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"This paper presents a game theory model of the strategic interaction between Khartoum and Juba leading up to the referendum on Sudan's partition in 2011. The findings show that excessive militarization and brinksmanship is a rational response for both actors, neither of which can credibly commit to lower levels of military spending under the current status quo. This militarization is often at the expense of health and education expenditures, suggesting that the opportunity cost of militarization is foregone economic development. These credibility issues might be resolved by democratization, increased transparency, reduction of information asymmetries, and efforts to promote economic and political cooperation. The paper explores these devices, demonstrating how they can contribute to Pareto preferred outcomes in equilibrium. The authors characterize the military expenditure associated with the commitment problem experienced by both sides, estimate its costs from data for Sudan, and identify the opportunity cost of foregone development implied by continued, excessive, and unsustainable militarization. "--World Bank web site ; Ibrahim Elbadawi; Gary Milante; Costantino Pischedda

Droughts, it appears, both acted as a trigger to the adoption of structural reforms in some countries and aggravated the initial adverse effects (including environmental effects) of such reforms. The policy implication of the latter finding is that the reform requirement for drought-prone countries needs to be more flexible to climate conditions, and that in some countries reform of land tenure population policy and research and extension policy need to accompany reform of trade and pricing policies. (DSE/DÜI)

In the two to five years immediately following end of conflicts, UN peacekeeping operations have succeeded in maintaining peace, while income and consumption growth rates have been higher than normal and recovery on key education and health indicators has been possible. Aid also has been super-effective in promoting recovery, not only by financing physical infrastructure but also by helping in the monetary reconstruction of postconflict economies. However, sustaining these short-term gains was met with two difficult challenges. First, long-term sustainability of peace and growth hinges primarily on the ability of postconflict societies to develop institutions for the delivery of public goods, which, in turn, depends on the capacity of post-conflict elites to overcome an entrenched culture of political fragmentation and form stable national coalitions, beyond their immediate ethnic or regional power bases. Second, after catch-up growth runs its course, high levels of aid could lead to overvalued real currencies, at a time when growth requires a competitive exchange rate and economic diversification. Successful peace-building would, therefore, require that these political and economic imperatives of postconflict transitions be accounted for in the design of UN peacekeeping operations as well as the aid regime.

Political culture and the crisis of democracy in the Arab world / Abdelwahab el-Affendi -- Explaining the Arab democracy deficit : the role of oil and conflicts / Ibrahim Elbadawi, Samir Makdisi and Gary Milante -- Jordan : propellers of atuocracy : the Arab-Israeli conflict and foreign power interventions / Taher Kanaan and Joseph Massad -- Lebanon : the constrained democracy and its national impact / Samir Makdisi, Fadia Kiwan and Marcus Marktanner -- Syria : the underpinnings of autocracy : conflict, oil and the curtailment of economic freedom / Raed Safadi, Laura Munro and Radwan Ziadeh -- The Gulf region : beyond oil and wars : the role of history and geopolitics in explaining autocracy / Sami Atallah -- Algeria : democracy and development under the aegis of the 'authoritarian bargain' / Belkacem Laabas and Ammar Bouhouche -- Iraq : understanding autocracy : oil and conflict in a historical and socio-political context / Bassam Yousif and Eric Davis -- Egypt : development, liberalization and the persistence of autocracy / Gouda Abdel-Khalek and Mustapha K. Al Sayyid -- Sudan : colonial heritage, social polarization and the democracy deficit / Ali Abdel Gadir Ali and Atta el-Battahani -- The democracy deficit in the Arab world : an interpretive synthesis / Ibrahim Elbadawi and Samir Makdisi

"Despite notable socio-economic development in the Arab region, a deficit in democracy and political rights has continued to prevail. This book examines the major reasons underlying the persistence of this democracy deficit over the past decades and touches on the prospects for deepening the process of democratization in the Arab World. Contributions from major scholars in the region give a cross country analysis of economic development, political institutions and social factors, and the impact of oil wealth and regional wars, and present a model for democracy in the Arab world. Case studies are drawn from Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Sudan and the Gulf region, building on these cross-country analyses and probing beyond the modelʹs main global variables. Looking beyond the effect of oil and conflicts, the chapters illustrate how specific socio-political history of the country concerned, fear of fundamentalist groups, collusion with foreign powers and foreign interventions, and the co-option of the elites by the state contribute to these problems of democratization"--Provided by publisher.