New book addresses how to adjust the concept of public goods to today’s economic and political realities-includes discussion of governance of the IMF.
Water
Rights
News
Water meetings everywhere and not a drop to drink
Debates over “high-risk” infrastructure, follow-up to the World Commission on Dams and private management have dominated discussion of the Bank’s new water strategy and global meetings on financing water infrastructure in Washington and Kyoto.
Knowledge
News
Bank “soul searching” on privatisation
Critics of privatisation are invited to speak at a meeting organised by the Latin American and Caribbean department.
Social services
News
Bengal opposition to Bank-backed water tax
Residents of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) area in West Bengal will be the first to pay a new tax on water.
Environment
News
Complaints panel finds major problems in Coal India mines
An official report has found that villagers in Eastern India, have suffered harm to their livelihoods as a result of a Bank-backed coal mining project.
Environment
News
Complaints panel report finds social problems in Coal India mines
A new official report has found that villagers in Jharkhand state, Eastern India, have suffered harm to their livelihoods as a result of a Bank-backed coal mining project.
Accountability
News
Lesotho corruption verdict
Following a seven month trial, Canadian company Acres International was convicted on two counts of bribing an official to secure contracts for the Lesotho Highland Water Project, which received financing from the World Bank.
Social services
News
Ghana water privatisation disputed by independent analysts
An international fact-finding mission on plans to reform the water sector in Ghana made its conclusions public before the Annual Meetings of the World Bank and the IMF.
Social services
News
Bolivia water latest
Bolivia provides further lessons from Bank-backed water privatisation.
Social services
News
World Bank pushed to open up Bolivia water arbitration
The International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes, an independent part of the World Bank Group, is set to begin hearings on a Bank-backed water privatisation deal in which Bechtel took over the public water company in Bolivia’s third largest city, Cochabamba.
Featured briefings
12 December 2024
The Bretton Woods Observer: Winter 2024
12 December 2024
Missing in action: accountability is noticeably absent from the World Bank Group’s new Corporate Scorecard
The Corporate Scorecard’s accountability gap is symptomatic of a broader failure on the part of the WBG to fully internalise, integrate and learn from the work of its accountability mechanisms.
16 October 2024