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Business, government and civil society must recognize the important role that access to information and evidence plays in preventing corruption and crime.By collaborating, both the public and private sectors could work together to set up the necessary infrastructure/database to provide a single repository or access portal for information that would provide confidence to potential investors as well as governments, ultimately showing that transparency and better governance are possible.

Africa must use tech to chase corruption out of the shadows

By: EBR | Friday, August 30, 2019

Large-scale corruption is the elephant in the room in the ongoing conversation about Africa’s growth story

For two weeks in the early summer of 2019, the UK ran entirely on energy produced without burning coal. On those sunny, breezy days in May, the output from renewable sources allowed the UK National Grid to shut down its coal-fired power stations and pump wind and solar energy into the homes and businesses of consumers.The UK’s reliance on coal has declined dramatically and its government has announced plans to shut down all of its remaining coal-fired power stations by 2025.

Turning Europe into a giant wind farm could power the entire world

By: EBR | Friday, August 30, 2019

On windy days, Europe’s growing number of wind farms can run entire nations on clean energy. But what if there were turbines in every potential location?

The 2004 Olympics were indeed magical and dreamlike, but also a long time ago. Both hyperbole and nostalgia at this moment now miss the point. The ancient Olympics did not usher in abiding peace between city-states any more than do the modern Games between nations. The Games of the XXVIII Olympiad did not prevent the problems that have followed (nor did it cause them). The arc of preparation was not smooth; we do not mean to minimize the costs that were paid by Greeks before and after 2004.

Athens 2004, seen 15 years later

By: EBR | Thursday, August 29, 2019

This month, we’re taking a moment to remember the success of the Athens 2004 Olympics. We hope our friends in Athens and all Greeks do so as well

The move to include Russia was sensible at the time. Back in 1998, there was a strong hope for Russia to become a market-oriented, civilized economy that wanted to shed its twin roots of communism and gangster capitalism.One of the problems of today’s interconnectedness and arms arsenals is that, when one major country has committed a major offense against international rules, just about the only gesture that even the most powerful nations can make is henceforth to refuse to meet with the leader of the country that committed that act.

Macron’s Grand Design: The Russia-Iran Deal for Trump

By: EBR | Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Macron seems to be prepping a tempting offer: How about letting Russia back into the G8 (as Trump wants), in exchange for Trump cooling his fire on Iran?

Another pillar of Turkey’s rule-of-law architecture was recently dismantled: the independence of the Central Bank. Not only was the bank’s governor dismissed by presidential decree on July 6, but nine of the institution’s top managers—those people guaranteeing its professional credibility in international circles—were also dismissed a little later.The implications of this latest move are tragically simple: international financial markets and investors, on which Turkey is heavily reliant, will once again lose confidence in the country’s economic reliability. The central-bank episode illustrates the unavoidable linkage between rule of law on the domestic scene and international credibility.

Turkey’s Presidential Regime Rests on Zero Rule of Law

By: EBR | Tuesday, August 27, 2019

After almost nineteen years in power, Turkey’s president wields absolute power. It’s doubtful he would relinquish it without a fight

Without strong American leadership in global affairs and with a collectively exhausted G7, one major country after another took advantage of the void at the top of the geopolitical ecosystem.India annexed Kashmir, which was also claimed by neighboring Pakistan, thus bringing two nuclear powers into direct confrontation. China cracked down on democracy protesters in Hong Kong, flaunting international agreements. Russia’s leaders continued to meddle in its “near-abroad,” to destract the people at large from their faltering domestic economy.

The Summer of 2019

By: EBR | Monday, August 26, 2019

In terms of economic contentedness, the summer of 2019 in the U.S. and globally had an eerie feeling of the summer of 1913

More recently, in 2019, the CEO of a crypto-asset management fund passed away, and with him the credentials to access the cryptocurrencies he was managing, worth over $150 million. Impossible to retrieve. Was blockchain at fault? No, the company failed to implement proper checks and balances to prevent such a scenario. It also turns out that the CEO had stolen the funds before passing.Blockchain is a new technology and not the simplest one. It could take years for the blockchain community to converge on security standards that will reduce the frequency of breaches

Blockchain is not a magic bullet for security. Can it be trusted?

By: EBR | Friday, August 23, 2019

What blockchain promises is no less than the technological backbone of the 21st century’s renaissance of the social commons, giving back power to the people

This is important for the interpretation of the scientific evidence, for the defense of the integrity of climate science, and for public comprehension of the urgency of the climate issue. Second, objectivity is an essential ideal in scientific work, so if we have evidence that findings are biased in any direction—towards alarmism or complacency—this should concern us We should seek to identify the sources of that bias and correct them if we can.

Scientists Have Been Underestimating the Pace of Climate Change

By: EBR | Friday, August 23, 2019

A book entitled Discerning Experts explains why—and what can be done about it

In 2014, I suggested in these pages that a rising tide of populist parties and candidates could inflict serious damage on democratic institutions. At the time, my argument was widely contested. The scholarly consensus held that demagogues would never win power in the long-established democracies of North America and western Europe.

The Dictators’ Last Stand

By: EBR | Friday, August 23, 2019

Why the New Autocrats Are Weaker Than They Look

New rules recently agreed will require large investors to disclose and report on their processes to identify and prevent adverse sustainability risks and impacts in the case of both mainstream and sustainable investments after 18 months. They also introduce more detailed requirements to prevent greenwashing in the use of climate-related benchmarks.In addition, the Commission and European Supervisory Authorities, who regulate the EU’s financial sector, are working on mainstreaming the consideration of sustainability risks across EU financial regulation.

Human rights and green finance: friends or foes?

By: EBR | Thursday, August 22, 2019

Policymakers currently discussing a ‘taxonomy’ for sustainable finance products at EU level often argue that the proposal already includes social and human rights safeguards. This is not true in the least, warn Eleni Choidas, Lis Cunha and Rachel Owens

Contrary to the principle of historicism, they have recently started to declare Soviet-German Non-Aggression Agreement of 23 August 1939 signed by the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs Vyacheslav Molotov and Reichsminister of Foreign Affairs Joachim von Ribbentrop as virtually the primary cause of the war. Meanwhile, the Munich sell-off and Western powers’ policy of appeasing the aggressor and re-orienting Hitler’s expansionist plans from the West to the East of Europe are deliberately and fully silenced.

The Munich sell-off and World War II: lessons learned?

By: EBR | Thursday, August 22, 2019

In an op-ed based on her book “Score of the Second World War: Who started the war and when?” the famous Russian historian Natalia Narochnitskaya tells about the situation in Europe in the 1930s and the events that led to the conclusion of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact

The strong desire to become a better leader is rarely enough to create long-lasting change. As researchers Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey emphasised in their book Immunity to Change, “Desire and motivation aren’t enough: even when it’s literally a matter of life or death, the ability to change remains maddeningly elusive.” Our research into drivers and blockers and the tool we created builds directly on Kegan and Lahey’s ground-breaking understanding of the blockers to change, combined with positive psychology and other leadership development research for a holistic view of what concrete change could be.

The Powerful Drivers and Blockers of Leadership

By: EBR | Thursday, August 22, 2019

Exploring the hidden forces that motivate and hinder you can make you a better leader

Only in the EU, it is estimated that up to 7% of countries’ national health budgets is spent on diseases linked to obesity each year, with 3% spent on prevention.

Bad eating generates huge costs to society, experts warn

By: EBR | Thursday, August 1, 2019

The EU should not lower the guard on non-communicable dietary-related diseases such as obesity and diabetes, as they have a relevant economic impact on citizens’ daily life, according to food and nutrition experts

Drivers are those “assumptions” and “forces” that give an individual the impetus to act. Blockers, on the other hand, are the “assumptions” and “forces” that stand in the way of change, even when individuals rationally desire to adopt new behaviours.

The Powerful Drivers and Blockers of Leadership

By: EBR | Thursday, August 1, 2019

When Olivia, a global marketing head, received peer feedback that she continuously monopolised work conversations, she readily recognised her problem. However, all past efforts to restrain herself had failed

Social challenges to innovation in health should not be ignored. Many people around the world lack access to quality healthcare. Rising health costs are also an issue, in particular, out-of-pocket payments by private households without complete medical insurance.

The World’s Most Innovative Countries, 2019

By: EBR | Thursday, August 1, 2019

Continuing innovations in health and medicine have led to economic growth and a better quality of life for many around the world. But inequalities could grow rapidly

Chinese state television lacks any semblance of balance. Its reporting emphasizes violence on the part of the protesters. At the same time, it downplays the magnitude of what until recently were non-violent demonstrations against the steady erosion of democratic freedoms.

Two Chinas: Hong Kong and Shanghai

By: EBR | Thursday, August 1, 2019

The people of Hong Kong are fighting a very courageous battle against very long odds. Meanwhile, people in Shanghai live well under a Faustian bargain with the CCP

The first key trend is the Russia-West rivalry. Focused mostly on the Eurasian continent, it is a rivalry of economic and integration models. It bears little resemblance to the Cold War militarily, although certain aspects of political rivalry are also obvious. The scale of deployed forces and assets are lower by an order of magnitude than the threshold levels of the late 1980s, while the preparations made after the Ukraine crisis are very much unlike the efforts to raise an army of invasion or a force grouping deployed by the Warsaw Treaty Organization and NATO in Germany.

A major war between leading military powers is now impossible. Here’s why

By: EBR | Friday, July 26, 2019

Despite growing signs of military preparations under way in leading countries, there is every reason to believe that a major war is impossible in modern international relations, as is evidenced, inter alia, by the recent Indian-Pakistani war crisis that involved an exchange of air strikes and took a toll of several hundred lives

These 10 globally leading hubs have built a strong reputation for having plentiful start-ups and small businesses. New York City, for example, owns the number two slot for start-up ecosystems in part because it has more than 9,000 start-ups, numerous unicorns and high global connectedness (a measure of how much founders are connected with other top global ecosystems). Alternately, Beijing has been steadily moving up the ecosystem ranks in part to being home to more than 1,000 AI companies, which is one of the four fastest-growing startup sub-sectors globally

The next start-up cities that will transform the global economy

By: EBR | Friday, July 26, 2019

During the past decade, much of the discussion about start-up ecosystems has been centered on the question of which city or region will become “the next Silicon Valley”

For Boris Johnson, it has been a life-long ambition to become Prime Minister of his country.Coincidentally, the same holds true for Theresa May, only to resign having found the Brexit “knot” impossible to untie. Now “BoJo” moves to No. 10 to see if he is any more seaworthy than Mrs. May.The divisions that thwarted Mrs. May’s serious efforts at resolving the inner divisions of the country she led proved insurmountable for her.

Boris Johnson and Britain’s Deep-Rooted Divisions

By: EBR | Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Johnson has claimed that he can unite the country under his leadership. That seems a practical impossibility

Children’s trafficking and exploitation is a widespread phenomenon that is causing enormous suffering throughout the world. It can take several forms such as forced labor, sexual exploitation and child begging, among other practices.It is estimated that four million women and girls worldwide are bought and sold each year either into marriage, prostitution or slavery. Over one million children enter the sex trade every year. Although most are girls, boys are also victims.

Child Trafficking: A Global Scourge

By: EBR | Wednesday, July 24, 2019

The elimination of child exploitation is a daunting task. But it is achievable if effective programs are put in place

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Editor’s Column

The Von der Leyen Commission will not take office on November 1!

N. Peter KramerBy: N. Peter Kramer

The European Parliament overwhelmingly rejected Sylvie Goulard, the French nominee to be commissioner for the EU’s internal market and industrial policy

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Schinas: Expert knowledge and capability

Schinas: Expert knowledge and capability

European Commission Vice-President-designate, Margaritis Schinas, demonstrated an impressive command and expert knowledge of the wide-ranging, complex portfolio he will oversee, during his parliamentary hearing (Thursday), according to EPP Group Vice-Chairman, Esteban Gonzalez Pons

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Crowdfunding for Impact?

Crowdfunding for Impact?

Individuals seem increasingly keen to invest in ventures that create social impact, and crowdfunding platforms are making this easier than ever

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