In The News

Foreign Distillers Seek to Slake India's Thirst

Saritha Rai May 5, 2002
Diminished social disapproval of alcohol consumption among India's middle class, coupled with a national economy increasingly open to foreign investment, is attracting big foreign distillers to India. For decades, India vigilantly regulated foreign investment, choosing instead to bolster and develop its local industries. With increased pressure from the World Trade Organization (WTO) to...

Brazil's Prized Exports Rely on Slaves and Scorched Land

Larry Rohter March 25, 2002
Slavery lurks in remote parts of the Brazilian Amazon as laborers are duped into working contracts that exploit them mercilessly. The prime exports of this resource-rich region – exotic woods and beef – have raised many controversies at both national and international levels. Human rights violations and environmental degradation – both difficult to monitor – often go unpunished or are even...

More Aid, More Need: Pledges Still Falling Short

Tim Weiner March 24, 2002
The US is not living up to its aid responsibilities despite growing concerns about global poverty after September 11, says this article in The New York Times. Though President Bush has drawn an explicit link between poverty and terrorism, and is substantially increasing aid to poor countries as a result, US aid remains restricted to specific counties and is still far less than aid from its...

Bush Weighs Raising Steel Tariffs but Exempting Most Poor Nations

David E. Sanger March 4, 2002
The American steel industry, once booming, is now on the verge of failure. Unions and major steel companies are calling on President Bush to save steel jobs by imposing high tariffs on all steel imports. Bush faces a sticky political situation. Tariffs – which contradict the free trade principles that Bush advocates – would likely alienate international allies in Europe and Asia that Bush...

Why Are Globalizers So Provincial?

Alice H. Amsden January 31, 2002
A quick review of the national origins of leaders at the upcoming 2002 World Economic Forum reveals the provincial nature of purportedly global economic organizations. In order for institutions like the World Trade Organization to live up to their name, says MIT scholar Alice H. Amsden, leaders from semi-industrialized countries like Brazil, Mexico and China must be allowed among international...

Taiwan Polls Dash China’s Unification Hopes

Ching Cheong December 4, 2001
When Taiwan held legislative elections in late 2001, the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party won a majority of seats, leaving China surprised. This political turnaround has dealt a blow to the theory that economic integration between China and Taiwan will bring political integration. As one official remarked, businessmen make rational choices but “when it comes to an election…then one...

WTO Director-general Warns on Global Trading

Frances Williams November 10, 2001
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is recognized as the major trade organization of the world, but the emergence of many regional trade agreements (RTAs) has posed risks to global trade, according to the WTO director-general Mike Moore. Moore asserts that RTAs are developing their own rules within a specific region, which may make future negotiations at the WTO more difficult. Currently in...