The effects of public policies on social and economic outcomes depend on some fundamental state capacities, such as the ability to commit to a policy course; the ability to adjust policies when circumstances change; and the ability to coordinate, enforce, and implement policies. In a democratic...

This paper discusses coordination failures, their relevance to developing countries, and the circumstances under which they occur, arguing that that clusters can be seen as agglomerations of firms and organizations in related economic activities among which coordination failures are likely to...

We study the causes of low growth in El Salvador, a country with an impressive record of political, macroeconomic, and structural reform. We apply a growth diagnostic methodology and conclude that market failures in the process of self-discovering" the country´s productive potential is a main...

This paper provides an overview of the results of a project that evaluates the distributive impact of privatization in four Latin America countries. The aim of the project was to estimate the effects of privatization on customers and workers, based on existing household and employment surveys....

The authors investigate whether micro-simulation techniques can shed light on the types of policies that should be adopted by countries wishing to meet their Millennium Development Goals. They compare two families of micro-simulations. The first family of micro-simulations decomposes required...