Harvard Center for International Development

Since 2013, the Center for International Development has been collaborating with the Government of Albania to identify binding constraints to economic growth and create policy solutions to solve them. CID’s Growth Lab and Building State Capability programs have used the tools of growth diagnostics and problem driven iterative adaptation (PDIA) to help drive economic growth in the country. CID Researchers Ermal Frasheri and Tim McNaught have seen firsthand how theory informs public policy and how insights from public policymaking, in turn, enrich our theoretical frameworks. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Jason Keene, student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Ermal and Tim, who give an overarching perspective on the project, addressing questions such as: where did we start, where are we now, and what is our approach to country projects? Learn more about the project: https://albania.growthlab.cid.harvard.edu/ Interview recorded on May 3, 2019. About Ermal Frasheri: Ermal Frasheri joined the Center for International Development's Growth Lab as a Research Fellow in 2014. Ermal finished his doctoral studies, S.J.D, at Harvard Law School, where he worked in the areas of law and economic development, international law, European integration, and social and political theories. He has written papers on legal reform and comparative law, European Union, financial services, international law, and his dissertation examined the relationship between regional integration in the context of European integration and development strategies. Ermal has taught at Harvard in various roles since 2006 in the fields of political and social theories, European integration and EU law, democracy, international institutions, and sociology. He was awarded a teaching excellence award by Harvard, and was appointed a Byse Fellow at Harvard Law School (fall 207) where he taught a series of workshops on Law and Development. He has also taught International Law at Babson College, and European Union law at New England Law – Boston. Currently, Ermal teaches courses on Law and Corruption, and International Law and Migration at the Sturm College of Law, University of Denver. About Tim McNaught: Tim McNaught joined CID's Building State Capability program as a Fellow in 2016, focusing primarily on engagements with the governments of Sri Lanka and Albania. He currently is working on the Building PFM Capabilities in Africa program. Prior to joining CID, he worked as an economist for the Ministry of Finance in Timor-Leste, specializing in fiscal policy. He developed his strong interest in economic development while serving as a United States Peace Corps Volunteer in Azerbaijan. Tim holds a Master in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) from the Harvard Kennedy School and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Miami. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-Public%20Policy%20in%20Action.pdf

The Other Slavery examines the system of bondage that targeted Native Americans, a system that was every bit as terrible, degrading, and vast as African slavery. Anywhere between 2.5 and 5 million Native Americans may have been enslaved throughout the hemisphere in the centuries between the arrival of Columbus and the beginning of the 20th century. And, interestingly, in contrast to African slavery which targeted mostly adult males, the majority of these Indian slaves were women and children. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Anna Mysliewic, student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Andres Resendez, author of The Other Slavery and Professor of History at UCDavis. Purchase the book: https://amzn.to/2WBpzNr Interview recorded on April 26, 2019. About Andrés Reséndez: Andrés Reséndez is a professor of history and author. His specialties are early European exploration and colonization of the Americas, the U.S-Mexico border region, and the early history of the Pacific Ocean. His latest book, The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016), was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award and winner of the 2017 California Book Awards in nonfiction and the 2017 Bancroft Prize from Columbia University. He teaches courses on food and history, Latin America, and Mexico. He is currently working on a new book provisionally titled Conquering the Pacific: The Story of How a Mulatto Pilot and a Friar-Mariner Learned to Navigate the Largest Ocean and Launched our Global World. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-The%20Other%20Slavery.pdf

Environmental degradation reduces the environmental capacity to meet social and ecological needs of societies, which is exacerbated by natural hazards and extreme climate events, and often intensify existing vulnerabilities. Marginalized groups in cities, particularly women and poor, are disproportionately at risk to face negative consequences of such environmental stressors. To better understand relationship between women empowerment and environmental degradation in cities, researchers Ammar Malik and Amit Patel surveyed 1,199 households in 12 informal settlements of New Delhi (India), Dhaka (Bangladesh), and Islamabad and Lahore (Pakistan). Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Ghazi Mirza, student at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, interviews Ammar Malik and Amit Patel, who tested several linkages between empowerment and measures of environmental degradation and found many significant associations. Read the policy brief: https://bit.ly/2vY8Qos Interview recorded on April 19, 2019. About Ammar Malik: Ammar A. Malik is the Director of EPoD Research. He leads research-policy engagements that derive actionable policy insights from rigorous research. He oversees EPoD’s labor market and education research portfolios in the Middle East, identifying and supporting opportunities for data and economic analysis to inform local policies that empower underrepresented groups and support social and economic development. About Amit Patel: Amit Patel, PhD: Amit Patel is Assistant Professor at University of Massachusetts Boston’s McCormack Graduate School for Policy and Global Studies. Amit’s research focuses on bottom-up approaches to improve socio-economic outcomes for urban poor. His main research projects funded by the National Science Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Urban Institute, and the World Bank focus on housing and health disparities concerning urban poor living in slums in the Global South. He regularly teaches courses on public policy theories, urban politics and policies, and advanced quantitative methods. Amit has a PhD in public policy from George Mason University and prior training in management, urban and regional planning, and architecture. When he is not in the field or in front of the computer, you will find him behind the camera. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-Empowering%20Women%20in%20South%20Asia.pdf

The majority of the world’s 450 million smallholder farmers and the 2 billion people who depend on them live in rural villages in developing countries, growing crops at close to subsistence levels to feed their families. Small changes in agricultural practices can substantially improve productivity and profitability, but farmers continue to lack the advice they need to close the yield gap and maximize their incomes. However, mobile phone ownership and access to mobile phones are increasing in developing countries, presenting a huge opportunity to provide digital agricultural advisory services. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Jason Keene, student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Jonathan Lehe, Director of New Programs at Precision Agriculture for Development, who discusses how PAD is working to improve the lives of farmers in developing countries. www.hks.harvard.edu/centers/cid Interview recorded on April 5, 2019. About Jonathan Lehe: Jonathan Lehe is PAD's Global Research Manager. Mr. Lehe holds a Masters in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) from the Harvard Kennedy School. He has more than 10 years of experience in the global health and education sectors, managing research projects and implementation of programs to scale up access to critical public services in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. He has previously worked at the Clinton Health Access Initiative, and consulted for the World Bank, Bridge International Academies, and MIT's Jameel Poverty Action Lab. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-Improving%20Smallholder%20Farmers.pdf

The Building State Capability (BSC) program at CID uses the Problem Driven Iterative Adaptation (PDIA) approach to help organizations develop the capability to solve complex problems and to implement public policies. PDIA is a process of facilitated emergence, which focuses on problems (not solutions) and follows a step by step process (not a rigid plan) that allows for flexible learning and adaptation. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Anna Mysliewic, student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Salimah, who discusses the challenges and experiences BSC has faced when implementing PDIA in the field. Salimah draws on examples from BSC’s work in Albania and Sri Lanka, as well as the recent launch of the PDIAToolkit, a Do-it-Yourself kit for teams to use when solving complex problems. To learn more about PDIA: bsc.cid.harvard.edu Download the PDIAToolkit (in English and Spanish): bsc.cid.harvard.edu/PDIAtoolkit Interview recorded on March 1, 2019. About Salimah Samji: Salimah Samji is the Director of Building State Capability (BSC). She has more than 15 years of experience working in international development on the delivery of public services, transparency and accountability, strategic planning, monitoring, evaluation and learning. She joined CID in 2012 to help create the BSC program. Today, she is responsible for providing vision, strategic leadership, oversight and managing projects and research initiatives. Salimah also leads BSC’s work on digital learning. Before joining CID, she was an independent consultant working for the World Bank on issues of governance, and the Hewlett Foundation on strategic planning for one of their grantees. She has worked as a senior program manager at Google.org, leading a transparency and accountability initiative focused on empowering citizens and decision-makers, by making information on service delivery outcomes publicly available. Salimah has also worked at the World Bank as a social/rural development and monitoring and evaluation specialist in South Asia. She has a Bachelor of Mathematics from the University of Waterloo (Canada) and a Masters in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) from the Harvard Kennedy School. She is a qualified Casualty Actuary who changed careers after working for 18 months in Afghan refugee camps with a Canadian NGO (FOCUS Humanitarian Assistance) based in Pakistan. Salimah has worked and lived in Kenya, India, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Canada and the USA. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-PDIA%20in%20action.pdf

At a time when 65 million people are displaced from their homes and more than 800 million people go to bed hungry every night, how can we make a real difference in tackling poverty & social injustices? Fatema Sumar has been a diplomat and development leader, working in the U.S. Senate, the U.S. State Department, and the Millennium Challenge Corporation. Currently, Fatema is Vice President of Global Programs at Oxfam America, a division that focuses on humanitarian aid and response, local partnerships that improve disaster response, and food systems and security. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Ghazi Mirza, student at the Harvard Graduate School of Educaton, interviews Fatema, who gives us an in-depth look into her role at Oxfam America, the organization’s approach to development, and what they’re currently focused on in the development space. www.hks.harvard.edu/centers/cid Interview recorded on March 29, 2019. About Fatema Sumar: Fatema Z. Sumar joined Oxfam America in 2018 as Vice President of Global Programs, where she oversees our regional development and humanitarian response programs. Fatema comes to Oxfam with a distinguished career in the U.S. government, leading U.S. efforts to advance sustainable development and economic policy in emerging markets and fragile countries. Most recently, she served as Regional Deputy Vice President for Europe, Asia, Pacific, and Latin America at the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), where she managed investments focused on international growth and poverty reduction. Prior to MCC, she served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asia at the U.S. Department of State and as a Senior Professional Staff Member on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Fatema holds a Master’s in Public Affairs from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and a Bachelor of Arts in Government from Cornell University. She studied abroad at the American University in Cairo. View the transcript for the episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-%20Tackling%20Poverty%20Through%20Diplomacy%20and%20Development.pdf

Between 1999 and 2009, Jordan experienced a huge growth acceleration, tripling its exports and increasing income per capita by 38%. Since then, its economy has been thrown off balance, impacted by a number of external shocks that include the global financial crisis, the Arab Spring, and the Syrian Civil War. For the past year, CID has been working in the country with the goal of understanding what is hindering income growth per capita and drafting a roadmap to help Jordan get back on a sustainable growth track. This week on CID’s Research Spotlight podcast, we talk to CID fellows and project managers Miguel Angel Santos and Tim O’Brien on the methodologies and findings of this research project. To read the full paper: bit.ly/2FNNBtY Interview recorded on March 18, 2019. About Miguel Angel Santos: Miguel Angel Santos is an Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and the Director of Applied Research at the Center for International Development (CID) at Harvard University. At CID, he has been involved in various research projects aimed at helping governments to rethink their development strategies, both at the national and sub-national levels. Since he joined CID in August 2014, he has been involved in projects at the national level in Mexico, Panama, and Venezuela, and at the sub-national level in Mexico in the states of Chiapas, Baja California, Tabasco and Campeche; and the city of Hermosillo at Sonora state. He has also performed as project manager in the projects leading to the build-up of the Mexican Atlas of Economic Complexity, and the Peruvian Atlas of Economic Complexity. Before joining the field of international development, Miguel worked for ten years in corporate finance and business development in Latin America, performing as Director of Finance for the Cisneros Group of Companies (1997-2003), Head of Corporate Finance for Mercantil Servicios Financieros (2005-2007), and Business Vice-President for Sony Pictures and Entertainment Latin America (2008-2009). At that point, he decided to switch tracks and get involved in development economics. He holds two Master of Science degrees in International Finance and Trade (2011) and Economics (2012) from Universitat Pompeu Fabra, a Master in Public Administration from Harvard University (2014), and a Ph.D. in Economics at Universidad de Barcelona (2016). He was the head of the Macroeconomic Policy Team for presidential candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski in the Venezuelan elections of 2012. About Tim O’Brien: Tim O’Brien joined CID in 2015 and has worked on both Growth Lab and Building State Capability projects. He has led growth diagnostic research in Albania and Sri Lanka. Tim holds a Master in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) degree from the Harvard Kennedy School and a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University. Tim served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Malawi from 2008-2010 and has experience working with the World Bank and in environmental engineering. Tim’s research interests center on the challenges of economic transformation and adapting to climate change in developing countries and vulnerable communities. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-Jordan-elements%20of%20a%20growth%20strategy.pdf

Earlier this year, thousands of Bangladesh garment workers clashed with the police as they tried to push for higher wages. One person was killed as the police fired rubber bullets and tear gas against the protesters. This is unfortunately common throughout low-end supply chains. Governments try to repress laborers in order to curb minimum wage increases and keep costs low. This week Salimah Samji, Director of CID’s Building State Capability Program talks to Alice Evans Lecturer at Kings College London and Associate at the Building State Capability Program on possible solutions to this pressing issue. Read Alice Evans' report on Increasing Pro-Labour Reforms: https://bsc.cid.harvard.edu/publications/incentivising-pro-labour-reforms // www.bsc.cid.harvard.edu // Interview recorded on February 13, 2019. About Alice Evans: Alice Evans is writing a book on "The Global Politics of Decent Work". Through comparative research on strengthening corporate accountability, Alice explores how to resolve global collective action problems and improve workers' rights. She has published on the causes of falling inequality in Latin America; social movements; rising support for gender equality; cities as catalysts of social change; and the politics of maternal mortality. She is a Lecturer at King's College London, with previous appointments at Cambridge and the LSE. View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-Labor%20rights.pdf

Salimah Samji, Building State Capability Program Director talks to Anjikwi Mshelbwala, who took the PDIA online course offered by the Building State Capability Program in the Fall of 2017. Anjikwi, an ICT Officer at ActionAid talks about his experience applying the insights from the program in his native Nigeria and describes how the learnings he got from the course have helped him solve complex development problems ever since. *** - Learn more about CID's Building State Capability Program at: https://bsc.cid.harvard.edu/ - Download the free PDIA toolkit at: https://bsc.cid.harvard.edu/PDIAtoolkit - Download the Building State Capability book at: https://bsc.cid.harvard.edu/building-state-capability-evidence-analysis-action View the transcript for this episode here: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/Transcripts/Transcript-JPDIA%20Alumni%20Solving%20complex.pdf

Over the last eight years, the Syrian Civil War has left millions of people internally displaced and many more have fled the country to protect themselves and their families. This humanitarian crisis has left the region and its people to face incredible challenges in their everyday lives. Andrew Mitchell, British Member of Parliament and former Secretary of State for International Development considers the situation to be a catastrophe from which the international community can learn many lessons on how to support those in the country, as well as refugees throughout the world. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Nawal Qutub, student at the Harvard Graduate School of Educaton, interviews Andrew Mitchell, who discusses the humanitarian crisis in Syria following the Civil War and how the international community can assist with rebuilding the country once peace is restored. // www.growthlab.cid.harvard.edu // Interview recorded on February 22, 2019. About Rt. Hon. Andrew Mitchell: Rt Hon. Andrew Mitchell is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Sutton Coldfield since 2001. He was the MP for Gedling from 1987 to 1997. He served in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for International Development from 2010 to 2012. Mitchell was elected President of the Cambridge Union in 1978. Before university, he served for several months as a United Nations military peacekeeper in Cyprus. He has extensive pre-government experience of the developing world, and is the founder of Project Umubano, a Conservative Party social action project in Rwanda and Sierra Leone in central and west Africa, launched in 2007. Mitchell was returned as MP for Sutton Coldfield at the 2017 general election, with a reduced majority.