Category: Law and Economics

Land and the Mortgage: History, Culture, Belonging

daivirt1 Comment

By Daivi Rodima-Taylor and

The mortgaging of land, a risky practice usually treated as just an economic and legal contract, hasneeded a broader set of perspectives for a fuller, more humanist understanding. Most of the existing scholarly literature on land and mortgages has been written by economists and legal specialists, reflecting the perspectives of their disciplinary traditions. Lacking are assessments from a wider range of disciplines in the social sciences and humanities, drawing upon historical experiences, cultural meanings, and locally informed perspectives.

Our recent edited volume, drawing on historical and observational research in different parts of the world, is meant to help fill that gap. It examines mortgaging as a social and cultural phenomenon to show its origins, variation, and effects on human lives and communities. Here anthropologists, historians, and economists explore archival, printed, and ethnographic evidence about mortgage. The book shows how mortgages affect people on the ground, where local forms of mutuality mix with larger bureaucracies. Tracing origins of land titling, pledging, and the mortgage in over millennia and incorporating findings from authors鈥� original field research, the book explores effects of government, bank, and aid agency attempts and impositions meant to encourage mortgage lending and borrowing.  It shows how these mix in practice, in different languages, currencies, and contexts, with locally rooted understandings, and how all parties have sought, and too often failed, to make adjustments. The outcomes of mortgage in Africa, Europe, Asia, and America challenge economic development orthodoxies, calling for a human-centered exploration of this age-old institution.  It must take account, we insist, of emotions, vulnerabilities, and histories of unexpected outcomes, as shown in different societies, cultures, and environmental and political conditions.

Read More »

The Agrarian Crisis in Punjab and the Making of the Anti-Farm Law Protests

shreya.s3 Comments

The protests in Punjab are happening at a time when the agrarian economy is under stress. With increasing uncertainty, previously antagonistic groups across classes, castes & gender are coming closer, building a broader base for the agitation & beyond.

Punjab鈥檚 farmers have been unrelenting in their opposition to  passed in September. Their sustained and creative opposition continues to make headlines. The central government too remains adamant and increasingly belligerent about sustaining the laws in their current form. The political pressure of the farmers has led the Punjab government, in a symbolic gesture, to pass  rejecting the centre鈥檚 farm laws. The past weeks have witnessed bitter stand-offs: farmers blocking rail tracks, the railways suspending services to Punjab , and . A march of thousands of farmers to Delhi earlier this week to register their opposition to these laws is faced police barricades, water cannons, and tear gas shells.

In the face of the unpopularity of the farm laws, the central government has found refuge in different kinds of arguments in favour of the reforms. It has sought to discredit the protests by arguing that the agitation is driven by , and that small and marginal farmers are  with these laws. The opposition to the new laws is portrayed as coming from large, prosperous, and politically powerful farmers, who dominate Punjab鈥檚 farmers unions and who benefited the most from the old system.

Read More »

The Use and Abuse of the Phrase 鈥淕lobal Public Good鈥�

James Love3 Comments

24133986625_cac64b3352_o
Photo by

A flawed understanding of the concept of 鈥減ublic good鈥� hampers the fight for equitable access to the upcoming COVID-19 vaccine

The term 鈥済lobal public good鈥� has been used in very different ways by policy makers, economists and others. The term 鈥済lobal鈥� is not particularly controversial, and in this context is generally understood to involve cases where the benefits of the service or good impact residents of more than one country, even if not necessarily the whole world. The term 鈥減ublic good鈥� is subject to more diverse uses, often depending upon one鈥檚 educational or professional training.

For many people, perhaps most, the term 鈥減ublic good鈥� is loosely defined to include cases where governments are willing to undertake measures to expand access, with universal access at least an aspirational goal. However, among the other influential definitions of 鈥減ublic good鈥� is one that is exceptionally restrictive. A proposal by Paul Samuelson first published in 1954, meant at the time as an extreme and polar case, has found its way into countless articles, textbooks and academic courses, and has parameters that are rarely met in practice. At times, Samuelson鈥檚 66-year-old paper is actually an obstacle to collective efforts to supply and distribute goods that have considerable impact on society.

The COVID-19 pandemic presents an astonishing global challenge regarding the control of the pandemic and the reduction of harm. The health impacts are large, particularly for older patients, and growing unpredictably, and the pandemic has had an enormous social and economic impact on everyone, with no obvious end in sight.Read More »

Neoliberalism on Trial: Jokowi 2.0, Omnibus Bill and the New Capital City

trissiaoeiLeave a comment

piqsels.com-id-jxnok

When the majority of Southeast Asian countries began to enact more aggressive responses to the novel coronavirus, Indonesia turned a deaf ear to virus mitigation efforts. As it had no confirmed cases of the coronavirus as of February, Joko Widodo鈥檚 (Jokowi) government instead kept pushing extensive economic reform agendas. It submitted a 1,028-page Job Creation Omnibus Bill on 12 February, calling the bill the country鈥檚 third great structural reform program after the聽 1998 International Monetary Fund鈥檚 (IMF) Letter of Intent and the 1967 Foreign Direct Investment Law. Despite criticism from the opposition, the president insisted on this neoliberal agenda, claiming that the objective of the bill is to promote more foreign direct investment (FDI) in the manufacturing sector and thus create more jobs.聽

What effects do neoliberal policies have on political and economic life in Indonesia and state-capital relations in particular? This blog post follows David (2006) in taking a historical-geographical approach to investigate this question, with a focus on policies put in place in the current president Jokowi鈥檚 second term. For , such a bold move to deregulate the economy signals the resurgence of state-led development in a new form. Put differently, what this article would like to argue is that deregulation, an all-encompassing hegemonic ideology rather than simply a policy, has become some sort of 鈥榖anner to unite under鈥� for the ruling capitalist class in Indonesia.聽Read More »

Abolish Africa鈥檚 Sovereign Debtors鈥� Prisons Now

negondo201 Comment

pic_jail

By Ndongo Samba Sylla and Peter Doyle

This piece was written before the Coronavirus outbreak. It is a timely proposal of action. Given the high exposure of the developing world to the virus in contexts of medical and other logistical shortcomings, the damage to their productive capacity is likely to be much more severe than for the advanced world. 聽This fact is already reflected in particularly sharp virus-stirred capital outflows from these countries. 聽All this greatly increases their exposure to the present global structures for sovereign insolvency, and the urgent need for those structures to be radically reformed鈥攁s the authors propose with the Pre-Emptive Sovereign Insolvency Regime (PSIR).

In a radical call for reform of the IMF鈥檚 pro-creditor and anti-growth approach to indebted countries in Africa, Ndongo Sylla and Peter Doyle argue that the continent has a choice to make. Creditors, using the IMF, must be stopped from forcing devastating output losses by imposing high primary surpluses.

Within a decade, just to keep up with the flow of new entrants into its labour markets, sub-Saharan Africa needs to create 20 million new jobs every year. This is a huge challenge. But it is also a thrilling opportunity鈥攖o harness the energy and creativity of all of Africa鈥檚 young.

However, after it reviews these issues in Africa, the IMF鈥檚 immediate message鈥攍iterally in the same sentence鈥攊s to pivot to 鈥榖udget cuts to secure debt sustainability!鈥�

That is plain wrong. For Africa to meet its development objectives, the IMF must radically change its pro-creditor anti-growth approach to highly indebted/insolvent countries.Read More »

Trade for Human Rights as a Minimum Core Obligation

sfparrLeave a comment

Money and healthimage from torange_biz free photobank.jpg

In on the Minimum Core Doctrine (MCD) John Tasioulas states:

鈥渢he essence of the concept will be taken to be the sub-set of obligations associated with socio-economic rights that must be immediately complied with in full (obligations of immediate effect)鈥� (p. 3).

He contrasts these against those obligations that require significant resources and are therefore subject to 鈥榩rogressive realization鈥�. Thus, the defining characteristic of MCD is that it differentiates obligations between those of immediate effect and those of progressive realization. And the focus is on the nature of the obligations (what the state must do when) rather than the nature of substantive rights (the condition of people鈥檚 lives).

However, the discussion about what constitutes minimum core obligations in substance focuses on the nature of rights enjoyment and a package of minimum goods and services that would be required rather than the nature of obligations. This starts with General Comment 3 that refers to 鈥榓 minimum core obligation to ensure the satisfaction of, at the very least, minimum essential levels of each of the rights鈥�, and to the provision of 鈥榚ssential primary health care鈥� (ICESCR quoted in Tasioulas p. 5). Further, human rights-based practice begins to specify specific types of diseases to be treated and goods and services that would be included in the minimum, as under the 鈥榮elective primary health care model鈥� adopted by UNICEF (Tasioulas p. 5).Read More »

Free Trade Free for All: Market Romanticism Versus Reality

jmoududLeave a comment

oil_carrier_tanker_cargo_vessel_ship_maritime_petroleum_harbor-456176.jpg!d.jpg

The drama surrounding President Trump鈥檚 decision to impose import tariffs on steel and aluminum has roiled the Republican Party and wide swathes of the corporate elite. The tariff decision comes on the heels of . This accusation of 鈥渦nfairness鈥� when it comes to US trade deficits is well worn. In a previous era, Japan was the alleged culprit of 鈥渦nfair鈥� trade practices because of its persistent trade surpluses with the U.S.Read More »

A Soft Law Mechanism for Sovereign Debt Restructuring

martinmguzman1 Comment

1024px-UN_General_Assembly_hall

By Martin Guzman and Joseph E. Stiglitz

The ultimate goal of sovereign debt restructuring is to restore the sustainability of public debt with high probability[1]. But this is not happening. Since 1970, more than half of the restructuring episodes with private creditors were followed by another restructuring or default within five years[2] 鈥� evidence inconsistent with any sensible definition of 鈥渞estoration of sustainability of public debt with a high probability.鈥� This evidence suggests that relief for distressed debtors is often insufficient for achieving the main goal of a restructuring, delaying the recovery from recessions or depressions, with large negative social consequences.[3]

The lack of a statutory regime for dealing with distressed sovereign debt makes sovereign debt crises resolution a complex process 鈥� marked by inefficiencies and inequities that take multiple forms[4]. The current non-system is characterized by bargaining based on decentralized and non-binding market-based instruments centered on collective action clauses and competing codes of conduct. The IMF often plays the role of the facilitator in this process of bargaining between a distressed debtor and its creditors.[5] But it has not always been successful in ensuring that restructuring needs are addressed in a timely way 鈥� indeed, it has often failed; and as we have already noted, even when restructuring processes have ultimately been carried out, they have often not been deep enough.[6]Read More »