斯里兰卡的文明断层线冲突

文明断层线战争无疑是一个热点话题,绵延几十年的僧泰冲突一直考验着斯里兰卡人,也一直为世人所关注。     

Basic needs: The case of Sri Lanka

This article has two related objectives: to judge Sri Lanka's success in meeting its ‘basic needs’ and growth objectives, and to use Sri Lanka's experience to cast light on general hypotheses regarding basic needs. The analysis suggests that Sri Lanka's social expenditures had a substantial cost in growth and unemployment. However, largely because of these social programmes, it has the best social indicators, compared to its income, of any country for which data are available. Its growth has, surprisingly, been above average for low-income countries. Implications for basic-needs programmes include the need to ‘target’ social programmes, the high priority of primary education and the potential high impact, but also high costs, of assuring minimum caloric intakes.     

Branch expansion and banking efficiency in Sri Lanka’s post‐conflict era

This study assesses changes in the technical efficiency of commercial banks in Sri Lanka following the end of armed conflict in 2009. The weighted aggregate-efficiency technique, based on a group-wise heterogeneous subsampling bootstrap approach, is employed to compare efficiency levels during the periods 2007–2009 and 2010–2013. This technique allows for heterogeneity in environmental and regulatory conditions between the two periods while assuming homogeneity within each period. Our results reveal that the banking sector experienced a significant efficiency improvement post-conflict even with unprecedented branch expansion. The findings, therefore, controvert the mainstream view that bank efficiency declined with rapid industry expansion. Further, we conclude that geographical expansion of the banking sector is a viable and effective policy tool to achieve broad-based and inclusive growth for emerging economies like Sri Lanka, particularly in a period of post-conflict recovery.     

Countries in Violent Conflict and Aid Strategies: The Case of Sri Lanka

In countries with an ongoing violent conflict, aid donors are confronted by four sets of issues: how the volume as well as the orientation of the program can influence a peace process; whether development efforts can be undertaken in rebel-controlled territories; and how an early rehabilitation program can affect the long-term process. This paper analyzes the strategies applied in Sri Lanka by donors undertaking a traditional development approach and those following a more comprehensive approach. Dilemmas are generated vis-à-vis both the government's and the rebels' policies and interests. Four general conclusions underline the political nature of development aid programs during a violent conflict.     

From Plantations to Smallholder Production: The Role of Policy in the Reorganization of the Sri Lankan Tea Sector

The Sri Lankan tea sector has changed from one dominated by vertically integrated plantations to one where independent processors of black tea purchase their input (green leaf tea) from small, independent growers. This paper provides a unifying conceptual framework to characterize three major factors affecting the changes in vertical coordination arrangements (transaction, production, and management costs). Regulation and government policy have altered these determinants of organizational change. Transaction costs have been reduced by state intervention into the price for green leaf which subsequently lowered the risk of processors re-negotiating prices downward. Production costs, which continue to be dominated by labor expenses due to the lack of technological developments for harvesting, have increased more for plantations than independent producers due to union pressures.     

An empirical analysis of Sri Lanka's Manufacturing Productivity slow-down

This paper analyses empirically the changes in Sri Lanka's manufacturing productivity during a period of regime shift from import substituting industrialisation to export-oriented industrialisation. We have used a varying coefficients stochastic production frontier model on a balanced panel data set to shed light on the effects of trade liberalisation on Total Factor Productivity which incorporates both changes in Technical Efficiency and Technical Progress. The results of the empirical validation of the stochastic production frontier model reveal that there were two distinct phases of output and productivity growth under each of the two trade liberalisation episodes that occurred during 1978–88 and 1988–97, respectively. The analysis carried out in this paper decomposing Total Factor Productivity into Technical Progress and Technical Efficiency also reveals that during early years of each episode, perspiration or factor inputs was the driving force of increased output growth giving way to ‘inspiration’ or technical progress as each phase matured. The stochastic production frontier empirics reported in this paper together with negative feedback effects emanating from the political turmoil and the prolonged ethnic conflict virtually brought the growth of foreign direct investment to a grinding halt in late 1980s, when the election of new right-wing government appears to have given a shot in the arm to overcome the paralysis of technical progress that seem to have contributed to the productivity slow-down in Sri Lanka's manufacturing sector in the eve of the new millennium.     

Financial literacy and remittance behavior of skilled and unskilled immigrant groups in Australia

Studies of financial literacy show that many people are poorly prepared for making major financial decisions. One important sub-group rarely examined by financial literacy studies is immigrants, who have specialized financial needs related to remittances. This paper examines variation in financial literacy amongst two actively remitting immigrant groups in Australia – Sri Lankans and Samoans – using surveys designed and supervised by the authors. Paying attention to remittance-related and credit-related literacy, large gaps in the level of financial literacy of the two groups are shown, which are due especially to differences in educational attainment. The wide variation in transactions costs of various remittance channels suggest that many immigrants could save several hundred dollars per year if improved financial literacy helped to produce more efficient remittance choices.     

Differentiation in Economic Costs and Returns from Living with Wildlife in Namibian Community Conservancies

There is substantial differentiation across Namibian community conservancies in the costs and returns from living with wildlife. Real returns rose between 1998 and 2017, albeit unevenly. Those bordering national parks, and with higher game counts, earned more. Large livestock predators (lion, leopard, hyaena, cheetah, wild dog) had the greatest impact on human–wildlife conflict costs across all regions. As of 2017, more than a fifth of conservancies had higher estimated costs than economic returns from hunting and tourism. More resources are required to support Namibian conservancies if this is to be a sustainable model, especially as coronavirus limits international travel.     

Rural energy technology assessment: A Sri Lankan case study

This paper reports and assesses the results of a comparative survey on the costs and benefits of windmills and kerosene pumpsets for irrigation of subsidiary food crops in the Dry Zone of Sri Lanka. Secondary objectives are to draw out lessons from the survey (i) for other renewable energy technology programs and (ii) for evaluation methods. Survey results provide a windmill user evaluation, a cost analysis and a comparison of net crop income under the two techniques (windmill and kerosene pumpset). At both financial and economic prices the renewable energy technology is found inferior to the fossil-fuel based technology. The small data set requires caution in drawing final conclusions but does suggest that there is a critical loss in flexibility over cropping patterns by adoption of the windmill.     

Trade liberalization and welfare: Differentiated-good versus homogeneous-good markets

In this paper, we examine the effects of liberalization on industrial location and national welfare in a framework of new economic geography. Specifically, we explicitly incorporate arbitrary trade costs in both differentiated-good and homogeneous-good sectors into a two-country model, and clarify the effects of trade-barrier reduction in each sector. We show that their impacts on welfare levels in the two countries are different, and, if an industry is liberalized while the other is protected, a conflict between the countries might occur. Therefore, appropriate liberalization in both sectors is effective to alleviate such a conflict.     

New Multilateralism in Action for Peace: A Case Study of the US-led Operation Unified Assistance in the Asian Tsunami Disaster1

Abstract

In the aftermath of the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami in December 2004, the ensuing multinational relief, humanitarian, and rebuilding efforts of the Operation United Assistance (OUA) are new examples of international cooperation to sustain and rebuild Asian communities in the post-9/11 security environment. An analysis of the cooperative efforts in light of differing theoretical perspectives provides a forum for debate on the nature of cooperation in the international arena and the implications for ethnic and civil wars in Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Once described and explained by multiple theories, the relief operations can then be used to predict and perhaps even prescribe future international cooperation in natural disasters and conflict resolution in civil war environments. As a case study, this paper also examines international security strategies and the implications for economic prosperity and political stability in sovereign but weak nation states.     

产业集群外部性的产权问题探析

本文将立足于集群经济的外部性进行考察,运用产权理论的内生交易费用和外生交易费用理论对其进行分析和初步研究探讨。产权清晰性或是模糊性的设定和安排的本质是一个费用问题,由于内生交易费用与外生交易费用的两难冲突,只有内生费用和外生费用的总和最小时,才是有效率的。最后,提出了产业集群的发展在清晰产权和模糊产权这两种制度安排的选择问题。     

企业环境成本管理研究

文章通过对环境成本的界定与分析,提出从政府和企业两个方面加强环境成本的管理工作,杜绝以牺牲环境为代价换取利益的行为,解决好经济发展与环境保护的矛盾,实现企业利益与社会利益的双赢。     

Equity Risk Premium Puzzle: Evidence from Indonesia and Sri Lanka

This paper investigates the equity risk premium puzzle in the Indonesian and Sri Lankan stock markets in order to identify the relationship between the volatility of excess returns and the equity risk premium. The asymmetric impact of negative shocks on the equity risk premium is also examined using threshold and exponential GARCH-M models. We analyse data on the excess returns of the Indonesian and Sri Lankan stock markets from 2004 to 2013, and we find that the impact of the conditional volatility of excess returns on the equity risk premium is not significant in either country. Instead, we find an impact from negative return shocks on the equity risk premium only in Sri Lanka. Therefore, we conclude that investors are not compensated for the conditional volatility of the excess returns in these two markets, while Sri Lankan investors are compensated for the risk of negative shocks.     

On ‘the political economy of stabilization’

Joan Nelson (1984) includes Sri Lanka in the period 1977–1982 in a series of case studies of the factors affecting the political acceptability of stabilization and adjustment programs. This is misleading because, unlike the other countries dealt with, Sri Lanka was not faced with an economic crisis when it accepted large multilateral loans under policy conditionality. In fact, the economic policies pursued in Sri Lanka after 1977 reflect the interests and political program of the domestic capitalist class. The existence of such a class introduces dimensions to the analysis of the politics of adjustment not dealt with in Nelson's framework.     

EXPORT‐LED GROWTH HYPOTHESIS: FURTHER ECONOMETRIC EVIDENCE FROM SOUTH ASIA

This paper examines the export‐led growth (ELG) hypothesis for five South Asian countries through cointegration and multivariate Granger causality tests. Strong support for a long‐run relationship among exports, imports, and real output for all the countries except Sri Lanka were found. Feedback effects between exports and GDP for Bangladesh and Nepal and unidirectional causality from exports to output in the case of Pakistan were found. No causality between these variables was found for Sri Lanka and India, although for India GDP and exports did induce imports. A feedback effect between imports and GDP was also documented for Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal, as well as unidirectional causality from imports to output growth for Sri Lanka. These and other findings are discussed from the standpoint of the export‐led growth hypothesis.     

Ethnic Diversity,Political Stability and Productive Efficiency: Empirical Evidence from the African Countries

While ethnic diversity has been shown to produce numerous negative effects on the economic performance due to disagreement on the production of the public good, nepotism in making employment decisions, increased corruption and rent‐seeking behaviour, its positive effects appear to have received much less attention. We hypothesise and test several explanations why higher levels of ethnic diversity may be associated with better socio‐economic outcomes. We find that productive efficiency will be higher in the societies where ethnicities can benefit from the complementarity of skills. Incentives to engage in an ethnic conflict will be lower and the extent of political stability higher in those countries where the opportunity costs of ethnic conflict are more substantial. We also find some evidence in support of the political aspirations hypothesis that attributes the negative effects of ethnic diversity to the strife by ethnic groups for more political influence.     

The plantation sector in Sri Lanka: Recent changes in the welfare of children and women

Although Sri Lanka has achieved high standards of mass well-being, physical quality of life indicators for the historically deprived plantation population fall well below the impressive national averages. This paper analyses the position of women and children on the plantations within the context of the global recession and national economic strategies. It highlights some of the programmes which, along with a legacy of concern for social welfare in Sri Lanka, have attempted to maintain and even improve the living conditions of plantation women and children.     

西部地区金融抑制的制度分析

简要疏理和评述近年来我国区域金融与经济发展关系的实证研究现状,重点对1997年亚洲金融危机后我国金融市场化改革进入新的阶段,西部地区普遍存在的独特金融抑制形式和影响进行制度分析,透析了我国现行的金融市场化改革与西部经济中相关配套制度供给不足而带来高额的交易成本,并基于上述分析提出了西部地区金融改革的路径选择和制度创新的思路,尝试构建适合西部经济发展的金融制度和组织结构。     

Impediments to Promoting Backward Linkages from the Garment Industry in Sri Lanka

The slow growth of backward linkages from the garment industries (export-oriented) in developing countries and the policy merits of promoting these linkages have considerable contemporary relevance. Backward linkages are useful particularly for a garment industry to reduce the lead time and remain competitive in the international market. Local suppliers to the garment industry cannot function however unless conditions exist which allow them to be competitive. Furthermore, in a world where multinational garment-buying firms are dominant, a large import dependence in the garment industry does not necessarily imply that there are many opportunities to create local supplies and thereby create backward linkages. These factors are shown from the Sri Lankan attempts to promote backward linkages from the garment industry. It is argued that formation of backward linkages in the garment industry that operate in an open economy such as Sri Lanka is a natural outcome of industrial deepening and therefore will be time dependent. It is noted that even with less backward linkages, the garment industry in Sri Lanka has contributed significantly to foreign exchange earnings and employment creation in the country.