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Reforming Global Finance

The Globalist’s “Reforming Global Finance” presents essays and analyses by experts in the fields of economics, financial markets and financial governance.

The essays in the series point the way forward to a global financial system that is more transparent, accountable and effective by alerting a global audience of experts and non-experts alike to the relevance of financial reform to their own lives and futures.

The series — which consists of 103 essays published between April 2012 and December 2013 — was supported by a grant from the Ford Foundation.

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Reforming Global Financial Governance
By Luis Ubiñas, President, Ford Foundation

How can the global financial regulatory system be restructured so it works as well for Main Street as it does for Wall Street?

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Planning for the Future of Democracy: The Four L’s
By Arun Maira, Member, Planning Commission (India)

In the battle between governments and markets, can global problems be solved by localization, lateralization, learning and listening?

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A Chance for Happiness for Europe’s Unhappy Family
By Yanis Varoufakis, Economist, National and Kapodistrian University (Greece)

Can Europe find away to resolve its debt crisis even though it is clearly not ready to form a federal structure?

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Discounting the Finances of Egypt
By Jonathan Anderson, Founding Partner, Emerging Advisors Group

Could Egypt’s economic and financial problems be even worse than the political ones?

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Rebuilding Through Reform: How to Ensure Global Financial Stability
By Esther L. George, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City

What steps can be taken to build a financial system that is better able to withstand future crises?

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France’s Economy is Doing All Right, Thanks
By Thomas Fricke, Columnist, Financial Times Deutschland

Does France really stand to gain much from emulating the German economy?

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The United States and the EU: Capitalisms Compared
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

Which model of corporate governance is doing a better job of striking a balance between the needs of business and the need of society, the U.S.’s or the EU’s?

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Reinventing Banking After the Jamie Dimon Flameout
By Martin Hutchinson, Market analyst and author

Is the current financial landscape too complex for any self-styled J.P. Morgan to master?

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A Brief History of Global Anchor Currencies
By Sanjeev Sanyal, Global Strategist, Deutsche Bank

How can dominant economic powers of their time use their currencies to gain cheap financing from abroad?

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The Nordic Model’s Economic Appeal
By Daniel Sachs, CEO of Proventus

The Nordic model has been hailed for its social successes. But does it make good economic sense?

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The State of Finance: An Interim Assessment
By Robert J. Shiller, Economist, Yale University

What can be done so that financial capitalism is a source not of disasters, but of true human progress and democratization?

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Financial Capitalism: A Safe Venue for Power Struggles Without Violence
By Robert J. Shiller, Economist, Yale University

Who still remembers that, before the advent of modern financial capitalism, power was wielded in much starker ways?

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Adam Smiths of Capital, Friedrich Lists of Labor
By Branko Milanovic, Lead Economist, World Bank

Why do people who consider themselves pro-free market take radically different positions on the mobility of capital and labor?

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Why Supervising the Financial Sector Really Matters
By Ravi Menon, Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore

What must a government consider when undertaking a critical intervention in financial markets?

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Global Rebalancing: The U.S.-China Dimension
By Stephen S. Roach, Former Non-Executive Chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia

Can China successfully shift from export-led to consumer-driven growth? Can the United States learn to save?

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Ronald Reagan’s Raw Deal for America
By Louis Hyman, Economist, Cornell University

What’s “patriotic” about cutting taxes for the rich — and “empowering” the middle class by letting it pile up mountains of debt?

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Markets and Governments: A Historical Perspective
By Ravi Menon, Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore

What can governments do to seize the opportunities of globalization, while minimizing its downsides?

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From the Washington Consensus to a Singapore Consensus?
By Ravi Menon, Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore

Does the world need more markets, more government, or does it just need markets and government to be more effective?

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Dateline Singapore: Market Economies and Social Inclusion
By Ravi Menon, Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore

Are social safety nets inherently incompatible with market-based incentives to work and save?

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Britain’s Self-Defeating Blame Game
By Holger Schmieding, Chief Economist, Berenberg Bank

How justified are claims by Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne that the eurozone crisis is killing Britain’s economic recovery?

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France’s Epoch-Making Choice
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

Will Francois Hollande choose to make France like Germany or to make France like Italy?

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The Nordic Model and the European Crisis
By Daniel Sachs, CEO of Proventus

Has Scandinavia’s emphasis on fairness and social cohesion made its economies more resilient to Europe’s crisis?

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The German Strategy on the Euro: A Pre-Summit Roadmap
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

How does Germany see its role, and what are its real intentions and specific plans, with regard to saving the euro?

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Not a Global Crisis, But the West’s (And Keynes Can’t Help)
By Meghnad Desai, Former Professor of Economics, London School of Economics

Why is the current economic crisis in Europe and the United States likely to be unresponsive to Keynesian solutions?

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Debunking The Global Savings Glut Theory
By Richard Duncan, Chief Economist, Blackhorse Asset Management

Is paper money created by the world’s central banks responsible for the “global imbalances” that destabilized the economy?

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The LIBOR Mess
By Robert J. Shapiro, Chairman of Sonecon, LLC

Could the LIBOR scandal become the biggest financial fraud in history?

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Diamond(s) Are Not Forever
By Ian Johnson, Secretary-General, Club of Rome

Did Barclays Bank executives engage in fraud to boost the bank’s market valuation — or because they lacked simple values?

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Exits from the Rat Race
By Robert and Edward Skidelsky, Authors of “How Much is Enough? Money and the Good Life”

How did mid-century concerns about how economic gains were distributed throughout society give way to today’s crisis-prone, Darwinian capitalism?

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Beyond LIBOR: Derivatives as WMD on the American People
By Dennis M. Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc.

Why should derivatives be moved out of the dark of over-the-counter markets into the brighter light of exchanges?

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Beyond LIBOR: Whiners on Wall Street
By Dennis M. Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc.

Are financial industry complaints about the alleged costs of regulation justified? Or does history prove they are without merit?

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Don’t Leave It to the Economists
By Adair Turner, Chairman, Financial Services Authority (UK)

Why do economists — and the policymakers who heed their advice — need to reconsider the conventional wisdoms of their profession?

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Is Modern Finance a Productive Economic Activity?
By Adair Turner, Chairman, Financial Services Authority (UK)

Financial systems play an important role in economic growth. Why, then, do they sometimes go off the rails?

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From Iraq to LIBOR: Excessive Risk-Taking and Democratic Accountability
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher of The Globalist

What is it about U.S. and UK financial and foreign policy elites that has them engage so willingly in excessive risk-taking?

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Can Central Bankers Cope With the Crisis?
By Henry Kaufman, President, Henry Kaufman & Company

Are the current monetary tactics of Western central banks analogous to dosing a patient with steroids?

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The Danger of More Financial Concentration
By Henry Kaufman, President, Henry Kaufman & Company

Has increasing financial concentration improved the economic function of finance — the effective allocation of credit?

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Just Blame the Mathematicians?
By Martin Hutchinson, Market analyst and author

How did mathematicians and traders, working hand in hand, find ways to take larger risks than banks officially contemplated?

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Larry Summers and the Imperialism of Economics
By H. Woody Brock, President, Strategic Economic Decisions

Do economists have the right analytical tools to solve our most pressing problems?

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How the ECB Really Works
By Holger Schmieding, Chief Economist, Berenberg Bank

Why doesn’t the European Central Bank act more like the Fed in its approach to the economic crisis?

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How China’s Approach in Africa Complements the West’s
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

Can China’s market-building approach to Africa complement the West’s tradition democracy-building approach?

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The Economic Fallout of the U.S. Financial Crisis
By Dennis M. Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc.

Will the costs of the financial crisis limit the government’s ability to deal with future crises?

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Tackling Too Big To Fail: The Most Important Rightsizing in U.S. History
By John Prout, Executive Director, Foundation for Fund Governance and Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher of The Globalist

Why is it taking so long to write and implement new U.S. financial reform regulations?

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Big Banks: Resolving the “Too Big to Fail” Issue
By John Prout, Executive Director, Foundation for Fund Governance

What will it take to wind down the era of Too Big to Fail banks and financial institutions?

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Should We Expect Multinationals to Be Loyal?
By Robert D. Atkinson, President, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation

Why would a European CEO be “shunned” if he moved much of his production to China?

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Global Citizens and the Global Economy
By Nancy Birdsall, President, Center for Global Development

How can global citizens and international institutions create the conditions for inclusive and sustainable economic growth?

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Ten Steps to Run the Economy as if the Future Matters
By Diane Coyle, Economist and author

What policies should governments focus on to ensure that future generations live at least well as the current generation?

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Natural Resources, Natural Corruption?
By Frank Vogl, Co-Founder of Transparancy International

How can transparency help end the fleecing of resource-rich countries by their corrupt leaders?

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Can American History Save the Euro?
By Thomas Mayer, Senior Fellow, Center of Financial Studies, Goethe University Frankfurt

Can the eurozone successfully model its monetary and fiscal community on the U.S. political regime of the 19th century?

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Rethinking American Capitalism
By Richard Duncan, Chief Economist, Blackhorse Asset Management

Can the United States transform its consumption- and credit-based economy to one based on investment and saving?

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The Real Winners and Losers of Globalization
By Branko Milanovic, Lead Economist, World Bank

Globalization has radically changed the dynamics of global income growth. So who has won and who has lost?

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Financial Reform With Real Teeth
By Dennis M. Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc.

What are the potential costs if Wall Street is successful in weakening the Dodd-Frank financial regulations?

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America’s 1% Vs. the Globe’s 1.3 Billion
By The Globalist

The $600 billion of total income of the world’s poorest 1.3 billion people is equal to the income of what percentage of the richest Americans?

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The Silent Revolution Inside the IMF
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

The global balance of economic power is changing — and the IMF is changing right along with it.

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Elections of Destiny: Reagan in 1980 and Gladstone in 1880
By Martin Sieff, Contributing Editor, The Globalist

How did the U.S. election of 1980 and the British election a century prior lay the groundwork for each country’s decline?

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Wall Street: Wake Up, Step Up or Shut Up
By Dennis M. Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc.

Wall Street lost its bid to unseat President Obama. Now it should get onboard with sensible regulation and oversight.

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The Rise of the Plutocrats
By Chrystia Freeland, Digital Editor, Thomson Reuters

Why have Americans been so tolerant of the rising gulf between rich and poor?

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A Eurozone Crisis or a Global Crisis?
By Thierry Vissol, Special Adviser for Media and Communications, EC’s Representation in Italy

Is the euro crisis just a European crisis — or is it a global crisis in search of a global governance solution?

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Time for Truth on Poverty, Power and Climate Change
By Peter Goldmark, Columnist for Newsday, and David De Ferranti, President, Results for Development Institute

Are international financial institutions helping or hindering the switch to clean energy technologies?

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U.S. Energy Policy and the Anti-Innovation Bias
By William H. Janeway, Managing Director, Warburg Pincus

Can the United States muster the economic insight and political will to step into the 21st century world of energy?

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Sovereign Debt Difficulties: Had Enough Yet?
By Barry Herman, Visiting Senior Fellow, Graduate Program in International Affairs, The New School

Can the fragmentary and chaotic process of resolving sovereign debt crises be made fairer and more effective?

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The American Boulevard of Stolen Dreams: Part I – 1945-1980s
By Hedrick Smith, Author and Documentary Filmmaker

Why has the American Dream slipped out of reach of much of the middle class?

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The American Boulevard of Stolen Dreams: Part II — 1990s-2012
By Hedrick Smith, Author and Documentary Filmmaker

How has the American middle class fared under Presidents Bush I, Clinton, Bush II and Obama?

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Next Stop: The Debt Ceiling Debate
By Uwe Bott, Principal, Bott Consulting, and Contributing Editor, The Globalist

What’s the historical background of Congressional negotiations over domestic debt?

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India Grows at Night
By Gurcharan Das, Author, columnist and Indian business executive

How could a nation become the world’s second fastest growing economy despite a weak, flailing state?

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India: Confessions of a Disillusioned Libertarian
By Gurcharan Das, Author, columnist and Indian business executive

Will the political class of India step up or will the Indians themselves need to reform government and rid it of corruption?

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The Global Rise of a Regulatory Superstate in Europe
By Anu Bradford, Professor of Law at Columbia Law School

How does Europe exercise world power? Isn’t doing it away from military battlefields a truly modern form of global leadership?

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The EU: Global Regulation King by Default
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

Is the United States’ anti-regulation stance undermining its global power?

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A Brief History of U.S. Defaults
By Uwe Bott, Principal, Bott Consulting, and Contributing Editor, The Globalist

Does the United States have a stellar credit record — or is it a nation of deadbeats?

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Putting Finance Back in the Box
By Thomas I. Palley, Senior Economic Policy Adviser, AFL-CIO

What can be done to make finance serve interests of the real economy?

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The Apple Saga: Rethinking the Risk-Reward Ratio
By Mariana Mazzucato, Professor of Economics, University of Sussex

Will the U.S. lead in technological innovation falter if the government can’t reap some of the rewards from its successful investments?

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Inequality and Democratic Capitalism
By Branko Milanovic, Lead Economist, World Bank

Was the second half of the 20th century — when capitalism became closely entwined with democracy — just an unusual interlude?

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The Emperors of Banking Have No Clothes
By Anat Admati, Professor at Stanford University, and Martin Hellwig, Director, Max Planck Institute

Why have bank lobbyists been so successful in stymieing efforts to rein in banking, despite the massive fallout from the global financial crisis?

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Brazil and the Global Battle to Eliminate Extreme Poverty
By Rogerio Studart, Executive Director of the World Bank

Is Latin America’s largest country providing a model for how to reduce poverty in lean budgetary times?

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Can Income Inequality Destabilize the U.S. Economy?
By Uri Dadush, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Kemal Dervis, Brookings Institution

Beyond political frustrations and social distrust, could the present level of gross income inequality also destabilize the U.S. economy in the future?

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Strengthening Resilience in Developing Countries
By J. Eric Smith, CEO, Swiss Re Americas

Can giant insurance companies help small customers in developing countries bounce back from environmental catastrophes?

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Bringing About Real Corporate Change in Bad Industries
By Richard Phillips, Senior Index Analyst, S-Network Global Indexes

Is capital itself the only practical force capable of restraining capitalism’s own excesses?

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Funny Money and the Super-Rich
By Martin Hutchinson, Market analyst and author

Is the U.S. Federal Reserve the chief culprit in bringing about the grotesque levels of U.S. income inequality?

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Do We Need New Global Institutions?
By Ian Goldin, Professor of Globalisation and Development, Oxford University

What is the world to do when national governments retreat from global commitments?

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How Ben Bernanke Saved Europe’s Banks
By Neil Irwin, Columnist, Washington Post

How did Europe become, in effect, the 13th district of the Federal Reserve system?

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Learning to Love Inflation (Thanks To Quantitative Easing)
By Richard Phillips, Senior Index Analyst, S-Network Global Indexes

Why should real capitalists and long-term investors love quantitative easing?

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Obama’s Covert Trade Deal
By Lori Wallach, Director, and Ben Beachy, Research Director, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch

Has the Obama Administration’s Pacific trade negotiations violated the President’s pledge to open government?

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U.S. Housing Recovery: A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
By Uwe Bott, Principal, Bott Consulting, and Contributing Editor, The Globalist

Why are U.S. regulators (again) failing to take action to prevent a bubble in the U.S. housing market?

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Time for a U.S. Pivot to Latin America
By Kevin P. Gallagher, Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Why is China looking more attractive to Latin America than the U.S. for new trade?

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Brazil and Turkey: The Global Middle Class Rises
By Uwe Bott, Principal, Bott Consulting, and Contributing Editor, The Globalist

Why are Brazil and Turkey both facing mass protests right now?

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Cleaning Up the Vatican Bank
By Massimo Franco, Political Columnist for Corriere della Sera

Will Pope Francis be able to reform the Vatican Bank?

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The U.S. as a Global Risk Generator
By Kevin P. Gallagher, Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Are regulators making it easier for Wall Street to return to pre-crash behaviors and export them to the world?

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Connecting on Wall Street
By Lily Fang, Associate Professor of Finance, INSEAD

Does Wall Street have different standards for its male and female financial analysts?

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It’s Not a Conspiracy, Mr. Erdogan!
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

How has Turkey’s prime minister failed to anticipate the social and political changes that accompanied his government’s economic successes?

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Coordinate Currencies or Stagnate
By Thomas I. Palley, Senior Economic Policy Adviser, AFL-CIO

What can be done to prevent a wave of competitive devaluation of currencies?

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Should China Deregulate Finance?
By Kevin P. Gallagher, Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Why is it in the world’s best interest for China to go slow on deregulating its financial system?

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Is Europe’s Complacency America’s Fault?
By Yanis Varoufakis, Economist, National and Kapodistrian University (Greece)

Is Europe stuck in its economic ways because the United States protected it from harsh global realities for too long?

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Larry Summers Reloaded
By Stephan Richter, Editor and Publisher, The Globalist

Is it a good idea to make a brilliant man the next U.S. Fed Chairman?

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Speaking Truth to African Power
By Frank Vogl, Co-Founder of Transparancy International

What can be done to reduce rampant corruption with resources revenue in Africa?

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The Coming Global Economic Ice Age?
By Uwe Bott, Principal, Bott Consulting, and Contributing Editor, The Globalist

As investors pull back and commodity prices fall, is a new crisis in emerging markets brewing?

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Global Cooperation Buckling Under Past Successes
By Kevin Young, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Thomas Hale, Oxford University, and David Held, Durham University

In finance and beyond, how is global cooperation failing from its own prior wins?

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Macroeconomic Mercy and German History
By Robert Kuttner, Co-Editor of The American Prospect

Why Germany should show more generosity toward eurozone countries in crisis.

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Trade Secrets and the Return of the 99 Percent
By Marc-William Palen, Lecturer in History, University of Exeter

What are the architects of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreements trying to keep secret?

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Trade Deals Must Allow for Regulating Finance
By Kevin P. Gallagher, Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Instead of pushing for cross-border financial deregulation, the United States should learn from other nations’ safeguards.

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The Democratization of Banking
By Robert J. Shiller, Economist, Yale University

Do we need to repeat the 19th-century savings bank movement for the 21st century?

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Don’t Pity the Poor JPMorgan Shareholder
By Richard Phillips, Senior Index Analyst, S-Network Global Indexes

Accountability has to be the key underpinning of modern capitalism.

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The Problem With Billionaires
By Bill Humphrey, Assistant Editor, The Globalist

A different case for higher U.S. taxes on the ultra-rich.

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CEO Pay: A Swiss Rebellion
By Beat Guldimann, President of Tribeca Consulting Group, and Stephan Richter, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of The Globalist

What will be the ramifications of a Swiss referendum on executive compensation?

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The U.S. Abandons the World’s Poor at the WTO
By Kevin P. Gallagher, Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Does allowing India and other poor countries to help farmers and consumers really distort global markets?

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What’s Next for the WTO?
By Lori Wallach, Director, and Ben Beachy, Research Director, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch

To reform the WTO, the director-general can take a cue from his home nation, Brazil.