Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
October 7th marked the 99th day of implementation of the World Bank's revised Policy on Access to Information. Civil society and the World Bank convened to both celebrate the milestone as well as critically analyze the gaps and difficulties of the disclosure...
Posted October 14, 2010 | 17:52:23 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
On Wednesday, October 6, the opening of the Civil Society Policy Forum of the World Bank/IMF Annual Meetings, economist and Columbia University professor Jeffrey Sachs spoke on a panel, "New Issues and Opportunities in Resource-based Development." Sachs, director of Columbia's Earth Institute, addressed resource-based investments in...
Posted October 11, 2010 | 14:35:51 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
On Friday, October 8, civil society organizations convened at the World Bank for a panel discussion entitled, "Energy: Poverty, Sustainability and Climate Change." The event was part of the Civil Society Policy Forum of this year's World Bank/IMF Annual Meetings, held in Washington, DC.
The...
Posted May 3, 2010 | 14:44:55 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
On Saturday, April 24th, the Bank Information Center, with the input and endorsement of a coalition of several international NGOs, presented the World Bank with a "Model Energy Strategy" as an alternative to the Bank's current approach to energy lending. An expert...
Posted March 11, 2010 | 14:15:42 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
On Friday, March 5th, the World Bank convened a multi-stakeholder consultation in Washington, DC as part of a review of their Energy Strategy. More than one hundred participants from civil society, private sector, the World Bank and various international organizations attended the consultation as part of...
Posted October 28, 2009 | 19:35:35 (EST)
On Monday, October 5, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) launched the first of several civil society consultations regarding the review and update of their Policy and Performance Standards on Social and Environmental Sustainability during the World Bank/IMF Annual Meetings in Istanbul. These standards govern how communities and the environment are...
Posted July 30, 2009 | 16:42:41 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
Though the World Bank is consistently entangled in a game of tug-of-war with competing interests, accountability, human rights and development outcomes must never be sacrificed in the name of expediency. That said, the Bank's current struggle within its Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) illustrates the difficulty...
Posted June 23, 2009 | 18:49:00 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
Who would have imagined that transparency, participation and collaboration would be stated goals of any official U.S. government (USG) policy -- and not just in a rhetorical manner, but rather as an invitation for constructive engagement with American citizenry? The World Bank (WB), currently reviewing its...
Posted May 5, 2009 | 15:45:05 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
The Bank Information Center, along with several other civil society representatives from across the globe, participated in the Washington, DC round of consultations on the World Bank's Policy on Disclosure of Information as part of the 2009 Spring Meetings of the World Bank and IMF. The...
Posted April 20, 2009 | 12:47:40 (EST)
Co-authored by Rebecca Harris
In the aftermath of the market meltdown and the hindsight appraisal of the opaque, intricate proceedings of Wall Street and the resulting sub-prime racket that obstructed the deadly iceberg from the sights of the investing public until it was far too late to reverse course, the...
Posted October 18, 2010 | 17:46:52 (EST)