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The majority of developing countries in the Global South are evidently rich in natural resources, but paradoxically blighted by excruciating poverty and conflicts. This paradox of deprivation and war in the midst of plenteous resources has been the subject of great debate in international political economy in contemporary history. This book contributes to the debate by examining the underlying structures, actors and contexts of rentier politics and how they often produce and aggravate conflicts in the various extractive economies and regions of the Global South. The book critically explores the theories of rentier economies and natural resource conflicts, as well as the practical ramifications of rentier politics in the Global South with all their resonance for political economy and security in the Global North. Contents: Extractive economies and conflicts in the global South: re-engaging rentier theory and politics, Kenneth Omeje; Rentier politics, extractive economies and conflict in the global South: emerging ramifications and theoretical exploration, Usman A. Tar; Anatomy of an oil insurgency: violence and militants in the Niger delta, Nigeria, Michael Watts; Nationalization versus indigenization of the rentier space: oil and conflicts in Nigeria, Ukoha Ukiwo; Greed or grievance? Diamonds, rent-seeking and the civil war in Sierra Leone (1991-2002), John M. Kabia; Politics and oil in Sudan, Peter Woodward; São Tom nd Príncipe: the troubles of oil in an aid-dependent micro-state, Gerhard Seibert; Rentier politics and low intensity conflicts in the DRC: the case of Kasai and Katange provinces, Germain Tshibambe Ngoie and Kenneth Omeje; Thugs' paradise, agencies' guinea pig and the natural resource intrigue: the civil war in Liberia, T. Debey Sayndee; Resource exploitation, repression and resistance in the Sahara-Sahel: the rise of the rentier state in Algeria, Chad and Niger, Jeremy Keenan; Oil sovereignties in the Mexican Gulf and Nigerian Niger delta, Anna Zalik; Extractive resources and the rentier space: a South American perspective, Julia Buxton; Rentier states and war-making: the United Arab Emirates and Iraq in comparative perspective, Rolf Schwarz; Rethinking the rentier syndrome: oil and resource conflict in the Persian Gulf, Dauda Abubakar; Index. Kenneth Omeje, University of Bradford, UK

This study examines the effect of digital financial inclusion on relative poverty among urban households in China. Based on the data of the China Family Panel Studies and the Peking University Digital Financial Inclusion Index of China, using the weak relative poverty line to identify relative poverty among urban households, we use a probit model, a mediating effect model, and an instrumental variable method to conduct empirical research. The results reveal that digital financial inclusion helps reduce the probability that urban households will fall into relative poverty. Digital financial inclusion not only promotes entrepreneurship by urban households but also increases their participation in the financial market. The increase in their income flow can be translated into an improvement in the stock of wealth, enabling them to avoid falling into relative poverty. But this effect is heterogeneous. Digital investment and digital credit play more important roles than digital payment. It is also more pronounced in households with higher financial literacy and households in smaller cities. In addition, regardless of how the relative poverty line and digital financial inclusion are calculated, our results are robust. The research in this study is important for a comprehensive understanding of the development of digital financial inclusion and urban relative poverty in developing countries such as China.

While World Health Organization member countries embraced the concept of universal coverage as early as 2005, few low-income countries have yet achieved the objective. This is mainly due to numerous barriers that hamper access to needed health services. In this paper we provide an overview of the various dimensions of barriers to access to health care in low-income countries (geographical access, availability, affordability and acceptability) and outline existing interventions designed to overcome these barriers. These barriers and consequent interventions are arranged in an analytical framework, which is then applied to two case studies from Cambodia. The aim is to illustrate the use of the framework in identifying the dimensions of access barriers that have been tackled by the interventions. The findings suggest that a combination of interventions is required to tackle specific access barriers but that their effectiveness can be influenced by contextual factors. It is also necessary to address demand-side and supply-side barriers concurrently. The framework can be used both to identify interventions that effectively address particular access barriers and to analyse why certain interventions fail to tackle specific barriers.

PurposeMicro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) are the backbone of economic development for every economy. They contribute to local economic development through household wealth creation, employment generation and poverty reduction. Despite this pivotal role, MSMEs lack access to finance, and scholarship on the enabling role of financial inclusion on micro, small and medium-sized enterprises' performance is scant. The authors contribute to closing the knowledge gap by examining the enabling effect of financial inclusion on MSMEs using the FinScope MSME 2017 survey for the Kingdom of Eswatini. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned objective.Design/methodology/approachThe study used the re-centered influence function regression framework to estimate unconditional quantile regressions and the generalized ordered logit model to analyze the data.FindingsThe findings from the unconditional quantile regression revealed that small changes in access to bank accounts, saving for business, formal saving, stokvel and informal saving at the 50th and 75th percentiles have a positive and statistically significant effect on microenterprises' annual turnover profit. Conversely, small changes in formal insurance have a mixed effect on annual turnover profit. At the 10th and 25th percentiles, a small increment in insurance reduces annual turnover profit but increases microenterprise annual turnover profit at the 75th percentile. Meanwhile, the evidence from the generalized ordered logit model showed that financial inclusion reduces the likelihood of microenterprises being classified as least developed and increased the chances of microenterprises falling into emerging and developed business categories.Research limitations/implicationsThis study makes use of a cross-sectional survey dataset, as a result, it does not infer causal relationships over the long term, but rather an association between the independent and dependent variables.Practical implicationsOverall, formal and informal financial inclusion enhances the annual turnover profit for microenterprises, particularly at the 50th and 75th percentiles in the Kingdom of Eswatini. The authors recommend a specialized institution such as a micro, small and medium-sized partial credit guarantee scheme to improve the quality and affordability of credit for microenterprises, and a mix of financial and non-financial supports depending on the development stage to boost a sustainable microenterprises' sector.Originality/valueThe study uses two advanced cross-sectional techniques, the recentered influence function framework and the generalized ordered logit model to analyze the data. The paper is original and contributes to the discussion of the role of financial inclusion in enabling microenterprises' success in Africa, using the FinScope 2017 survey of microenterprises in Eswatini as a case study.Peer reviewThe peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-10-2020-0689.

The economics of growth has come a long way since it regained center stage for economists in the mid-1980s. Here for the first time is a series of country studies guided by that research. The thirteen essays, by leading economists, shed light on some of the most important growth puzzles of our time. How did China grow so rapidly despite the absence of full-fledged private property rights? What happened in India after the early 1980s to more than double its growth rate? How did Botswana and Mauritius avoid the problems that other countries in sub--Saharan Africa succumbed to? How did Indonesia manage to grow over three decades despite weak institutions and distorted microeconomic policies and why did it suffer such a collapse after 1997? What emerges from this collective effort is a deeper understanding of the centrality of institutions. Economies that have performed well over the long term owe their success not to geography or trade, but to institutions that have generated market-oriented incentives, protected property rights, and enabled stability. However, these narratives warn against a cookie-cutter approach to institution building. The contributors are Daron Acemoglu, Maite Careaga, Gregory Clark, J. Bradford DeLong, Georges de Menil, William Easterly, Ricardo Hausmann, Simon Johnson, Daniel Kaufmann, Massimo Mastruzzi, Ian W. McLean, Lant Pritchett, Yingyi Qian, James A. Robinson, Devesh Roy, Arvind Subramanian, Alan M. Taylor, Jonathan Temple, Barry R. Weingast, Susan Wolcott, and Diego Zavaleta.

Since the 1990s, global income and wealth inequality has increased significantly, especially in developing countries, where the imbalance in wealth distribution has become increasingly prominent. This study seeks to thoroughly investigate the effects of expansionary monetary policy on income and wealth inequality, using China as a case study and employing extensive household survey microdata for empirical analysis. The findings indicate that expansionary monetary policy has significantly enhanced overall income and wealth levels. However, when considering the extent of wealth growth, it appears that affluent households have benefited more than their low- and middle-income counterparts, thereby widening the wealth gap. In addition, the real estate market boom played an amplifying role in this process, further deepening the impact of monetary policy on wealth inequality. The findings of this paper provide an important empirical basis for understanding the complex relationship between monetary policy and socio-economic inequality, and provide practical references for policymakers to consider the fairness of income and wealth distribution when formulating relevant monetary policies.

Background Substantial out-of-pocket (OOP) expenditures push a large portion of the population below the poverty line, especially those residing in rural areas having low incomes. Individuals from economically disadvantaged states in India incur higher healthcare costs for hospitalization in public health centers than do those from more developed states. Economically poorer households in states such as Bihar and Odisha face significantly higher OOP expenditures for hospitalization in public health centers than do those in economically developed states such as Tamil Nadu. Objective This study aims to compare households by using the wealth index and demographic factors concerning OOP expenditures on medicines for acute and chronic illnesses in Odisha, India. Methodology A cross-sectional household survey was adopted to conduct the research. Access to medicines focused on OOP expenditures in Odisha is being studied by purposively selecting six districts: Rayagada, Kalahandi, Angul, Keonjhar, Khordha, and Kendrapara. A total of 902 households were surveyed. A stratified random sampling procedure was adopted to select the locations and households. The survey took place from October 2021 to February 2022. The sampled respondents were investigated for acute and chronic illnesses. The software SPSS version 25 was used to analyze the data. The details of the expenditures for the past four weeks were compared with those of medicines and healthcare expenses. Households were categorized into wealthy, middle, and poor classes. The prevalence of acute and chronic illnesses was analyzed in light of the share of medicine expenditures to total household expenditures. Results Out of 902 surveyed households, 173 (19.2%) spent out-of-pocket (OOP) money on medicines due to acute and chronic illnesses. Among the studied population, 23.7% were affected by acute illness, whereas 10.9% suffered from chronic illness. Wealthy households constituted most of the OOP expenditure (81 wealthy households), whereas 33 poor households also contributed to the OOP expenditure. According to the unadjusted odds ratio (UOR) analysis, wealthy households were 0.25 times less likely to spend more than 50% of their total monthly household budget on medicine than poor households (UOR = 0.25, 95% CI = 0.09—0.65). Similarly, ST households were 0.18 times less likely to spend more than 50% of their money on medicine from their budgets than SC households (UOR = 0.18, 95% CI = 0.04–0.72). Conclusion The present study again reveals that capital regions (metropolitan regions) are well protected against OOP expenditures on medicines, but tribal areas are still underserved. The odds ratio reveals a critical positive association between high OOP and poor economic status in households in Odisha. That association must be minimized or nullified for equitable economic and social development.

Sustainable tourism is not a static target, but a dynamic process of change, a transition. This book considers how monitoring using indicators can assist tourism to make such a sustainability transition. It encourages the reader to view tourism from a broad, interdisciplinary perspective and draws on material from a wide range of sources. The book explains why monitoring is important for different groups of stakeholders; public and private sector, NGOs and communities. It also examines important monitoring considerations such as what and where to measure, how much will monitoring cost and how the data can be presented. The book puts particular emphasis on indicator use and implementation. It highlights the process and techniques to develop and use indicators and then provides clear and detailed examples of monitoring in practice around the globe at different geographic scales.

High-resolution income data is crucial for informing policy decisions as it allows policymakers to better understand the distribution of wealth and poverty. However, obtaining this information is often cost-prohibitive, especially in developing countries. We evaluate the potential of using high-resolution satellite imagery and machine learning techniques to create income maps with a high level of geographic detail. We train a neural network with satellite images from the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires (Argentina) and 2010 census data to estimate per capita income at a 50x50 meter resolution for 2013, 2018 and 2022. The model, based on the EfficientNetV2 architecture, demonstrates strong predictive accuracy for household incomes ( R 2 = 0.878), achieving a spatial resolution over 20 times finer than existing methods in the literature. The model also allows estimating income maps for arbitrary images, and can therefore be applied at any point in time. Our approach opens up new possibilities for generating highly detailed data, which can be used to assess public policies at a local level, target social programs more effectively, and address information gaps in areas where traditional data collection methods are lacking.

Previous research on the role of commute duration in subjective well-being (SWB) has paid little attention to developing countries and the possible pathways determining the relationship between them. In this study, we construct a conceptual framework, identifying the possible pathways through which commute duration may affect SWB. Next, we empirically analyse some of these pathways in the context of urban China. We find that although the direct effects of commute duration on life satisfaction and emotional well-being are insignificant, prolonged commute duration has significant and negative indirect effects on life satisfaction and emotional well-being through lowering health, job satisfaction, and community-based social capital. In addition, compared with people who commute by public transport, those who use private cars are more satisfied with their lives. Urban policymakers should give more consideration to reducing traffic congestion, to promoting the housing and labour market, as well as public transport, to reduce the negative influences of commute duration on SWB.