Albania provides a small amount of social assistance to nearly 20 % of its population through a system that allows a degree of community discretion in determining distribution. This study investigates the poverty targeting of this program. It indicates that relative to other safety net programs...

This study reviews the African Region of the World Bank's current thinking on cost sharing and the poor as apllied in Sub-Saharan Africa. It inventories country experiences and Bank activities in cost sharing for education and health, reviews African experiences with the implementation of cost...

This report assesses the changes in social welfare and policy that have taken place in Poland during the economic transition. It aims to test the main hypotheses concerning changes in the role of the welfare state, workings of the labor market, the distributional consequences of transition, and...

Countries the world over have launched ambitious privatization programs to improve the efficiency of state enterprises, free up resources for social services, and mobilize capital for expansion and modernization. A universal concern in this process is the effect privatization has on labor. Many...

Many developing countries have made dramatic progress in promoting private sector participation in their infrastructure sectors, especially with the help of foreign investors. However, this has not been the case in Southern and Eastern Africa, which have been perceived as relatively unattractive...

The Guinea-Bissau Economic Update monitors significant recent economic developments in the country, highlighting the key structural challenges Guinea-Bissau faces in its pursuit of inclusive and sustained growth