This paper analyzes why the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has lagged in growth and globalization. Despite attempts to spur recovery and initiate structural reforms, many countries in the region remain on a slow growth path, effectively sidelined from globalization and the benefits of closer economic integration with the rest of the world. The benefits from oil failed to generate a sustained growth dynamic or bring about greater regional economic integration. The paper highlights that the slowdown in economic reforms is a key factor for the economic depression in the MENA region.

First Published in 2008. With contributions from a range of leading experts in this rapidly changing field, the book will be of particular value to economists, national and international institutes, banks and other financial institutions and the academic world. For ease of reference, the text is supported with charts and table, and there is a complete index.

As a government institution specializing in development-oriented finance, the China Development Bank (CDB) has combined advanced international financial theories with China's practical conditions and has done remarkably well in removing financing bottlenecks, establishing market credit systems, and ensuring faster and better economic and social development. Its practice and theory in development-oriented finance represent a major distinctive feature of China's socialist market economy.Written in the setting of great history, great changes and great challenges, this book contains a systematic study of the theory and practice of development-oriented finance that has evolved along with China's reform and opening up. It provides an in-depth analysis of the ideological basis, theoretical contents, operating principles and innovative development of China's financial system.China's Rise: Development-Oriented Finance and Sustainable Development will promote further discussions and researches on China's modern economic and financial systems and in turn the sustainable development of the Chinese economy and the world economy at large.

Annette Kleinbrod analyses the Chinese capital market and examines to what extent the stock and bond markets contribute to the financing of China's development. Her approach takes into account the relatively recent re-emergence of the stock and bond markets in China, the limited data available, and the country's current dynamics.

ÔDing ChenÕs detailed institutional analysis of the development of the Chinese stock market brings the question of enforcement to centre stage. In doing so, she not only introduces readers to the particularities of the Chinese system; she also sheds new light on conventional debates about the law and economics of corporate governance.Õ Ð Andrew Johnston, University of Sheffield, UK ÔIn this book Dr Ding Chen has made an important theoretical contribution to our understanding of corporate governance in transitional economies and of corporate governance in China especially. Drawing upon the insights of New Institutional Economics theory she examines the interplay between formal and informal enforcement mechanisms relating to corporate governance in China. To support this argument the book breaks new ground by providing a comprehensive examination of enforcement actions in ChinaÕs stock market; her findings are at variance from conclusions found in other research, such as in the law and finance literature. Rather than simply imitating the dominant Anglo-American model of corporate governance, she argues that local conditions will greatly affect the choice of the most appropriate governance models. This has been especially so in China.Õ Ð Roman Tomasic, University of South Australia and Durham Law School, UK This important new book attempts to establish a fresh conceptual framework for the study of corporate governance by employing the new institutional economics of contract enforcement. This framework helps to clarify two critical issues including the role of law in financial development and whether there is an optimal corporate governance model that should be followed by countries attempting to develop their own stock markets. Applying this novel framework, the author conducts a comprehensive study on Chinese corporate governance and discovers that the Chinese stock market has rapidly expanded even in the absence of any effective institutions. She provides a credible explanation to this ÔChina puzzleÕ by arguing that the growth of the stock market is mainly driven by state guarantees, institutional rent seeking by state-owned companies, financial repression and investorsÕ speculation. Indeed, there is probably nowhere better to look than ChinaÕs stock market to assess the limits of the gradualist approach to financial development. As the book explains, the potential efficiency gains that could be created by a healthy, well-functioning stock market have been completely outweighed by the consideration of maintaining the existing political system. This book will appeal to scholars and students of economics and law with an interest in corporate governance, Chinese economic development and new institutional economics.

This well-written book is the first to deal with entrepreneurship in all its aspects. It considers the economic, psychological, political, legal and cultural dimensions of entrepreneurship from a market-process perspective. David A Harper has produced a volume that analyses why some people are quicker than others in discovering profit opportunities. Importantly, the book also covers the issue of how cultural value systems orient entrepreneurial vision and, in contrast to conventional wisdom, the book argues that individualist cultural values are not categorically superior to group oriented values in terms of their consequences for entrepreneurial discovery.

China's transition from a planned economy to a market economy has succeeded in producing more than a decade of phenomenal growth. Whilst similar reforms in countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union have seen an initial downturn in production, usually with a significant rise in unemployment, the success of the approach taken by China has been remarkable. However, China embarked upon the process, without a well-designed blueprint at the outset. The resulting piecemeal, partial, incremental, and often experimental approach has proved complicated to implement - requiring a complex melding of politics and economics, internal and foreign affairs, government and market. How the difficult task of balancing the diverse array of often competing concerns has been achieved is the subject of this book, which examines the dismantling of the centrally planned system and the mechanism of institutional change in Chinese transition.

A distinguished international group of central bankers, commercial bankers, entrepreneurs, academic advisors, policymakers, and representatives of development finance organizations and donor agencies, brought together by KfW, examines in this book the future of financial sector development in Southeast Europe. They explore ways to strengthen the banking sector in Southeast Europe, further promote SMEs, and improve access to financial services in the region. Experts and decision-makers assess the opportunities and challenges presented by the EU accession process and Basel II, and offer candid insight into the expanding role of the private sector in developing the financial landscape. The perspectives presented in this book will prompt discussion and intellectual exchange that will serve as a new starting point for further successful cooperative initiatives.

'Achieving the goals set by world leaders in the United Nations Millennium Declaration will be difficult without a significant improvement in the lives of slum dwellers, and the lives of slum dwellers cannot be improved without the sound and sustainable economic development that is conducive to the establishment of a strong shelter sector. As Financing Urban Shelter: Global Report on Human Settlements 2005 emphasizes, one of the key challenges in meeting the Millennium Declaration Goal on slums is mobilization of the financial resources necessary for both slum upgrading and slum prevention by supplying new housing affordable to lower income groups on a large scale. . . . It is my hope that, by highlighting the impacts of current shelter financing systems on low-income households and by identifying the types of financing mechanisms that appear to have worked for them, this report will contribute to the efforts of the wide range of actors involved in improving the lives of slum dwellers, including governments at the central and local levels, as well as non-governmental and international organizations.' From the Foreword by KOFI ANNAN, Secretary-General, United Nations Financing Urban Shelter presents the first global assessment of housing finance systems, placing shelter and urban development challenges within the overall context of macroeconomic policies. The report describes and analyses housing finance conditions and trends in all regions of the world, including formal housing finance mechanisms, microfinance and community funding, highlighting their relevance to the upgrading of slums. Recent shelter finance policy development is discussed at the international and national levels, and the directions that could be taken to strengthen shelter finance systems are examined. The Global Report on Human Settlements is the most authoritative and up-to-date assessment of conditions and trends in the world's cities. It is an essential tool and reference for researchers, academics, public authorities and civil society organizations around the world. The preceding issues of the Global Report on Human Settlements have addressed such topics as An Urbanizing World, Cities in a Globalizing World and The Challenge of Slums. Published with UN-HABITAT