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The "Boundary Settlement" between India and China: a dilemma
No full textFollowing Narendra Modi’s maiden visit to China in May 2015, the Joint Statement that was released by India and China, affirmed that: “an early settlement of the boundary question serves the basic interests of the two countries and should be pursued as a strategic objective by the two governments”. Nonetheless, this joint determination to seek a political settlement to the protracted border issue is tainted by great pessimism and speculations. Despite a strong political will on each side, and incentives, such as various agreements and confidence building measures, the ‘boundary problem’ remains unresolved and rather more complicated. Neville Maxwell rightly notes: “the border dispute between India and China stands exactly where it did when it first emerged half a century ago”. The increased military standoffs between Indian and Chinese troops at the disputed border further delay the political settlement, and add fuel to the stagnancy. Given this, what is noteworthy is that although on the surface, the India-China border remains peaceful, it still serves as a delicate flashpoint in the bilateral relationship. There remains a compounded risk of escalation as a result of miscalculations born out of ‘trust deficit
Bürgerengagement in China Zivilgesellschaft auf dem Prüfstand
No full textChinas Entwicklung ruft Bewunderung und Ängste hervor. Die Frage der Menschenrechte und der globale Wettbewerb um Rohstoffe stehen hierzulande im Mittelpunkt der Diskussion über Chinas Rolle. Und innerhalb Chinas? Inwieweit sind die Menschen dort vom Umbruch in China betroffen und organisieren sich? Was hat das alles mit uns zu tun? Gibt es eine Wechselwirkung zwischen Entwicklungen hier und dort? Wie sehen die Umwelt-, Sozial- und Menschenrechtsstandards entlang internationaler Wertschöpfungsketten aus, in denen Chinas Banken als Investoren in Erscheinung treten? Diese Fragen greifen wir auf. Brücken bauen zwischen Zivilgesellschaften in Europa und Asien, dafür stehen die Stiftung Asienhaus und das China-Programm. Wir wollen informieren über Entwicklungen und Nöte der Menschen vor Ort. Wir bleiben aber hier nicht stehen, sondern fragen auch, welche Rolle unsere Politik, unsere Lebensweise oder „unsere China-Strategien“ dabei spielen. Wir wollen die Folgen unseres Handelns auf die Menschen in Asien, insbesondere in China, aufzeigen. Wie die Beziehungen zu China gestaltet werden, wird mit über die Zukunft unserer Erde entscheiden. Diese Fragen sind zu wichtig, um sie allein der Politik und der Wirtschaft zu überlassen. Die Einmischung der Zivilgesellschaft ist gefragt. Auch in China setzen sich Menschen für die Entstehung einer Zivilgesellschaft ein. Ein erster Schritt ist die Gründung von Interessenorganisationen und NGOs. NGOs in China sind durchaus in vielen Bereichen einflussreich, auch wenn die Bedingungen für sie schwierig sind – und gegenwärtig immer schwieriger werden. Einen Einblick in ihre Arbeit vor allem in den Bereichen nachhaltige Wertschöpfungsketten, Arbeitsrecht, Rohstoffabbau und Agraraktivismus bietet dieses Dossier
Pretas und arme Seelen. Ein Beispiel für eine parallele Entwicklung religiöser Inhalte und Strukturen in Europa und Asien
No full textSowohl im frühen Buddhismus als auch im mittelalterlichen Christentum entwickelte sich eine Literaturgattung religiös-didaktischer Gespenstergeschichten, die sich nicht auf räumliche oder zeitliche Nähe zwischen den beiden Traditionen zurückführen lässt. Aufbauend auf Scott Atrans Modell der evolutionären Grundlage religiösen Denkens zeigt der Autor auf, dass die Eigenschaften des menschlichen Gehirns es plausibel machen, dass parallele narrative und körperschaftliche Strukturen in religiösen Traditionen entstehen wenn die jeweiligen religiösen Experten an diese gemeinsamen neurologischen Grundlagen anknüpfen können und dadurch ihre eigene Position stabilisieren. Sowohl mittelaterliche Bettelorden als auch der Sangha des frühen Buddhismus hatten ein Interesse daran sich als Mediator zwischen Lebenden und Verstorbenen zu positionieren, deshalb wurde die Entstehung der didaktischen Gespensternarrative auch durch diese beiden Gruppen in ihren jeweiligen Einfluss-sphären befördert
Family Planning: The Hidden Need of Married Adolescents in Nepal
No full textIn Nepal, both early marriage and motherhood still place adolescents and their children at a great disadvantage. In 2011, one-third of girls aged 15-19 were already married. About 60 percent of them were pregnant or had at least one child, and one in ten had two living children (Nepal Demographic Health Survey, 2011). This brief aims to understand why married adolescents in Nepal have low contraceptive use and a high unmet need for family planning, providing policy recommendations based on a literature review, interviews with key-informants, and a comprehensive analysis of secondary data from household surveys (NDHS 2006-2011). Given that early childbearing in Nepal still occurs primarily within marriage, the brief addresses the needs of female married adolescents which are often overlooked by policy-makers. However, it is important to note that unmarried adolescents are progressively engaging in sexual activity in Nepal increasing their risks for contracting an STI or an unplanned pregnancy that warrants special attention
Formal Institutionalization of Military Rule: The 21st Amendment in Pakistan
No full textThe first ‘regular’ transfer of power between two civilian governments in Pakistan manifested itself in the aftermath of the 2013 general elections. Many celebrated this shift as a positive sign of democratic consolidation. However, the appreciation of this allegedly ‘new democratic wave’ ignores the resilience of decade-old authoritarian, and anti-democratic patterns. The military still dominates all significant political decision-making processes. Furthermore, with the 21st constitutional amendment the soldiers were able to further entrench their formal role in the political-institutional setup. This seriously challenges the notions of civilian supremacy, which is unfortunate, since civilian control of the armed forces is a necessary constituent for democracy and democratic consolidation
Sri Lankan Presidential Elections 2015
No full text"On August 17, Sri Lanka’s 15 million strong electorate went to the national polls for the second time this year. Among analysts, there is no doubt that this was not only a ‘popular vote’, which decided over the new composition of the country’s 225-seat-parliament, it was also a referendum regarding the basic nature of Sri Lanka’s political culture. Furthermore it was a choice of destiny over the future course of national reconciliation, the need for political revamping to fix political-administrative aberrations, and the pledge of the minorities in a civil war-torn country. More concretely, it was a decision whether the authoritarian strongman and former president, Mahinda Rajapaksa representing the vision of a ‘strong state’ based on an extreme, ethnic exclusive brand of nationalism, should be allowed to return to power or not. In sharp contrast, there was the alternative option to continue the notion of democratic political reforms and inclusive, consensual-based politics in order to improve good governance in multi-ethnic and multi-religious Sri Lanka- despite the fact that it started slow and tenacious – personified in President Maithripala Sirisena and incumbent Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. (...).
The Misallocation of Land and Other Factors of Production in India
No full textThis paper quantifies the misallocation of manufacturing output and factors of production between establishments across Indian districts during 1989-2010. It first distills a number of stylized facts about misallocation in India, and demonstrates the validity of misallocation metrics by connecting them to regulatory changes in India that affected real property. With this background, the study next quantifies the implications and determinants of factor and output misallocation. Although more-productive establishments in India tend to produce more output, factors of production are grossly misallocated. A better allocation of output and factors of production is associated with greater output per worker. Misallocation of land plays a particularly important role in these challenges
Reinventing Rio: For an inclusive sustainable development strategy
No full textOur civilisation is confronted with the challenge of rising higher and higher on its developmental ladder. We are challenged with the double task of giving everyone the opportunity to enjoy accomplishments of progress, while at the same time preserving our planet; respecting its environment and engaging in a sustainable use of natural resources. As we are witnessing the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris, we think it is necessary to take this opportunity to assess the strategy intended to guide us through this process and come up with adjustments that are necessary
Toward a More Business Friendly Tax Regime: Key Challenges in South Asia
No full textThis paper discusses competitiveness-related issues surrounding the design and administration of corporate and value added/sales taxes in four South Asian countries -- Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. The paper is based largely on analysis of tax legislation; in addition, data from the World Banks enterprise surveys, the Doing Business report, as well as industry studies are used for evidence on tax compliance costs for business. The review of tax regulations in the region shows several commonalities: (1) widespread use of tax incentives to support selected industries, types of firms, and industrial locations; (2) many exemptions from value-added taxes as well as the practice of levying multiple indirect taxes on the same base; and (3) high costs of tax compliance for businesses. The paper discusses the consequences of tax policies for the competitiveness of South Asian producers, describes the main problems in tax administration, and outlines key directions for reforms
Households or Locations?: Cities, Catchment Areas and Prosperity in India
No full textPolicy makers in developing countries, including India, are increasingly sensitive to the links between spatial transformation and economic development. However, the empirical knowledge available on those links is most often insufficient to guide policy decisions. There is no shortage of case studies on urban agglomerations of different sorts, or of benchmarking exercises for states and districts, but more systematic evidence is scarce. To help address this gap, this paper combines insights from poverty analysis and urban economics, and develops a methodology to assess spatial performance with a high degree of granularity. This methodology is applied to India, where individual household survey records are mapped to “places” (both rural and urban) below the district level. The analysis disentangles the contributions household characteristics and locations make to labor earnings, proxied by nominal household expenditure per capita. The paper shows that one-third of the variation in predicted labor earnings is explained by the locations where households reside and by the interaction between these locations and household characteristics such as education. In parallel, this methodology provides a workable metric to describe spatial productivity patterns across India. The paper shows that there is a gradation of spatial performance across places, rather than a clear rural-urban divide. It also finds that distance matters: places with higher productivity are close to each other, but some spread their prosperity over much broader areas than others. Using the spatial distribution of this metric across India, the paper further classifies places at below-district level into four tiers: top locations, their catchment areas, average locations, and bottom locations. The analysis finds that some small cities are among the top locations, while some large cities are not. It also finds that top locations and their catchment areas include many high-performing rural places, and are not necessarily more unequal than average locations. Preliminary analysis reveals that these top locations and their catchment areas display characteristics that are generally believed to drive agglomeration economies and contribute to faster productivity growth