Development Decision-Making and the Content of International Development Law

International development law deals with the rights and duties of states and other actors in the development process. As the consensus view of the development process disintegrated during the 1970s and 1980s, the agreement on the content of international development law also began to break down. Today there are two competing idealized views of development. The first, the traditional view, maintains that development is about economic growth, which can be distinguished from other social, cultural, environmental, and political development issues in society. The second, the modern view, maintains that development is an integrated process of change involving intertwined economic, social, cultural, political, and environmental dimensions. These two views of development lead to different perceptions of the substantiw content of development law, of the importance of sovereignty, and of the relationship between national and international law in the law applicable to development

Lessons From The NGO Campaign Against The Second Review Of The World Bank Inspection Panel: A Participant\u27s Perspective

This case study of the Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) campaign against the second review of the World Bank\u27s Inspection Panel is intended as an example of the impact international civil society can have on international financial institutions (IFIs)

Can Parallel Lines Ever Meet? The Strange Case of the International Standards on Sovereign Debt and Business and Human Rights

This special issue is a cooperation of the Yale Journal of International Law and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). It emerged from UNCTAD’s work on sovereign debt workouts, specifically from its Working Group on a Sovereign Debt Workout Mechanism (2013 to 2015). The working group developed a Roadmap and Guide for Sovereign Debt Workouts, published in 2015. It proposes an incremental approach to sovereign debt workouts that relies on the continuous, progressive development of sovereign debt restructuring practice. This work has inspired the adoption of Basic Principles for Sovereign Debt Restructuring by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015. The special issue assembles papers that elaborate, reflect on, and critically scrutinize the incremental approach to sovereign debt restructuring. As the political momentum that would be necessary to adopt an international treaty governing sovereign debt workouts is currently lacking, the incremental approach explores the possibility of further developing current practice in line with legal principles that have emerged from progressive developments in debt restructuring practice in reaction to the crises of the last decades

Reconciliation Financing: An Innovative Approach to Poverty, Inequality, and Social Conflict

This paper focuses on the problem of addressing historical injustices and raising finance for small scale revenue generating projects that benefit those victims of these past injustices who still lack access to jobs, services and opportunities. These projects always experience funding problems. They are considered both too rich for grant funding because they generate a stream of revenues but too poor for commercial funding because either they are too small or they generate an insufficient income stream to be attractive to commercial funders. In proposing a debt-based solution to these funding problems, the paper proposes 3 principles of reconciliation financing

Differing Conceptions of Development and the Content of International Development Law

International development law is the branch of international law that deals with the rights and duties of states and other actors in the development process. Its original content was premised on a particular generally accepted understanding of development. Under the pressure of the problems of development that arose during the 1970s and 1980s, this general agreement on the key issues in development disintegrated. As a consequence, the consensus on the content of international development law also began to break down. Today, there are competing idealized views of development that shape the current debate about both development, and the content of international development law. The first view, which can be termed the traditional view, maintains that development is about economic growth. It argues that the challenges of economic development can be distinguished from other social, cultural, environmental and political issues in society, including human rights. The second view, which can be termed the modern view has a holistic understanding of development. It argues that development should be viewed as an integrated process of change that involves economic, social, cultural, political and environmental dimensions. Each of these views leads to a different understanding of the contents of international development law. The traditional and modern views of international development law differ in their understanding of the substantive content of development law, the importance they attach to the principle of sovereignty and in their view of the relationship between national and international law in the law applicable to the development process

Assessing the Potential for Global Economic Governance Reform

Every dynamic social system’s adaptive capacity is finite. Eventually, the ability of the system’s legal and institutional arrangements to adapt to the changing operational context is exhausted. At this point, unless the system is significantly reformed, it begins losing its legitimacy and efficacy.This article contends that the structure, operation and scale of the global economy has changed so dramatically that the current arrangements for global economic governance are approaching this crisis moment. They are failing to deliver an inclusive, sustainable and efficient international economic system that can contribute to peace, prosperity and human welfare. Their governance arrangements and operating practices and procedures have not been adequately adapted to the new realities of the international political economy. Key institutions are only slowly adjusting their current decision-making practices to the fact that the balance of economic power among their members has shifted. They have also been slow in responding to the growing importance of such non-state actors as corporations, civil society organizations and subnational governments in the governance of the global economy.The political will to make the necessary changes to the institutional arrangements for global economic governance is lacking. This means that in the short to medium term, absent a serious crisis, there is limited potential for reform. However, this does not mean that opportunities for meaningful partial reforms do not exist. Those actors that are interested in reform need to carefully seek out those opportunities and, once identified, use them to make the system more participatory, accountable and responsive to the concerns to all stakeholders in the system. This in turn should enhance the capacity of the system to respond productively to future opportunities for more profound changes in global economic governance.In making this case, the article first briefly describes the key features of the order established after World War II. Second, it discusses some of the changes that these institutions have undergone over the past 70 years. Third, it discusses the adjustments that, in fact, have been made in global economic governance. It also indicates some ways in which opportunities for making the system more inclusive, responsive and accountable can be identified. Finally, it offers suggestions regarding possible changes within the current order and on the role entities like the Group of 20 and the BRICS grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa can play in promoting these changes.It should be noted that, due to space limitations, while this article discusses global economic governance in general, it concentrates primarily on the cases of the two most prominent institutions in global economic governance – the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group (the World Bank). The reason for focusing on the IMF is that it is the most significant multilateral institution active in the governance of international financial and monetary affairs. The World Bank is an important funder of development activity even if it is not the largest such lender. It is the model that was used in setting up all of the regional multilateral development banks (MDBs) and it has had an influence on the structure and function of other MDBs. It has also been a thought leader in the area of development finance

The Inspection Panel and International Law

This essay argues that the creation of the Inspection Panel (Panel) was an important international legal development. It was the first time that an international organization established a mechanism that enabled those communities and individuals who claimed they had been harmed by the decisions and actions of the international organization to hold the organization accountable. The creation of the Panel also promoted the role of non-state actors in making the soft international law that is applicable to the international financing of development projects. This essay will discuss each of these developments before drawing some conclusions about the Panel and international law