The City (or Council) Manager--a career professional who handles budget, personnel, and implementation, leaving political matters to elected officials--has been adopted in more than a score of cities in LAC. City managers are found in more than 2,000 U.S. cities, making it the most widely used...

Historically, government in the Latin America and Caribbean Region has been highly centralized. In the past decade, a few countries have legislated devolution and sharing of important responsibilities to subnational governments, and, currently, most countries are either implementing that...

Many economists advocate the use of tradable water rights as the most efficient system for allocating scarce water resources among alternative economic uses. According to this view, a private market in tradable water rights would maximize the economic value of the resource; would help to reduce...

Urbanization is transforming the developing world. However, understanding the pace, scale, and form of urbanization has been limited by a lack of consistent data. East Asia’s Changing Urban Landscape aims to address this problem by using satellite imagery and other data to measure urban...

Broad-based commodity price declines occurred in the second half of 2014. Crude oil prices declined the most, down 55 percent to $47 per bbl (barrel) in early January, from a high of $115 per bbl in late-June 2014, bringing an end to a four-year period of high and stable prices. The oil price...

The World Bank Group (also known as the “Bank Group”) is the largest anti-poverty institution in the world, offering loans, advice, knowledge, and an array of customized resources to more than 100 developing countries and countries in transition. Established in 1944 and headquartered in...