Poor governance and lack of state capabilities in around 45 countries pose a threat to global security and development. The involvement of the international community is required to help these states break out of their low-development.high-conflict traps.

This paper explores the implications of climate change for industrial policy (IP). Five implications are discussed, namely the need for international coordination of IPs; for putting human development, and not emission targets, as the overriding objective of low-carbon IP; of stimulating...

New challenges and emerging paradigms have turned industrialization and industrial policy into one of the most hotly debated and interesting issues of the early twenty-first century. Both the role of manufacturing in economic development and the contribut

In this working paper we provide an overview of two recent special journal issues on violent conflict and entrepreneurship. These are the special issue of the Journal of Small Business and Entrepreneurship (2011) and the special issue of the Journal of Co

Population density gradients for South Africa’s cities are quite small in absolute value, indicating a relatively flat population distribution across the cities. In contrast employment is less flatly distributed than the population. The relationship between employment densities and distance...

Building on a Lewis-type model of structural change and entrepreneurship we show how a global economic crisis consisting of a financial and a trade shock can undermine structural change in developing countries via the start-up and innovation activities of

The global economic crisis, which erupted about one year ago with the US sub-prime mortgage crisis and the collapse of the investment bank Lehman Brothers, painfully reminds us on how vulnerable developing countries can be to external shocks.This short paper provides an overview of recent...

It is often claimed that entrepreneurship is indispensable for economic growth and development. These claims are mostly generated by scholars working in the field of entrepreneurship andmanagement studies. In contrast, development economics scholars seem to be less concerned about...

Improved governance and lower start-up costs may not be sufficient for encouraging the type of entrepreneurship that matters for economic growth. Using panel data on 60 countries spanning the period 2003-07 this paper establishes that (i) opportunity-motivated entrepreneurship (as opposed to...

The success of new start-up firms often depends on timing. It is valuable for the potential entrepreneur to wait for the right moment before starting a new firm. In this paper we provide a theoretical model to determine the optimal time for starting a new firm. We integrate insights from the...