Archivo categoría «Internacional»
By Ed Miliband, a member of the British Parliament and the leader of the Labour Party (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 27/01/12):
Is 20th-century capitalism failing 21st-century society? Members of the global elite debated that unusual question on Wednesday at the annual World Economic Forum.
There was a time, not long ago, when such a debate would have been held only among the protesters who annually shelter in igloos farther down the Alpine slopes. So it is encouraging that more than three years since the global financial crisis, a belated process of soul-searching has begun in search of the … Seguir leyendo
By Bill Gates, co-chairman of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 27/01/12):
Last week, Oxfam and Save the Children released a report saying that emergency relief in the Horn of Africa came months late, costing thousands of lives and millions of dollars. Oxfam and Save the Children conclude that humanitarian assistance should be done differently. The anti-foreign aid establishment is using the report to argue that aid doesn’t work and should be cut across the board.
The very fact that $2.1 billion has been donated to help the victims of the famine is a testament … Seguir leyendo
Por Keyu Jin, profesor invitado de Economía en la London School of Economics. Traducido al español por Leopoldo Gurman (Project Syndicate, 26/01/12):
Al principio parece difícil de entender: el capital mundial fluye de los países pobres a los ricos. Los países con mercados emergentes generan superávits de cuenta corriente y las economías avanzadas, déficits. Uno esperaría que los países (jóvenes) en desarrollo, con rápido crecimiento y escasez de capital lo importasen del resto del mundo para financiar su consumo y su inversión. ¿Qué hacen entonces enviando capital a los países más ricos en lugar de importarlo?
China es un … Seguir leyendo
By John Campbell, a senior fellow for Africa policy studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and a former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria. He is the author of Nigeria: Dancing on the Brink (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 26/01/12):
Boko Haram’s bloody weekend attacks in Nigeria’s most important Islamic city, Kano, following unrelated countrywide protests over the end of a decades-old fuel subsidy underscore the fact that business as usual is no longer good enough. Only genuine reform of Nigeria’s political economy can pull it back from the brink.
By partly reinstating the fuel subsidy, coupled with alleged payoffs to … Seguir leyendo
By Olivier De Schutter, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food. On March 6, he will present to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva a set of guiding principles for assessments of trade and investment agreements’ impact on human rights (Project Syndicate, 25/01/12):
The World Economic Forum’s annual gathering is normally little more than a toast to the benefits of increasing global GDP, trade, and investment. But this year’s meeting comes at a time when economic expansion can no longer be taken for granted, and when the uneven benefits of past growth are sparking mass social … Seguir leyendo
Por Arturo Pérez-Reverte, escritor, navegante y autor de varias novelas y libros de tema náutico (EL PAÍS, 25/01/12):
La noche del 14 de abril de 1912, 99 años y nueve meses antes de que el Costa Concordia se abriese el casco en un escollo de la isla toscana del Giglio, el Titanic se hundió en el Atlántico Norte llevándose a 1.503 personas. El abandono del barco fue desastroso. El capitán Edward Smith, que pese a 34 años de experiencia profesional se comportó más como torpe gerente de un hotel de lujo que como marino, tardó 25 minutos en … Seguir leyendo
Por Martin Tobias, médico especializado en salud pública, de Wellington, Nueva Zelanda. Traducido al español por Leopoldo Gurman (Project Syndicate, 24/01/12):
Se atribuye a Albert Einstein la frase «todo debe hacerse tan simple como sea posible, pero no más que eso». Sin embargo, el debate actual sobre la epidemia de enfermedades no contagiosas (ENC: enfermedades crónicas como los problemas cardíacos, accidentes cerebrovasculares, diabetes y cáncer) ha ignorado este consejo. Los responsables de diseñar las políticas han simplificado excesivamente el desafío centrándose en la creciente prevalencia de las ENC –la mera cantidad de personas enfermas– lo cual, para mí, no … Seguir leyendo
By Chika Unigwe, an Afro-Belgian writer of Nigerian origin (THE GUARDIAN, 22/01/12):
This week, still reeling from Friday’s bloody bombings on the northern city of Kano, Nigeria braces itself for more violence ahead. The bulk of the casualties in the attacks on churches belonged to the Igbo people, and this has already led to retaliatory attacks in parts of south-eastern Nigeria. An Igbo group, Ogbunigwe Ndigbo, gave all northern Muslims in the region two weeks to leave or face their wrath. In Lokpanta, where my mother is from, the Muslim Hausa community – which settled there … Seguir leyendo
By William Boyd, the author of the forthcoming novel Waiting for Sunrise (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 22/01/12):
In France I live near a little village called Sadillac. It’s no more than a cluster of houses, an old chateau, a church and a graveyard surrounded by a few farms and vineyards. The village probably hasn’t changed much since the French Revolution; its population hovers around 100. By the graveyard is a simple obelisk with the names of the 30 or so young men from Sadillac who died in the First World War, 1914-18. It’s almost impossible to imagine the effect … Seguir leyendo
By Mark V. Vlasic, an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center and senior fellow at Georgetown’s Institute for Law, Science & Global Security who served as head of operations of the World Bank’s StAR Secretariat (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 20/01/12):
One year ago, the eyes of the world focused on Tunisia as its ruler, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, fled the country, allegedly with millions of dollars in gold and assets on his airplane. The government of Tunisia is now working with the international community to recover Ben Ali’s ill-gotten gains.
The process will be slow, … Seguir leyendo
Por Jesús Lizcano Álvarez, catedrático de la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid y presidente de Transparencia Internacional España (EL PAÍS, 20/01/12):
La situación actual de la economía es realmente preocupante, tanto en lo que concierne a la propia realidad económica, como a la teoría y los modelos económicos que supuestamente sirven para mejorar dicha realidad. Quizá sea necesario repensar, y por qué no, rehacer a fondo tanto una como otra, comenzando por cambiar algunos de los principios y postulados económicos que, como fruto de una larga inanición intelectual en este terreno, se vienen asumiendo convencionalmente desde hace ya muchas décadas.… Seguir leyendo
Por Jeffrey Frakel, profesor de Formación de Capital y Crecimiento en la Universidad de Harvard. Traducido del inglés por Carlos Manzano (Project Syndicate, 20/01/12):
Los mercados en ascenso han tenido unos resultados asombrosamente buenos en los siete últimos años. En muchos casos, han superado con gran diferencia a los países industrializados avanzados en crecimiento económico, proporción de la deuda respecto del PIB, política fiscal anticíclica y evaluaciones por parte de las agencias de calificación y los mercados financieros.
Sin embargo, al comenzar 2012 los inversores están preguntándose si los mercados en ascenso no irán a tener una corrección, desencadenada … Seguir leyendo
By Mohamed A. El-Erian, CEO and co-CIO of PIMCO, and author of When Markets Collide (Project Syndicate, 19/01/12):
More than three years after the global financial crisis, the world still has a nasty plumbing problem. Credit pipes remain clogged, and only central banks are working to clear them. But their ability to do so is waning, posing yet another set of risks for Western economies blocked by too little growth, too much unemployment, deepening inequality, and debt in all the wrong places. Fortunately, it is not too late to build broader pipes that compliment and replace the damaged infrastructure.… Seguir leyendo
Por Josep Oliver Alonso, catedrático de Economía Aplicada UAB (EL PERIÓDICO, 19/01/12):
El esquema de ducha escocesa al que nos hemos venido acostumbrando ha continuado estas primeras semanas del 2012. Unos días, el Tesoro español consigue favorables tipos de interés, reduce la prima de riesgo y el euro se refuerza. Otros, la calificación de la deuda se rebaja, el dólar se encarama y las bolsas resisten a duras penas. Y todo ello en medio de un temporal de noticias contradictorias. Mientras EEUU parece tomar aliento, la confianza empresarial en Alemania continúa al alza y el crecimiento de China se … Seguir leyendo
By Kal Raustiala, professor of law and director of the Burkle Center for International Relations at UCLA (LOS ANGELES TIMES, 18/01/12):
Of all the hangovers from the George W. Bush years, the thorniest may be what to do about the U.S. military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. There are still 171 detainees at Guantanamo and little consensus on what to do with them. Last spring, President Obama announced the resumption of military trials for some of those charged with participating in the 9/11 attacks. These trials, known as military commissions, have been stalled for years by legal challenges. … Seguir leyendo