Civil justice reform efforts in industrial countries face common problems in increasing access to justice and reducing costs and delays. A recent survey examined problems with and reforms of civil justice in 3 common law nations and 10 civil law countries. All reported that the economic...

This note presents the lessons from the assessments that are likely to be most useful to country directors, and task teams preparing new adjustment operations. The five adjustment loans (two in Argentina, and one each in Korea, Malaysia, and Russia) show that applying basic lessons is not always...

The succesful selection and design of Bank lending operations involving policy reforms depends on the World Bank's capacity to assess borrower ownership. The Bank must know whether there is sufficient ownership to justify lending and, if not, how to work with the government to build broader...

The note addresses the role of ombudsman offices, and what ensures its effectiveness. Good administration requires much more than acting legally, which include constitutional, and human rights abuses, mismanagement, as well as illegal practices. An ombudsman's independence from other branches of...

The note reviews the potential of public expenditure reviews as objective analysis of a country's public spending issues, and in advancing the development agenda in the Bank's client countries. It examines the experiences with these reviews, setting the approach for improving them, finding that:...

This briefly examines some considerations when designing safety nets: a) local needs; b) financial and political sustainability; c) cost benefit analysis; and d) approach at targeting needy groups. Furthermore, it emphasizes that the poor must be included in productive activity, so that safety...

This note argues that a carbon tax system is more practical to implement, monitor, and enforce than tradable permit-based approaches to global climate-change action. It suggests that a sensible design will be an upstream carbon tax on the fossil fuel supply chain, which can also include other...