Governments face growing contingent liabilities from disasters as they tend to shoulder a significant share of disaster response and recovery costs. Disaster shocks increase government expenditure and hamper economic activities. An increasing number of countries are developing financial...

China has long known more than its fair share of disasters, including earthquakes, typhoons, floods, and droughts. The good news is that in recent decades, the country has made tremendous headway in building its resilience to disasters. Learning from these efforts will be critical to...

How does law change society? In the rational actor model, law affects behavior only by changing incentives and information-the command and coordination function of law. Under the view that humans are social animals, law is also a guidepost for social norms that regulate behavior-the expressive...

Namibia should be congratulated on their forward looking and energetic public sector because of the strategic vision of the leadership, as could be observed in the Ministry of Home Affairs and Immigration (MHAI). MHAI is responsible for the technical and organizational infrastructureused to...

Integrated civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) and identity management systems (IDMS) provide a critical basis for identity management and the establishment of personal identity. When developed in an integrated matter, these systems can provide major savings in terms of time and...

This study finds that natural shocks-storms in particular-are a significant and often leading cause for power supply disruptions. This finding is based on 20 years of high frequency (i.e. daily) data on power outages and climate variables in 28 countries-Bangladesh, the United States and 26...

This review examines the literature on the role of infrastructure in determining the productivity and competitiveness of firms. It shows that the existing evidence base is clear in concluding that reliable and high-quality infrastructure is a crucial foundation for enabling businesses to thrive....

Transport corridors can generate wider economic benefits and costs through their effects on a potentially diverse set of development outcomes, such as economic growth, poverty, jobs, equity, environmental quality, and economic resilience. To advance understanding of how corridors could generate...

In June 2015, about 53,000 people were affected by unusually severe floods in the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area, Ghana. The real impact of such a disaster is a product of exposure ("Who was affected?"), vulnerability ("How much did the affected households lose?"), and socioeconomic resilience...

Disruption of infrastructure services can cause significant social and economic losses, particularly in the event of a natural disaster. The World Bank Group and the Government of Japan established the Quality Infrastructure Investment Partnership to focus attention on the quality dimensions of...