Economic Gangsters in the Blogosphere
A number of bloggers have picked up on Economic Gangsters, including Tukopamoja, Prof. Michael Veseth (of the University of Puget Sound), and filmmaker Ted Hope. They have added some great insights and new takes on Economic Gangsters, and the broader problems of corruption and violence. (Justin Wolfers at the Freakonomics blog at New York Times also gave his perspective on the book earlier).
One of our favorite parts of Tukopamoja’s post was the following snippet, a true story from his fieldwork in Africa:
“Eight years ago, as I crossed the Uganda-Kenya border, I was sequestered in a shack, interrogated, threatened with prison, and ultimately required to pay a bribe by border guards. After that harrowing experience, I returned to my hotel and recounted the story to the first friendly face I saw: my sympathetic colleague Ted Miguel. Ted and his colleague Ray spent the succeeding years studying violence and corruption in poor countries; and this sweet book is the latest fruit of those labors.”
He goes on to write:
“This book won’t just show you that economists can be clever (although it will show you that): It shows that economics, cleverly applied, can illuminate some of the most intractable development problems of our time. I strongly recommend it.”
Thanks, T.!
– Ray and Ted
Hi Ray and Ted,
Good to see this subject explored. Our work began with my colleague’s paper which he delivered to President Clinton’s re-election committee. In the same week, 5 years before 9/11 it warned of the terrorism risk of leaving multitudes in poverty.
It also described ideas for digital and economic inclusion which have since been embraced as social business and creative capitalism. A year later , it was “blogged” as an “idea virus” on the web.
He’d gone on to Russia to leverage a bottom up development initiative and microfinance bank, and had run ins with FSB and corrupt government, including drugging and short term incarceration.
We’ve been working on leveraging social enterprise in Ukraine since 2002, delivering 3 papers based upon swords to ploughshares strategy to the Senate Foreign relations Committee over the last 6 years.
A lot of our activism, and needless to say reaction to it was conducted through the web, but we’re pleased to see progress in Ukraine and what we see as a firm US response in the launch of the East Europe Foundation at Davos.
Most of this stuff will be found on my website link, but this document in particular may be of interest with regard to tensions in Eastern Europe this year. An interview with a diaspora leader about an obstructed strategy for peace broking economic development.
http://www.iccrimea.org/scholarly/economicdev.html
Jeff Mowatt
Thanks Jeff, this is really cool stuff. We appreciate you pointing us to your website and we look forward to checking it out.
– Ted
Ted and Ray,
This may amuse. The suspect is alleged to be an economic hit man in the guise of a peace foundation. More interesting is the dialogue about TNK-BP that follows:
http://eng.maidanua.org/node/295
Then it gets better (or worse) as the use of bearer instruments raises concerns.
http://www.mw.ua/1000/1550/62947/
Jeff