Wasteful duplication of facilities, uneconomic entry, universal service, and cream skimming are the catchphrases used by many telecom executives, civil servants, and merchant bankers in arguing for continuing telecom monopolies and cross-subsidies. The author explains why their arguments are wrong

Buying, selling and mortgaging farmland are still rare in Eastern and Central Europe. Not surprisingly, given the level of risk in many of these countries, short-term transactions, especially leasing, are more common. These short-term transactions do almost as well as land sales in allocating...

Many developing countries suffer from logjam in the courts, a condition that tends to reduce the effectiveness of bankruptcy law in relieving financial distress. Colombia's bankruptcy reform provides some useful lessons for these countries. In particular, it shows that when traditional court...

Many laws and regulations in developing countries drive small businesspeople out of the formal banking sector and into the hands of high-cost and sometimes unscrupulous moneylenders in the informal sector. The author looks at these barriers to credit for small farmers and firms and suggests...

The buildup of interenterprise credit in many Central and Eastern European countries is often seen as a problem that requires a government bailout. The authors show that arrears rise only temporarily, as the hard budget constraint bites, and then plateau. Therefore, they argue that while...

World Bank Group client governments as well as donors often ask about the effects of business entry reforms and the persistence of those effects. Four clear findings emerge from existing research. First, more firms enter the market when registration procedures and costs are cut. Second, a large...

Self-dealing, prevalent in emerging markets, often harms minority shareholders. The related-party transaction is one common technique, especially in markets with weak law enforcement. Beyond self-dealing, other methods of expropriation, such as insider trading and dilution of share value, can...

Collateral can increase access to finance, especially for small firms, and lead to better terms for loan contracts. Many argue that firms are excluded from formal credit markets because they lack assets that can serve as collateral. In fact, firms generally have a wide array of productive assets...

Resource flows from extractive industries can be a lifeline for postconflict countries, helping to fund critical reconstruction needs. But these resources present issues not found elsewhere in the economy and need to be well managed. Sector governance principles that apply to oil-producing...

For at least a decade, governments and non-profit organizations, often supported by bilateral aid, have experimented with tele-centers as means to extend access to computers, the Internet, and other information, and communication services to rural, and low-income urban areas of developing...