employment and skills. In particular, the prescriptions by the conventional trade theory will be contrasted with a view taking into account technology transfer, labour-saving technological progress and skill-enhancing trade.

A number of studies show that companies with more women involved in leadership positions tend to outperform their sector in terms of return on equity, operating result, and stock price growth. A diverse board may signal independence, creative thought, opportunities for breakout strategies and an open-mindedness on the part of the company -- traits that are increasingly important as external factors such as globalization and heightened competitiveness impact the marketplace. Having women in key positions may add value through women’s distinctive set of skills, and creating cultures of inclusion through a diverse workforce. This paper begins with a review of studies analyzing gender diversity and firm performance, followed with an analysis of role incongruity and gender inequality in the workplace. The paper continues with examination of the multitude of revelations concerning egregious incidents of sexual harassment, which may go a long way toward explaining the apparent barriers present for women pursuing pathways to positions of organizational leadership. We then offer our proposals for potential solutions involving changing company norms.

From both health and environmental policy perspectives, it is advisable to ensure that individuals maximise the nutritional gains from eating meat, without having a significantly adverse environmental impact, i.e. sustainable meat consumption pathways are imperative. This is especially true for developing countries, where rising incomes and growing populations have meant that meat consumption has also risen. India is an example of a country where a large share of the population has been vegetarian due to religious and cultural factors, although this is rapidly changing. In this paper, we hypothesise that social interactions and globalisation are two factors that explain this shift in consumption behaviour, especially amongst Hindu households. These hypotheses are based on the theoretical findings of Levy and Razin (2012). The empirical results show that Hindus that are members of religious groups are less likely to eat meat than non-member Hindus, whereas Hindus that are members of non-religious types of groups are more likely to eat meat than non-members. We also find that Hindu households that frequently use sources of media such as newspapers, the radio or television are more likely to consume meat compared to Hindus that do not. This paper provides important policy implications, both in terms of the formulation of Nationally Recommended Diets in developing countries, and in terms of identifying the channel of influence of both social networks and globalisation on social and religious norms, consumption behaviour, and ultimately, on climate change.

This working paper provides a business history perspective on debates about the Great Divergence, the rise of the gap in incomes between the West and the Rest, and the more recent Great Convergence, which has seen a narrowing of that gap. The literature on the timing and causes of the Great Divergence has focussed on macro analysis. This working paper identifies the potential for more engagement at the micro level of business enterprises. While recognizing that the context of institutions, education and culture play a role in explanations of wealth and poverty, the paper calls for a closer engagement with the processes how these factors translated into generating productive firms and entrepreneurs. The challenges of catching-up were sufficiently great in the Rest that initially minorities held significant advantages in capital-raising and trust levels which enabled them to flourish as entrepreneurs. Yet by the interwar years there is evidence of more general emergence of modern business enterprise in Asia, Latin America and Africa. Many governmental policies after 1945 designed to facilitate catch-up ended up crippling such emergent business enterprises without putting effective alternatives in place. The second wave of globalization from the 1980s provided more opportunities for catch up from the Rest. Firms from emerging markets had the opportunity to access the global networks which replaced large integrated firms. There were also new ways to access knowledge and capital, including through management consultancies and hiring graduates from business schools. The upshot was the rise to global prominence of firms based in the Rest, including Foxcomm, Huawei, HNA, Cemex, and TCS.

This dissertation focuses on identifying the nature of the future world in respect to the advent of extended number of refugees. Refugee migration and crisis in outside the original countries owing to a deluge of refugees is an important phenomenon happening throughout the world currently. With the case study analysis of current refugee migration events in Asia, Middle East, Africa and the Americas, the paper tries to find out the future nature of the smallest unit of analysis for a long time – nation state. All features of economic, religious, ethnic and cultural aspects taking into account, the core argument centers around whether the influx of refugees into outer or neighbor countries is increasing the possibility of ethnic conflict throughout the world making the future world a world full of feuds and conflicts. The dissertation also tries to find out the true aspects of Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations theory and if the theory is going to be signified in a future world full of feuds and conflicts. With historical and contemporary analysis of the various cases of refugee influx, the paper also tries to measure the economic consequences of refugee migration and influx. Do globalization and liberal economies tend to survive or does the refugee influx prevent cooperation among ethnicities and states? The dissertation also attempts to find out whether refugee crisis would instigate ethnic nationalism and if the neoliberal world order would fall apart owing to the problems originated by huge refugee influx and migration.

Around the world employers complain of shortages of skilled workers. Meantime, educational and training institutions often function as “bridges to nowhere.” This has implications for both social and economic development. When VET systems are ineffective, they either turn out individuals with skills that are poorly matched to the demands of the labor market, or replicate existing social divisions between rich and poor. Economic inequality, both cross-sectional and spatial, undermines the ability of educational and skill-forming institutions to equalize opportunities for young people to acquire skills usable in the labor market. This bifurcates society between a low-wage, low-skill, often informal employment sector, and a higher-skill, higher-wage sector. This problem has grown more acute everywhere as a result of automation and globalization. For this reason, experts and policy-makers around the world have called for upgrading the quality and effectiveness of vocational education and training (VET), in particular by encouraging closer cooperation between employers and schools. They seek to adapt elements of the German and other continental systems where apprenticeships are the most common pathway leading from school to jobs. Building firm-school partnerships requires overcoming two sets of collective action dilemmas, however: coordinating the interests of firms around setting professional standards and curricular goals, and establishing cooperation between employers and schools. The paper argues that cooperative arrangements vary along two dimensions: the “breadth” of collaboration by schools and firms, i.e. how many firms and schools pool their efforts to upgrade VET; and the “depth” of commitment, that is, how costly is the joint commitment by firms and schools to VET. The evidence suggests that there is typically a trade-off between deepening and broadening. The paper compares China and Russia — two large, relatively decentralized countries with different economic systems — with respect to current efforts to close the gap between skills and jobs. It draws conclusions about the nature of the circumstances under which reforms are likely to result in greater deepening or broadening of cooperation. The paper argues that the formation of effective institutions for resolving collective dilemmas result from government initiatives mobilizing existing capacities to respond to challenges in the external environment.

The reorganization of the international power system highlights a large spectrum of relational attitudes between the named actors, offering new dimensions to the strategies, policies, relationships and approaches in the field of security, in a real network of dependency and inter-connected interests (regardless of their meaning - divergent or convergent), to which the not less complex dimension of control and internal management are added (generated by the pressure of globalization, economic crisis, social and political crisis, economical competitors, pressure of the international community, terrorist threat, etc.). Starting from these premises, the first part of the paper presents the stage of knowledge in the field and the methodological approach of the suggested topic, outlining reference items - both from the theoretical spectrum and, mainly, from the practical area, which led to suggesting the present study. All these items place the approach of the NATO Centres of Excellence institution in a multi-disciplinary conjuncture, starting with their relevance in NATO (implicitly, the transformation process of the Alliance), the challenges connected to institutional integration and geo-political considerations. Highly involved in the dynamics of present geo-political and geo-strategic realities' evolution, NATO, a complex political-military organization, even if it does not pursue on becoming a global security alliance, but, mostly, an alliance with global partners 1, is involved in a pro-active process of adaptation to the new requirements and challenges of the present and future security environment. Following, as a main objective, the analysis of connections and interdependence between the evolutions of global security, and particularly (in traditional area of interests of the Alliance) the transformation objectives which are pursued, the paper focuses – in a first stage – on configuring the reference base of approaching the main structural, doctrinal and operational evolutions that are pursued by NATO in its adaptation efforts. Also, this part presents the steps taken until now in regards with the systematic approach towards the NATO Centre of Excellence, both in the institutional-functional field and from the perspective of operational value.

Upgrading vocational education and training (VET) has become an increasingly urgent task for societies facing the challenges of rapid technological change and globalization. Today governments in many countries, including the United States, Russia and China, are seeking to adopt elements of the German dual education model. However, implementing dual education is institutionally demanding because of the multiple collective dilemmas inherent in coordinating VET with the labor market. The Russian federal government has undertaken several initiatives designed to upgrade the quality of VET by encouraging close cooperation of vocational schools and firms at the regional level. This paper focuses on a 2013 project administered by the Russian Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI), which ran a competition to select regions as pilot regions for the development of new models of dual education. The paper compares the 13 pilot regions with regions that submitted proposals but were not selected and with and all other regions along multiple economic, social, demographic and institutional dimensions. The findings suggest hypotheses about the conditions that enabled the pilot regions to take advantage of federal policies encouraging the adoption of dual education.

In the post-World War II world economic order, international economic relations have conventionally been regarded as an area reserved for state-to-state relations and to some extent global administrative actors (international and regional organisations). However, with the advent and spread of globalisation, there has been a progressive departure from traditional paradigms, which dictate the patterns of interaction in the international economic system. Essentially, globalisation has challenged the sovereignty status quo of Westphalian statehood by disaggregating traditional governance structures and encouraging the emergence of new ones (sub-national and non-state actors). Focusing specifically on the international trade process (i.e. negotiation and implementation of international trade deals), there appears to be no uniformity in the theoretical conceptualisation of the role for sub-national actors within the international trade system. At present, sub-national governments enjoy varied degrees of acceptance within the various frameworks for international trade interactions of their home states. This is mainly due to the reality that there is a growing intersection between sub-national, national and international policy arenas, making the policy space increasingly difficult to neatly delineate. As such, even with more States making adjustments to accommodate sub-national governments in their international trade processes, it is questionable if there is any coherent pattern discernable from these case studies. More so, with international norms still opposed to the participation of sub-national actors in the international scene, most of the actions taken by these actors are classified as ‘wholly domestic policies’, which their central governments are mandated to ensure are in conformity with international obligations. This has made the mapping and understanding of sub-national government’s activities in the foreign sphere difficult to coherently conceptualise. Focusing on Belgium and Canada, this paper seeks to ascertain: whether there is any coherence deducible in the way we conceptualise emerging patterns of engagement by sub-national actors in international trade relations.To answer this research question, this paper evaluates the current status of sub-national actors in the international trade interactions of two federal systems - Belgium and Canada. These two countries have been selected for appraisal because they have adopted distinctively dissimilar models for assimilating the participation of sub-national actors into their international trade interactions. The central argument in this paper is that the emerging discourse on sub-national participation in international trade interactions of federal systems is progressively developing into coherent themes. It will be argued that these themes are emerging irrespective of the differing domestic constitutional settings in which sub-national actors are operating.

This paper asks whether history should change the way in which economists and economic historians think about populism. We use Müller's definition, according to which populism is 'an exclusionary form of identity politics, which is why it poses a threat to democracy'. We make three historical arguments. First, late 19th century US Populists were not populist. Second, there is no necessary relationship between populism and anti-globalization sentiment. Third, economists have sometimes been on the wrong side of important policy debates involving opponents rightly or wrongly described as populist. History encourages us to avoid an overly simplistic view of populism and its correlates.

Diversified business groups are well-known phenomenon in emerging markets, both today and historically. This is often explained by the prevalence of institutional voids or the nature of government-business relations. It is typically assumed that such groups were much less common in developed economies, and largely disappeared during the twentieth century. This working paper contests this assumption with evidence from Britain between 1850 and the present day. During the nineteenth century merchant houses established business groups with diversified portfolio and pyramidal structures overseas, primarily in developing countries, both colonial and independent. In the domestic economy, large single product firms became the norm, which over time merged into large combines with significant market power. This reflected a business system in which a close relationship between finance and industry was discouraged, but were there few restrictions on the transfer of corporate ownership. Yet large diversified business groups did emerge, which had private or closely held shareholding and substantial international businesses. The working paper argues that diversified business groups added value in mature markets such as Britain. In the domestic economy, Pearson and Virgin created well-managed and performing businesses over long periods. The much-criticized conglomerates of the 1970s-1990s era such as Hanson and BTR were also quite financially successful forms of business enterprise. The demise of many of them appears to owe at least as much to management fads as to serious financial under-performance.

This paper aimed at investigating the issue of the future of the Arabic Language with special attention given to exploring the following questions: (1) What are the factors that enhanced the prominent Arabic Language status in the past?(2)What are the phenomena that anticipate the death of the Arabic Language?(3) What are the factors that influenced the Arabic Language and led to the likelihood of its deterioration? (4)What are the best strategies to revive the past prominent status of the Arabic language and to stop its deterioration? More specifically, the paper discussed the status of the Arabic Language with regard to the different chronological stages it experienced during different historical eras. It also explored the influence of colonialism, globalization, current educational systems in the Arab countries and the political Arab scene on the status of the Arabic Language. The paper highlighted different linguistic and social phenomena that anticipate the “death” of the Arabic Language, such as “Arabization”, “Englishization”, “Diglossia”, and “Code-Switching” Authentic visual examples of these linguistic phenomena were provided to elucidate their negative impact on the Arabic Language. More focus was directed to the status of the Arabic Language in the Gulf Countries: conferences and recommendations suggested to protect the standard Arabic Language. In conclusion, this paper, by closely analyzing the current status of the Arabic Language, shed light on the little-recognized issue of strategic plans to protect the identity of the Arab nations.

The insertion of labour concerns into trade arrangements is on the rise. An increasing number of bilateral and regional trade agreements embody labour standards-related provisions and often allow them to be enforced through the agreements’ dispute settlement mechanisms. However, the question as to whether such provisions in fact translate into concrete improvements of workers’ rights is controversial. This issue has gained additional relevance through the negotiations of Mega-Regional Trade Agreements, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). The present paper analyses how labour standards concerns have been addressed in the TPP and the TTIP negotiations and what practical effects this may entail. It proceeds as follows: Section I provides an overview of existing regulatory approaches regarding labour provisions in trade agreements. Section II turns to the recently concluded negotiations of the TPP as well as to the ongoing TTIP negotiations. It looks at key lines of division that have characterised the negotiations and outlines features that the respective labour provisions contain or are likely to contain. Based on evidence from existing trade agreements, Section III then inquires into what can be expected of the labour provisions in the aforesaid Mega-Regional Trade Agreements in terms of effects on the parties’ labour standards. The final section concludes by suggesting that more innovative approaches regarding the design and implementation of the labour provisions could be explored than has so far been the case. It also notes that the labour provisions, as they currently stand, will hardly be able to ensure that the agreements’ other provisions, including those on trade and investment, do not undermine working and living conditions in the parties’ territories in the midand long-term. 1 Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, Heidelberg. The author is grateful to Lorand Bartels, Pablo Lazo Grandi as well as the participants of the Conference hosted at the University of Dresden 23 and 24 October 2014 on “Mega-Regionals and the Future of International Trade and Investment Law” for valuable comments and suggestions. All remaining errors are mine. Parts of the paper draw on earlier work published jointly with Anne Posthuma, in particular Franz Christian Ebert and Anne Posthuma, ‘Rebalancing Globalization: The Role of Labour Provisions in Existing International Trade Arrangements and Development Finance Policies’ in Raymond Torres (ed), World of Work Report 2009. The Global Crisis and Beyond (ILO 2009); Franz Christian Ebert and Anne Posthuma, ‘Labour Provisions in Trade Arrangements: Current Trends and Perspectives’ (2011) IILS Discussion Papers Series 205 accessed 14 November 2015. It also draws on a study which the author carried out for the ILO, published in 2013; ILO, ‘The Social Dimension of Trade Agreements’ accessed 14 November 2015, as well as on Franz Christian Ebert, ‘Labour provisions in EU trade agreements: What potential for channelling labour standards-related capacity building?’ ILR 2016 (forthcoming); advanced draft available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1564-913X.2015.00036.x/abstract. It goes without saying that none of the views expressed in the present paper should be attributed to the ILO. All comments on this work in progress are welcome at ebert@mpil.de.

The conceptual premise of Global Administrative Law is that, in order to cope with globalization, states’ right to regulate has been increasingly entrusted to global authorities, adopting rules and decisions which are best conceptualized as administrative regulation.Therefore, GAL is an answer to vertical and substantial institutional and legal globalization and it develops in order to avoid the risk of an administrative regulation (which goes global) unregulated by administrative law (which remains domestic).This paper, however, takes a slightly different approach to GAL. Focused on the impact of global regulatory regimes on domestic regulation, it argues that those regimes change the very nature of domestic rules and decisions as long as they are adopted according to decision-making processes open to the participation of "external" subjects, representing the interests of different political communities.From this perspective, GAL, conceived as global law regulating domestic regulation, is not an answer to vertical and substantial institutional and legal globalization, and contributes to the development of a horizontal and procedural path to legal globalization.The paper maintains this point by examining a single global regulatory regime -- namely the World Heritage Convention regime -- and, particularly, by considering three specific cases, referring to three different domestic administrative decisions, to whom that Convention has been applied. The World Heritage Convention regime -- as well as many other global regulatory regimes -- places on domestic authorities the burden of taking into account the global interests affected by their decisions. This is a typical procedural burden, drawn from the heritage of (domestic) administrative law. Thus, legal globalization progresses along a procedural path and according to administrative law (rather than private law) concepts.

In this paper, we bring together the concepts put forth in our previous papers and throw new light on how the Indo-Europeanization of the world may have happened from the conventional Central Asian homeland and explain the same using maps and diagrams. We also propose the ‘Ten modes of linguistic transformations associated with Human migrations.’ With this, the significance of the proposed term ‘Base Indo-European’ in lieu of the old term ‘Proto Indo-European’ will become abundantly clear to most readers. The approaches presented in this paper are somewhat superior to existing approaches, and as such are expected to replace them in the longer run. Detailed maps and notes demonstrating and explaining how linguistic transformations might have taken place in South Asia are available in this paper as understood from our previous research papers, and scholars from other parts of the world are invited to develop similar paradigms with regard to their home countries as far as the available data or evidence will allow them. This will help piece together a gigantic jig-saw puzzle, and lead to a revolution of sorts in the field, leading to a ripple-effect that will strongly impact several other related fields of study as well. We also re-emphasize our epigrammatic catch-phrases ‘The Globalization of Science’ and ‘Scientific Progress at the Speed of Light’, and attempt to show how the former will inexorably lead to the latter. This is done in a respectable level of detail, as zany and theoretical concepts gain respectability only if corroborated with real-world data from across the world. The end-result will be a transformation and a revolution in human knowledge, with inevitable cascading changes in cultural and social paradigms and relationships across nationalities and cultures, and rich rewards for scholars and students of Indo-European studies across the world.

This paper analyzes the first and still one of the very few international mechanisms established by governments to enable individuals, communities or their representatives to bring complaints against multinational corporations: the National Contact Point system under the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. The paper identifies patterns of complaints over time; it examines what differences exist in these patterns since the adoption of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights as the authoritative global standard in this space, key elements of which were incorporated into the OECD Guidelines; and it offers critiques of and suggestions for how the NCP system should be strengthened.

Police, as a formal institution, operate as a part of a three way relationship with the community and the state. In this research paper, Philip Stenning and Clifford Shearing explore how changes in both the community and the state may reshape both the institution of the police and the role of policing. This paper extends the conversation from our previous 2013 publication ‘Public Private Policing’ which was based on a forum held at the AIPM in the same year.

This paper constructs a simple theoretical model to study the implications of globalization for inequality and redistribution. It shows that when globalization increases inequality, a policymaker interested in maximizing the sum of welfares of all agents increases redistribution. Empirically, the paper examines the effects of globalization on inequality and redistribution in a panel data set of 140 countries for the period from 1970 to 2012. It finds that both inequality and redistribution have been increasing with globalization. The results are robust to the inclusion of many different controls and the exclusion of outliers.

A previous analysis of the impact of formal institutions on the knowledge economy of 22 Middle-Eastern and Sub-Sahara African countries during the 1996-2010 time period concluded that formal institutions were necessary, but inadequate, determinants of the knowledge economy. To extend that study, this paper claims that globalization induces peace and stability, which affects governance and through governance the knowledge economy. The claim addresses one weakness of previous research that did not consider the effects on the knowledge economy of globalization. We model the proposition as a three-stage process in four hypotheses, and estimate each hypothesis using robust estimators that are capable of dealing with the usual statistical problems without sacrificing economic relevance and significance. The results indicate that globalization has varying effects on peace and stability, and peace and stability affect governance differently depending on what kind of globalization induces it. For instance, the effects on governance induced by globalization defined as trade are stronger than those resulting from globalization taken to be foreign direct investment. Hence, we conclude that foreign direct investment is not a powerful mechanism for stimulating and sustaining the knowledge economy in our sample of countries. However, since globalization-induced peace and stability have both positive and negative effects on governance simultaneously, we also conclude that while the prospect for knowledge economy in African countries is dim, it is still realistic and attainable as long as these countries continue to engage in the kind of globalization that does indeed induce peace and stability. We further conclude that there is a need for a sharper focus on economic and institutional governance than on general governance as one possible extension of this paper.

Turkey, at the crossroads of Europe, Middle East and Asia, has confronted with mounting pressures of mixed migration flows in recent decades. This paper aims to explore Turkey’s contemporary approach to migration management by focusing on the adoption of the country’s first comprehensive immigration law (Law on Foreigners and International Protection) and the signing of the readmission agreement with the European Union in 2013. This incorporates an analysis of both policy continuities and changes in migration management in Turkey, while also providing an understanding of the interplay between internal and external factors, namely internationalisation and Europeanisation processes and the responsiveness of domestic actors to such pressures. The paper argues that migration policies driven solely by state-centric concerns are becoming increasingly inefficient in responding to the challenges caused by interlinked pressures of globalisation and multi-layered migratory flows. As Turkey’s role as a transit and receiving country grows, issues of international migration, and irregular migration in particular, are becoming dynamic topics in defining its role in a globalised world and as well as the trajectory of its relations with the EU.

This paper looks at how "Globalisation" – narrowly defined as the causes and effects of increased international economic integration – has influenced the demand for and supply of maritime products and services, with a particular emphasis on maritime labour. A central argument is that the manner in which maritime labour has been affected varies enormously among the maritime industries, and there is also variation among different occupations. Today, the Norwegian maritime industries have found "a new equilibrium", where old and national traditions have successfully merged with the new and global realities. The discussion paper is structured around six propositions about the relationship between globalisation and Norwegian maritime labour, and these propositions are discussed and linked to empirical data.

This paper looks at the recent trends of rising inequality in developing Asia, asks why inequality matters, examines the driving forces of rising inequality, and proposes policy options for tackling high and rising inequality. Technological change, globalization, and market-oriented reform have driven Asia’s rapid growth, but have also had significant distributional consequences. These factors have favored owners of capital over labor, skilled over unskilled workers, and urban and coastal areas over rural and inland regions. Furthermore, unequal access to opportunity, caused by institutional weaknesses and social exclusion, has compounded the impacts of these forces. All these combined have led to a falling share of labor income in national income, increasing premiums on human capital, and growing spatial disparity — all contributing to rising inequality. The three drivers of rising inequality cannot and should not be blocked, because they are the same forces that drive productivity and income growth. This paper outlines a number of policy options for Asian policy makers to consider in addressing rising inequality. These options, aiming to equalize opportunities and, thereby, reduce inequality, include efficient fiscal measures that reduce inequality in human capital, policies that work toward increasing the number and quality of jobs, interventions that narrow spatial disparity, and reforms that strengthen governance, level the playing field, and eliminate social exclusion.

Good health is crucial for human and economic development. In particular poor health in childhood seems to be of utmost concern since it causes irreversible damage and have implications later in life. Recent research suggests globalization is a strong force affecting adult and child health outcomes. Yet, there is much unexplained variation with respect to the globalization effect on child health, in particular in low- and middle-income countries. One factor that could explain such variation across countries is the quality of democracy. Using panel data for 70 developing countries between 1970 and 2009 this paper disentangles the relationship between globalization, democracy, and child health. Specifically the paper examines how globalization and a country’s democratic status and historical experience with democracy, respectively, affect infant mortality. In line with previous economic research, results suggest that globalization reduces infant mortality and that the level of democracy in a country generally improves child health outcomes. We also find that democracy matters for the size of the globalization effect on child health. If e.g. Cote d’Ivoire was a democracy in the 2000-2009 period, this effect would translate into 1,200 fewer infant deaths in an average year compared to the situation without democracy.

The paper analyzes the international context in which negotiations between the European Union and United States on a Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership have been launched in July 2013. This context includes both the repeated failures of the Doha Round negotiations as well as the previous attempts and achievements of the European Union and United States to create a transatlantic partnership. The author considers that the current circumstances are more favourable for the successful finalization of the transatlantic partnership but, at the same time, stresses the sensitive issues that may delay or divert the negotiations. The paper concludes that there are many possible immediate positive consequences on economic growth and creation of jobs of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership as well as a high potential to expand its implementation in North America through NAFTA and in some other countries that have free trade agreements with either the European Union or the United States.

This paper focuses on two examples – first, the imposition of tariffs on tires made in China and exported to the United States, which culminated in a decision of World Trade Organization’s (WTO) appellate body to uphold the US tariffs, and, second, the development of the European law, especially the decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union, on posted workers in the context of public procurement – in which labour concerns transcend the nation state’s borders and the relevant agents (states, municipalities, NGOs, trade unions, employers, industry associations) are in conflict outside the familiar space of the nation state. The examples refer to different markets – goods and capital, on the one hand, and services and labour, on the other, and they operate on different scales, the international in one case and the transnational (or regional) in the other. They also focus on qualitatively different governance regimes, which involve different constellations of political and social actors and different relationships between economic and social/political integration. Drawing on Fraser’s discussion of “abnormal justice”, a situation in which the traditional discourse and grammar of justice are being doubted, the paper juxtaposes the case studies in order to highlight three political dilemmas (“what”, “who”, and “how”) that arise in the context of abnormal justice and to illustrate how these dilemmas are interconnected. Although both cases exemplify the “what” question, the paper emphasizes the “who” and “how” dimensions of justice, arguing that if the process for resolving the conflict is fair, inclusive, and dynamically open to challenges, then its outcomes on distributive justice are more likely to be considered legitimate and persuasive.

The paper analyses social citizenship in post-Yugoslav states from a gendered perspective. It explores the parallel transformations of citizenship regimes and gender regimes on the basis of the case study of the textile industry, a traditionally “feminised” industrial sector in which employment rates have significantly declined in the last twenty years. By comparing the cases of Leskovac (Serbia) and Stip (Macedonia), the paper shows that transformations in social citizenship had profound implications when it comes to gender regimes. The overall deterioration of labour and welfare rights in the region had major consequences on women’s position as workers and citizens, producing the demise of the “working mother” gender contract which existed during socialist times. The “retraditionalisation” of gender relations in the post-Yugoslav region, therefore, is not only a consequence of nationalist discourses, but is also a direct result of transformations in social citizenship which occurred during the post-socialist transition.

The increased globalisation over the last 20 years has made effective global economic governance more important than ever. This period has witnessed the rise of a number of new international governance actors, such as the Group of Twenty (G-20) and the Financial Stability Board. The paper proposes a five-part test to evaluate how the existing global governance actors serve the interests of all stakeholders in the global economy. The test is based on five factors indicating good global governance. These are the goals relating to global economic governance being followed by the governance entity, respect for applicable international legal principles, good administrative practice, comprehensive coverage of all relevant issues and all affected stakeholders, and coordinated specialization. The paper uses these five factors to develop a framework for assessing the responsiveness of the G-20 to African issues and concerns. The final part of the paper applies this framework to the documentary outputs of the seven G-20 summits held during 2008-2012 to assess their responsiveness to Africa. It looks at how the communiques and other key documents from each of the summits address the issues arising from each part of the test and then makes an assessment of how well the G-20 has satisfied that part of the test over the course of the period from 2008-2012. The paper concludes that the G-20 is not fully satisfying any of the five parts of the test, and therefore fails to reach its full potential as a global economic governance actor.

Purpose – Owing to lack of relevant data on health human resource (HHR) migration, the empirical dimension of the health-worker crisis debate has remained void despite abundant theoretical literature. A health worker crisis is growing in the world. Shortages in health professionals are reaching staggering levels in many parts of the globe. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – A quantile regression approach is used to examine the determinants of health-worker emigration throughout the conditional distributions of health-worker emigration. This provides an investigation of the determinants when existing emigrations levels matter. The author assesses the determinants of emigration in the health sector through-out the conditional distribution of HHR emigration. Findings – The findings have been presented in two main strands: when existing emigration levels are low and when existing emigration levels are high. In the former case (when existing emigration levels are low), wealth-effects have the following implications. First, while economic prosperity is a good tool against nurse brain drain in middle income countries (MICs), health expenditure is a good instrument against physician brain drain in low income countries (LICs). Second, whereas positive demographic change fuels the problem in LICs, it mitigates the issue in their MIC counterparts. Third, savings, government-effectiveness, foreign-aid and inflationary pressures only accentuate the problem for both income groups. Fourth, corruption-control becomes a vital tool for emigration-control in both income-brackets. Fifth, while trade openness mitigates physician emigration in LICs, financial openness has the opposite effect on nurse emigration. In the latter case (when existing immigration levels are high), the following conclusions have been drawn. First, While economic prosperity fights nurse emigration only in LICs, savings is a tool against physician emigration only in their MIC counterparts. Second, health expenditure and inflationary pressures are relevant tools in the battle against physician resource flight. Third, whereas, government effectiveness is an important policy measure for mitigating emigration in LICs, human development plays a similar role in MICs. Fourth, democracy, press-freedom, foreign-aid and financial openness fuel emigration in either income strata. Fifth, population growth and trade openness are important tools in the fight against brain-drain. Sixth, the HIV infection rate is a deterrent only to nurse emigration. Originality/value – This paper complements existing literature by empirically investigating the World Health Organization hypothetical determinants of health-worker migration in the context of globalization when income-levels matter. In plainer terms, the work explores how the wealth of exporting countries play-out in the determinants of HHR emigration.

This paper constructs composite indices of globalization of 131 countries spread over the five continents and classified into World-I, World-II and World-III countries. KOF, the Business Cycle Research Institute in the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich is the source of data used in this study. The Composite Indices of Globalization have been computed by Pena’s method, which attributes the most desirable properties to the indices so constructed. On the basis of these indices, the paper investigates into the trends of globalization and disparities in globalization for a period of 11 years (1999-2009). Disparities have been obtained as the Gini’s coefficient as well as the coefficient of variation. The study finds that in all the three worlds, the trends in globalization are increasing while the trends in the disparities in globalization are decreasing, which suggest global integration and convergence of national economies to a global order. We also find that social indicators of globalization explain the variations in per capita income more potently than economic or political indicators of globalization do.

Seen in historical perspective the main economic predicaments of the present world (such as poverty, inequality, backwardness) appear in a somewhat different light than in many current discussions, especially by sociologists, radical economists and political scientists. In the present paper the achievements of the modern age, and in particular of the post- World War II period, are considered in the perspective of economic and demographic history, and in their connection with the contemporary systems of production and of international relations. Some considerations concerning future possible developments conclude the paper.