This paper analyzes power utilities in 15 jurisdictions to understand the determinants of success for reforms aimed at improving financial viability and cost recovery in the power sector and the impacts of these reforms on metrics of sector performance. The analysis finds that electricity...

Some 25 years have elapsed since international financial institutions espoused a package of power sector reform measures that became known as the Washington Consensus. This package encompassed the establishment of autonomous regulatory entities, the vertical and horizontal unbundling of...

The last few years have seen a growing commitment worldwide to universal health coverage (UHC). Yet there is a lack of clarity on how to measure progress towards UHC. This paper proposes a 'mashup' index that captures both aspects of UHC: that everyone-irrespective of their ability-to-pay-gets...

This report is an output of the Better Regulation for Growth Program between the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and IC, the Investment Climate Advisory Services of the World Bank Group. The reports identifies a set of minimum...

The purpose of this report is to introduce and present key components of the regulatory governance agenda, and to discuss its relevance for developing countries. The paper identifies failings and knowledge gaps relevant to the implementation of regulatory governance initiatives, and it discusses...

Over the last few years the Standard Cost Model (SCM) has become the regulatory reform tool of choice in European Union (EU) and Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries for identifying and reducing regulatory compliance costs. SCM provides a relatively simple...

What major insights have emerged from development economics in the past decade, and how do they matter for the World Bank? This challenging question was recently posed by World Bank Group President David Malpass to the staff of the Development Research Group. This paper assembles a set of 13...