To perform well, public officials must be confident enough about the future, to be able to see a relationship between their efforts, and an eventual outcome. Their expectations are shaped by their institutional environment. If the rules are not credible, or are unlikely to be enforced, of if...

This report summarizes the responses of Bangladeshi Class I (highest level) public sector officials to a survey seeking opinions on a number of civil service issues, from personnel management practices to rewards and disciplinary actions, and from employees' sources of income to the budget...

New data from the 2008 World Bank Group Entrepreneurship Survey indicates a very strong and statistically significant relationship between entrepreneurship and a better business environment. Data for 100 countries on the number of total and newly registered corporations over an eight-year period...

This paper addresses two vital concerns in the debate on adaptation to climate change. First, how can countries prepare to manage the impact of climate-change induced natural disasters? Second, how can countries ensure that they have the governmental institutions required to manage the...

This paper reports on the 2009 update of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) research project, covering 212 countries and territories and measuring six dimensions of governance between 1996 and 2008: Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism,...

This paper presents new indicators for 185 economies measuring the accessibility of business regulatory information. The paper shows that the new data can serve as meaningful proxies for the overall transparency of governments and the new data have explanatory power for the quality of business...

In Localizing Development, Mansuri and Rao survey theory and evidence for development strategies based on local community empowerment. This note extends their theoretical argument by focusing on local government as a vital source of new leadership. Local leaders who provide better public service...

This paper addresses topics on which an agreement is necessary to arrive at consensus guidelines or principles of regulation and supervision of cooperative financial institutions (CFIs) in developing countries. Specifically we identify those aspects related to CFI industry structure, governance,...