Examining the Big Picture

Recently at CIGI we have launched three initiatives, which examine the Rising BRICSAM and their impact collectively and individually on global governance.

The first is the Princeton Summer Workshop, which in collaboration with our partners at Princeton University (Dean Anne-Marie Slaughter and Professor John Ikenberry)  we held from August 25th through the midday of August 27th. This Conference was an opportunity for authors to present and discuss their first draft efforts. The title of the Conference and the future volume identifies the meeting focus  – ‘Rising States; Rising Institutions.’

There are chapters on the largest of the emerging powers – Brazil, China and India and how these three impact global governance.  There is a chapter examining the development of a number of emerging power organizations; a chapter on Continue reading

A Call to Arms?

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has seemingly risen from the ashes.  His actions to protect the financial institutions in the United Kingdom and his call for global cooperation and a kind of Bretton Woods II have revitalized his leadership image.

On October 17th, in the Washington Post Prime Minister Brown penned an op-ed, “Out of the Ashes” The Financial Crisis is also an Opportunity to Create New Rules for our Global Economy.” In the opinion piece Brown casts a view back Continue reading

Testing the Thesis

For some time now, as the financial storm clouds approached, various analysts have touted the view that the emerging markets and the rising powers – China, India, Brazil and Russia, and others – are increasing decoupled from the United States and the sub-prime threat. Now that the financial meltdown is upon us, I suspect those who argued such a line would be happy to take it back (Note Dani Rodrik’s disdain for decoupling as well in his blog post ‘The Other Shoe Drops‘.)

Now it is not to say that these Rising Powers are bound to find themselves in the situations they faced in say 1997 or 1998, but they are all being buffeted in different ways by the gales of this widening financial meltdown.  Contagion is upon us Continue reading

The Challenge of Capitalism in China?

One of the most insightful experts on China and it’s economic structure is Professor Yasheng Huang.  Professor Huang teaches international management at the MIT Sloan School of Management and he is a ferocious analyst of the Chinese economy.  His most recent book, Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics: Entrepreneurship and the State (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008) is a must read for anyone interested in understanding how China became the emergent power of the BRICSAM.

Since I’m in the midst of it, I can not provide a final evaluation, but let me take a first cut at this study. There’s a hint early on by Yasheng Huang of the analysis to follow.  Yasheng writes: “…- the Chinese economy is so complicated that what appears to be straightforward and obvious on the surface is not at all so once we dig into the details.”

“Is there any reason to think that the general economic success of China has been a result of institutional forces dramatically different from those that have favored growth elsewhere?”

There are two explanations for China’s emergence.  The first – now traditional view suggests, according to Yasheng Continue reading