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World Development Report 2023: Migrants, Refugees, and Societies

World Development Report 2023 proposes an innovative approach to maximize the development impacts of cross-border movements on both destination and origin countries and on migrants and refugees themselves. The framework it offers, drawn from labor economics and international law, rests on a “Match and Motive Matrix” that focuses on two factors: how closely migrants’ skills and attributes match the needs of destination countries and what motives underlie their movements.

Women, Business and the Law 2023

Women, Business and the Law 2023 is the ninth in a series of annual studies measuring the laws and regulations that affect women’s economic opportunity in 190 economies. It identifies barriers to women’s economic participation and encourages reform of discriminatory laws. This year, the study also includes research, a literature review, and analysis of 53 years of reforms for women’s rights and makes an important contribution to research and policy discussions about the state of women’s economic empowerment.

Falling Long-Term Growth Prospects

Across the world, a structural growth slowdown is underway: at current trends, global potential growth—the maximum growth the global economy can sustain over the longer term without igniting inflation—is expected to fall to a three-decade low over the remainder of the 2020s. Nearly all the forces that have powered growth and prosperity since the early 1990s have weakened. The growth rates of investment and total factor productivity are declining. The global labor force is aging, and expanding more slowly. International trade growth is much weaker now than it was in the early 2000s. In addition, a series of shocks has roiled the global economy over the past three years. A persistent and broad-based decline in long-term growth prospects imperils the ability of emerging market and developing economies to combat poverty, tackle climate change, and meet other key development objectives.

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World Development Report 2023: Migrants, Refugees, and Societies
Migration is a development challenge. About 184 million people—2.3 percent of the world’s population—live outside of their country of nationality. Almost half of them are in low- and middle-income countries. But what lies ahead? As the world struggles to cope with global economic imbalances, diverging demographic trends, and climate change, migration will become a necessity in the decades to come for countries at all levels of income. If managed well, migration can be a force for prosperity and can help achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
The Economics of Water Scarcity in the Middle East and North Africa: Institutional Solutions
Despite massive infrastructure investments, countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region continue to face unprecedented water scarcity due to climate change, population growth, and socioeconomic development. Current policy regimes for managing water across competing needs are primarily determined by state control of large infrastructure. Policy makers across the region understand the unsustainability of water allocations and that increasing investments in new infrastructure and technologies to increase water supply place a growing financial burden on governments. However, standard solutions for demand management—reallocating water to higher value uses, reducing waste, and increasing tariffs—pose difficult political dilemmas that, more often than not, are left unresolved.
Private Cities: Outstanding Examples from Developing Countries and Their Implications for Urban Policy
Private Cities: Outstanding Examples from Developing Countries and Their Implications for Urban Policy aims to fill this gap. Using an analytical framework that draws on urban economics and political science, it includes inventories of private cities in the Arab Republic of Egypt, India, Indonesia, and Pakistan and provides structured reviews of 14 outstanding examples across all developing regions.
Africa’s Resource Future: Harnessing Natural Resources for Economic Transformation during the Low-Carbon Transition
This book examines the role for natural resource wealth in driving Africa’s economic transformation and the implications of the low-carbon transition for resource-rich economies. Resource wealth remains central to most Sub-Saharan African economies, and significant untapped potential is in the ground. Subsoil assets—such as metals, minerals, oil, and gas—are key sources of government revenues, export earnings, and development potential in most countries in the Africa region.
The Effect of Multinational Enterprises on Climate Change: Supply Chain Emissions, Green Technology Transfers, and Corporate Commitments
Multinational enterprises (MNEs) provide both a fundamental risk to and an opportunity for climate change mitigation. The climate ambitions of MNEs will affect the environmental performance of countries around the world. As a leading actor, proactive MNEs can impose sustainability standards or encourage green technology transfers that, in some cases, could affect millions of producers and accelerate the climate transition.
Thriving : Making Cities Green, Resilient, and Inclusive in a Changing Climate
Globally, 70 percent of greenhouse gas emissions emanate from cities. At the same time, cities are being hit increasingly by climate change related shocks and stresses, ranging from more frequent extreme weather events to inflows of climate migrants. This report analyzes how these shocks and stresses are interacting with other urban stresses to determine the greenness, resilience, and inclusiveness of urban and national development. It provides policymakers with a compass for designing tailored policies that can help cities and countries take effective action to mitigate and adapt to climate change.