In The News

Industrial Policy Puts Global Cooperation at Risk

Patricia Wruuck November 14, 2008
Leaders gathering in Washington DC for a G20 summit to discuss the global financial crisis recognize that a global response is required. Any new financial architecture also requires international cooperation – even as the economic slowdown increasingly triggers calls for protectionist measures at the domestic level. For example, US carmakers clamor for government aid to resolve problems – such as...

Save Doha to Save the G20 Summit

Ernesto Zedillo November 12, 2008
Political leaders will gather for a G20 summit to address global economic governance. The summit could also be an opportunity “to exorcise the demons of protectionism,” suggests Ernesto Zedillo, director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization. Finding agreement on the Doha Round of trade talks, debated for seven years, would send a powerful signal for endorsing open trade. Zedillo...

Leading UK Universities Back Qatar Robotic Research

Anthea Lipsett November 11, 2008
Qatar has the third largest natural-gas reserves in the world; the per-capita share of those reserves is 55 times that of reserves in top-ranked Russia, which has a larger population. As a result, Qatar can afford to fund high-tech centers and research initiatives from the world’s leading universities. The latest initiative of the Qatar Foundation, an education charity, is a center for robotic...

How 6 Parts Nearly Delayed World's Biggest Airliner

Chana Joffe-Walt November 6, 2008
Manufacturing can’t always keep pace with new products and ideas, and that is the case for some giant ball bearings, a needed part for major aircraft as well as wind turbines, reports Chana Joffe-Walt for National Public Radio. After calling his supplier in Germany, a US engineer working on the Airbus A380 was surprised to learn that delivery of the custom ball bearings would take 18 months and...

As China's Losses Mount, Confidence Turns to Fear

Ariana Eunjung Cha November 5, 2008
A global credit crisis has prompted consumers worldwide to slow spending, leading to shuttered factories in China. Leaders of China, like those throughout the world, worry that economic crisis could trigger political instability and demands for change. Growth in the domestic national product, whiles till approaching 10 percent, has been slow by Chinese standards. The government has acted...

Chinese Steelmakers Shiver, Indian Miners Catch Flu

Sumant Banerji October 30, 2008
Caution seeps throughout the global financial system, spreading crisis: In the West, homeowners struggle to pay mortgages, especially those of the high-rate, sub-prime variety; armed with less credit and confidence down, consumers in developed nations delay purchases of new cars and appliances. That has slowed steelmaking in China, which in turn has put a stop to purchases of iron ore from India...

Underdevelopment and Aid: Search for a Right Balance – Part II

Edward Friedman October 29, 2008
Africa remains one of the poorest aid recipients of the world, enduring challenges of high rates of disease, inadequate infrastructure and power sources, as well as corruption and poor governance. This YaleGlobal series examines diverse approaches on foreign economic aid emerging from the West and China. In the second article of a two-part series, Edward Friedman, political science professor at...