Transnational Bodies

World Bank Funds "Climate-Smart" Agriculture in Bangladesh

May 24, 2018

Illustrating the World Bank's embrace of the global climate agenda as a viable path toward achieving development, the institution recently announced the launch of a Climate-Smart Agriculture Country Profile and the Climate Smart Investment Plan for Bangladesh, pushing the country to take into account threats from global warming in its agricultural policies.
OECD: Tax Savings to Reduce Inequality

May 22, 2018

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has issued two reports calling on governments to improve their taxation of household savings and wealth with the aim of reducing economic inequality, identifying taxation as "among the most effective tools governments have for reducing inequalities and bringing about more inclusive growth."
NAM Countries Push for "Fairer" Global Governance

May 21, 2018

At a recent ministerial conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), a group based in neutrality during the Cold War that now includes 120 countries, adopted a declaration calling for a "fair, inclusive, transparent and effective system of global governance" and an "indivisible" approach to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
World Bank Explains Finance of Anti-Pollution Projects

May 18, 2018

The World Bank has published a brief explaining how it has provided billions of dollars in funding for "pollution management and environmental health totals," including projects aimed at "climate change mitigation," as part of the institution's growing focus on the environmental agenda in its development activities.
World Bank Touts Focus on Biodiversity

May 18, 2018

A press release from the World Bank highlights the development institution's embrace of the global environmental agenda by explaining its extensive role in funding "biodiversity conservation and sustainable use" and its application of a "safeguards policy" requiring its managers to consider biodiversity in all investment projects.
World Bank Prioritizes "Social Safety Nets" in Combating Inequality

May 16, 2018

A recent report from the World Bank lauds "social safety nets," including cash transfer programs and social pensions, as important tools in limiting poverty and economic inequality and pushes for more cooperation with international development organizations to reduce "gaps" in these programs.
Rieff: ICC and R2P Are "Unworkable" for Current World

May 15, 2018

Author David Rieff illustrates the sustained ebb in the legitimacy of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the "responsibility to protect" (R2P) doctrine as a microcosm of a broader global trend in which regimes such as China and Russia, and "populist" Western governments, disregard the human rights movement and move toward authoritarianism.
OSCE Official Demands Policing Reform in US

May 09, 2018

Responding to a police shooting in California in March, Chair of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly’s human rights committee Ignacio Sanchez Amor called on US officials to ensure greater accountability and to introduce "policing reform" to address "systemic problems within US law enforcement" involving the regularity of officers' use of lethal force.
World Bank Funds "Climate Resilience" of Jamaican Fishing

May 08, 2018

A new grant from the World Bank to Jamaica aimed at helping the country's fisheries sector become more "climate-resilient" shows how the development institution is increasingly embracing the UN's climate agenda in its financing decisions through its Strategic Climate Fund.
World Bank Sets up Audit of Business Regulation Rankings

May 08, 2018

The World Bank has announced that it has commissioned an independent external audit of the ranking of Chile in the organization's Doing Business report, following media reports that the country's fall in the annual report's ranking on ease of setting up and running a business was motivated by politics.