Paul Collier – författare

Two of the UK's leading economists call for an end to extreme individualism as the engine of prosperity 'provocative but thought-provoking and nuanced' TelegraphThroughout history, successful societies have created institutions which channel both competition and co-operation to achieve complex goals of general benefit. These institutions make the difference between societies that thrive and those paralyzed by discord, the difference between prosperous and poor economies. Such societies are pluralist but their pluralism is disciplined.Successful societies are also rare and fragile. We could not have built modernity without the exceptional competitive and co-operative instincts of humans, but in recent decades the balance between these instincts has become dangerously skewed: mutuality has been undermined by an extreme individualism which has weakened co-operation and polarized our politics.Collier and Kay show how a reaffirmation of the values of mutuality could refresh and restore politics, business and the environments in which people live. Politics could reverse the moves to extremism and tribalism; businesses could replace the greed that has degraded corporate culture; the communities and decaying places that are home to many could overcome despondency and again be prosperous and purposeful. As the world emerges from an unprecedented crisis we have the chance to examine society afresh and build a politics beyond individualism.

The world is in a mess. For more than a billion people, everyday life is played out against the backdrop of civil wars, military coups and failing economies. For them, the peaceful democracy taken for granted in the West seems an impossible pipe-dream. But solutions do exist - it is up to us to achieve them. Award-winning academic Paul Collier's vision for the future of the developing world is eye-opening, provocative and refreshingly unequivocal.

In The Plundered Planet: How to Reconcile Prosperity with Nature Paul Collier proposes a radical and often counter-intuitive rethink of international policy in order to combat global poverty and environmental devastation.How can we help poorer countries become richer without harming the planet? Is there a way of reconciling prosperity with nature? World-renowned economist Paul Collier offers smart, surprising and above all realistic answers to this dilemma. Steering a path between the desires of unchecked profiteering and the romantic views of environmentalists, he explores creative ways to deal with poverty, overpopulation and climate change - showing that the solutions needn't cost the earth. 'A practical handbook for ending world poverty. He wants us to read the evidence, not wear slogans on our T-shirts' Sunday Times'Collier and his team have researched the detail ... If you want to help the world, stem your bleeding heart and tell your broker to switch your funds to Emerging Markets (Africa)' Sunday Telegraph'An intriguing take on how western nations can stop poor countries rich in resources from being exploited'Observer'Anyone looking for a primer on how best to exploit the riches of nature could do worse than reading this introduction to the problem' Economist'Paul Collier must be read if one is to begin to understand the most vital contemporary arguments' Bob GeldofPaul Collier is Professor of Economics and Director of the Center for the Study of African Economies at Oxford University and a former director of Development Research at the World Bank. In addition to the award-winning The Bottom Billion, he is the author of Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places.

Exodus is an insightful, expert foray into the explosive issue of immigration, from Paul Collier, award-winning economist and author of The Bottom BillionMass international migration is a response to extreme global inequality, and immigration has a profound impact on the way we live. Yet our views - and those of our politicians - remain caught between two extremes: popular hostility to migrants, tinged by xenophobia and racism; and the view of business and liberal elites that 'open doors' are both economically and ethically imperative. With migration set to accelerate, few issues are so urgently in need of dispassionate analysis - and few are more incendiary.Here, world-renowned economist Paul Collier seeks to defuse this explosive subject. Exodus looks at how people from the world's poorest societies struggle to migrate to the rich West: the effects on those left behind and on the host societies, and explores the impulses and thinking that inform Western immigration policy. Migration, he concludes, is a fact, and we urgently need to think clearly about its possibilities and challenges: it is not a question of whether migration is good or bad, but how much is best?'Exodus is an important book and one I have been waiting to read for many years ... [it is] a work that is humane and hard-headed about one of the greatest issues of our times' - David Goodhart, Sunday Times'Paul Collier is one of the world's most thoughtful economists. His books consistently illuminate and provoke. Exodus is no exception' - Economist'Tinged with poignancy ... a humane and sensible voice in a highly toxic debate' - Colin Kidd, GuardianPaul Collier is Professor of Economics and Director of the Centre for the Study of African Economies at Oxford University and a former director of Development Research at the World Bank. He is the author of, among others, the award-winning The Bottom Billion and The Plundered Planet.

A FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOK OF 2024The world-renowned economist offers a ground-breaking new vision for inclusive prosperityLeft behind places can be found in prosperous countries—from South Yorkshire, integral to the industrial revolution and now England’s poorest county, to Barranquilla, once Colombia’s portal to the Caribbean and now struggling. More alarmingly, the poorest countries in the world are diverging further from the rest of humanity than they were at the start of this century. Why have these places fallen behind? And what can we do about it?World-renowned development economist Paul Collier has spent his life working in neglected communities. In this book he offers his candid diagnosis of why some regions and countries are failing, and a new vision for how they can catch up. Collier lays the blame for widening inequality on stale economic orthodoxies that prioritize market forces to revive left behind regions, and on the arrogant, hands-off and one-size fits all approach of centralized bureaucracies like the UK Treasury. As a result, Collier argues, the UK has become the most unequal and unfair society in the western world.Yet the core message of Left Behind is hopeful: bringing together encouraging case studies of recovery from around the world, Collier shows how renewal is achievable through a combination of collective learning, moral leadership and local agency. With keen insight, he draws lessons from such seemingly disparate fields as behavioural psychology, evolutionary biology and moral philosophy to share a bold, galvanizing vision for a more inclusive, prosperous world.

Europe is facing its greatest refugee crisis since the Second World War, yet the institutions responding to it remain virtually unchanged from those created in the post-war era. Going beyond the scenes of desperation which have become all-too-familiar in the past few years, Alexander Betts and Paul Collier show that this crisis offers an opportunity for reform if international policy-makers focus on delivering humane, effective and sustainable outcomes - both for Europe and for countries that border conflict zones. Refugees need more than simply food, tents and blankets, and research demonstrates that they can offer tangible economic benefits to their adopted countries if given the right to work and education. Refuge sets out an alternative vision that can empower refugees to help themselves, contribute to their host societies, and even rebuild their countries of origin.

*FEATURED IN BILL GATES'S 2019 SUMMER READING RECOMMENDATIONS* 'This is a beautifully written and important book. Read it' Martin Wolf, Financial TimesFrom world-renowned economist Paul Collier, a candid diagnosis of the failures of capitalism and a pragmatic and realistic vision for how we can repair itDeep new rifts are tearing apart the fabric of Britain and other Western societies: thriving cities versus the provinces, the highly skilled elite versus the less educated, wealthy versus developing countries. As these divides deepen, we have lost the sense of ethical obligation to others that was crucial to the rise of post-war social democracy. So far these rifts have been answered only by the revivalist ideologies of populism and socialism, leading to the seismic upheavals of Trump, Brexit and the return of the far right in Germany. We have heard many critiques of capitalism but no one has laid out a realistic way to fix it, until now. In a passionate and polemical book, celebrated economist Paul Collier outlines brilliantly original and ethical ways of healing these rifts - economic, social and cultural - with the cool head of pragmatism, rather than the fervour of ideological revivalism. He reveals how he has personally lived across these three divides, moving from working-class Sheffield to hyper-competitive Oxford, and working between Britain and Africa, and acknowledges some of the failings of his profession. Drawing on his own solutions as well as ideas from some of the world's most distinguished social scientists, he shows us how to save capitalism from itself - and free ourselves from the intellectual baggage of the 20th century.These times are in desperate need of Paul Collier's insights. The Future of Capitalism restores common sense to our views of morality, as it also describes their critical role in what makes families, organizations, and nations work. It is the most revolutionary work of social science since Keynes. Let's hope it will also be the most influential - George Akerlof, Nobel Laureate in Economics, 2001 In this bold work of intellectual trespass, Paul Collier, a distinguished economist, ventures onto the terrain of ethics to explain what's gone wrong with capitalism, and how to fix it. To heal the divide between metropolitan elites and the left-behind, he argues, we need to rediscover an ethic of belonging, patriotism, and reciprocity. Offering inventive solutions to our current impasse, Collier shows how economics at its best is inseparable from moral and political philosophy' - Michael Sandel, author of What Money Can't Buy and JusticeFor thirty years, the centre left of politics has been searching for a narrative that makes sense of the market economy. This book provides it - John Kay, Fellow of St John's College, Oxford and the author of Obliquity and Other People's Money For well-to-do metropolitans, capitalism is the gift that goes on giving. For others, capitalism is not working. Paul Collier deploys passion, pragmatism and good economics in equal measure to chart an alternative to the divisions tearing apart so many western countries. -Mervyn King, former Governor of the Bank of England

This volume analyses and compares economic growth in Nigeria and Indonesia during the period from 1950 to 1985, addressing questions as to why one country was so much more successful than the other. In providing some surprising answers for those who believed that the divergence would be found in deeply rooted, long term trends, the authors also offer insight into what has become a reversal of fortune in the late 1990's, as Indonesia has experienced decline, and the Nigerian economy had stabilized.

Global poverty is falling rapidly, but in around fifty failing states, the world's poorest people face a tragedy that is growing inexorably worse. This bottom billion live on less than a dollar a day and while the rest of the world moves steadily forward, this forgotten billion is left further and further behind with potentially serious consequences not only for them but for the stability of the rest of the world. Why do the states these people live in defy all the attempts of the international aid community to help them? Why does nothing seem to make a difference? In The Bottom Billion, Paul Collier pinpoints the issues of corruption, political instability and resource management that lie at the root of the problem. He describes the battle raging in these countries between corrupt leaders and would-be reformers and the factors such as civil war, dependence on the export of natural resources and lack of good governance that trap them into a downward spiral of economic and social decline.Collier addresses the fact that conventional aid has been unable to tackle these problems and puts forward a radical new plan of action including a new agenda for the G8 which includes more effective anti-corruption measures, preferential trade policies and where necessary direct military intervention. All of these initiatives are carefully designed to help the forgotten bottom billion, one of the key challenges facing the world in the twenty first century.

In this elegant and impassioned synthesis from one of the world's leading experts on Africa and poverty, economist Paul Collier writes persuasively that although nearly five billion of the world's people are beginning to climb from desperate poverty and to benefit from globalization's reach to developing countries, there is a "bottom billion" of the world's poor whose countries, largely immune to the forces of global economy, are falling farther behind and are in danger of falling apart, separating permanently and tragically from the rest of the world. Collier identifies and explains the four traps that prevent the homelands of the world's billion poorest people from growing and receiving the benefits of globalization - civil war, the discovery and export of natural resources in otherwise unstable economies, being landlocked and therefore unable to participate in the global economy without great cost, and finally, ineffective governance. As he demonstrates that these billion people are quite likely in danger of being irretrievably left behind, Collier argues that we cannot take a "headless heart" approach to these seemingly intractable problems; rather, that we must harness our despair and our moral outrage at these inequities to a reasoned and thorough understanding of the complex and interconnected problems that the world's poorest people face.

This book is the first of two companion volumes by these authors on trade shocks in controlled economies. Both theoretically innovative and drawing on extensive applied work, it addresses a number of issues in the forefront of economics, principally the relationship between macro and micro economics, by analysing the impact of an external macro shock - the coffee price boom - on each of two developing countries which have much in common but whose governmental organizations and objectives differ sharply.The authors focus on three important ways in which governments affect peasants: setting crop prices; controlling access to consumer goods; and provision of public services. They address these three areas using microeconomic analysis and household survey data collected in Kenya and Tanzania. Much of the analysis is relevant for a wide class of developing countries.

Developing countries frequently experience trade shocks and the policy implications of this have been debated for decades.This important book is Volume 1 of a comparative study covering 23 countries, using a common methodology to estimate the effects of shocks. The conventional wisdom has been that private agents, in particular peasant farmers, could not be trusted to use windfalls wisely. This was, and continues to be, the main rationale for stabilising taxation of export crops. The convention was also that windfalls accruing to the public sector were a bane since governments had low savings rates. The evidence in this definitive study supports neither generalisation. Trade shocks typically lead to high savings rates, irrespective of whether they accrue to private producers or to the government. However, the case studies find substantial policy errors so that windfalls are often not translated efficiently into permanent income increases and indeed often lead to a reduction in output. The studies argue for a drastic revision of the case for government action in response to trade shocks. Volume 1 deals with Africa, Volume 2 with Asia and Latin America.

Developing countries frequently experience trade shocks and the policy implications of this have been debated for decades.This important book is Volume 2 of a comparative study covering 23 countries, using a common methodology to estimate the effects of shocks. The conventional wisdom has been that private agents, in particular peasant farmers, could not be trusted to use windfalls wisely. This was, and continues to be, the main rationale for stabilising taxation of export crops. The convention was also that windfalls accruing to the public sector were a bane since governments had low savings rates. The evidence in this definitive study supports neither generalisation. Trade shocks typically lead to high savings rates, irrespective of whether they accrue to private producers or to the government. However, the case studies find substantial policy errors so that windfalls are often not translated efficiently into permanent income increases and indeed often lead to a reduction in output. The studies argue for a drastic revision of the case for government action in response to trade shocks. Volume 1 deals with Africa, Volume 2 with Asia and Latin America.

This book, the third in the Africa: Policies for Prosperity series, is concerned with the challenges of securing economic prosperity in Tanzania over the coming decades. Building on widespread economic reforms in the early 1990s, Tanzania has recorded steady economic growth over the last two decades, despite the downturn in global economic fortunes since 2008. The process of reform is continuous, however, and the challenge facing the current generation of policymakers is how to harness these favourable gains in macroeconomic stability and turn them into a coherent strategy for labour-intensive, inclusive growth over the coming decades. The next twenty years offer huge opportunity but also huge challenges to Tanzania. The pace of economic transformation and integration into the regional and global economy is picking up; society is becoming much more urban and with population growth remaining high, the need for high-quality employment, especially amongst the young, has never been so pressing. At the same time, the discovery of large natural gas reserves and a programme of heavy investment in transport and communications infrastructure creates the opportunity for Tanzania not just to exploit its natural locational advantage, but to finance the investment in this transformation.This volume brings leading international and national scholars into the policy arena to examine these challenges and to lay out, in a rigorous but accessible manner, economic policy options facing policymakers in Tanzania.

This is the first volume in a new series Africa: Policies for Prosperity. For the first time in more than a generation, sustained economic growth has been achieved across the continent - despite the downturn in global economic fortunes since 2008 - and in many countries these gains have been realized through policy reforms driven by the decisive leadership of a new generation of economic policymakers. The process of reform is continuous, however, and the challenge currently facing this new generation is how to harness these favourable gains in macroeconomic stability and turn them into a coherent strategy for sustainable growth and poverty reduction over the coming decades. These challenges are substantial and encompass the broad remit of economic policy. Each volume in this series brings leading scholars into the policy arena to examine these challenges and to lay out, in a rigorous but accessible manner, key challenges and policy options facing policymakers on the continent. Kenya has experienced a period of high and sustained growth since the mid 1990s, growth that has involved economic transformation away from a heavy reliance on traditional economic activities towards an emerging manufacturing economy. But this process, and the economic and social stability that had come to characterize Kenya, have been severely tested by the post-election violence of 2008. Restoring equitable growth and sustaining the structural transformation of the economy is essential if Kenya is to leave this period behind.The chapters in this volume address the key issues that will face economic policy makers in the coming years. They cover the conventional but central questions of finance and macroeconomic management, but also much deeper structural issues of trade, employment generation and education; of land policy, migration and urbanization; and the fiscal challenges facing an ageing but increasingly urbanized, and increasingly affluent, society.

Zambia is a landlocked mineral dependent country in Southern Africa whose history is intimately entwined with the copper mining industry. Having gained Independence from Britain in 1964 at the height of a copper boom, the country experienced a slow and painful economic decline over the next quarter century. However, following a traumatic and protracted process of economic adjustment through the 1990s and early 2000s, Zambia's economic potential is now better than it has been at any time since Independence. This book, which contains a set of rigorous but accessible essays by a range of Zambian and international scholars, seeks to examine the challenges and opportunities that currently face Zambian policymakers as they seek to harness the country's valuable natural assets to broad-based and sustainable economic growth over the coming decades. Written in a non-technical manner by leading scholars in the field, the chapters address key challenges in the areas of natural resource management, agriculture, trade, employment and migration, education, finance, and investment. This is the second volume in the Africa: Policies for Prosperity series following on from the successful first volume on Kenya.

This book consists of eight case studies investigating the political economy of the decision chain involved in natural resource extraction in resource-rich countries, where plunder rather than prosperity has become the norm. Some case studies reveal successes, while others show the decision chain to have failed disastrously.

A FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOK OF 2024The world-renowned economist offers a ground-breaking new vision for inclusive prosperityLeft behind places can be found in prosperous countries—from South Yorkshire, integral to the industrial revolution and now England’s poorest county, to Barranquilla, once Colombia’s portal to the Caribbean and now struggling. More alarmingly, the poorest countries in the world are diverging further from the rest of humanity than they were at the start of this century. Why have these places fallen behind? And what can we do about it?World-renowned development economist Paul Collier has spent his life working in neglected communities. In this book he offers his candid diagnosis of why some regions and countries are failing, and a new vision for how they can catch up. Collier lays the blame for widening inequality on stale economic orthodoxies that prioritize market forces to revive left behind regions, and on the arrogant, hands-off and one-size fits all approach of centralized bureaucracies like the UK Treasury. As a result, Collier argues, the UK has become the most unequal and unfair society in the western world. Yet the core message of Left Behind is hopeful: bringing together encouraging case studies of recovery from around the world, Collier shows how renewal is achievable through a combination of collective learning, moral leadership and local agency. With keen insight, he draws lessons from such seemingly disparate fields as behavioural psychology, evolutionary biology and moral philosophy to share a bold, galvanizing vision for a more inclusive, prosperous world.

Professor Paul Collier argues that the prospects for growth and stability in Africa would be enhanced if the concern about policy reversals were diminished, thus maximising inward investment flows. He advocates the EU taking a wider role and exerting more pressure on recalcitrant regimes.

This is an examination of the key themes in Africa's fiscal reforms and trade liberalization, and her prospects for improving trade and development. In this work, differing reform strategies are reformed and assessed with a range of case studies of fiscal reform in Kenya, the Cote d'Ivoire and Tanzania. The impact of trade liberalization and the linking of aid and trade by donor countries are also assessed.

Papers on regional integration and trade liberalisation in sub-Saharan Africa meant to apply new perspectives and approaches to an analytical framework and methodology for study of the region.

Paul Collier’s contributions to development economics,and in regard to Africa in particular, have marked him out as one of the most influential commentators of recent times. His research has centred upon the causes and consequences of civil war, the effects of aid, and the problems of democracy in low-income and natural-resource-rich societies. His work has also enjoyed substantial policy impact, having seen him sit as a senior adviser to Tony Blair’s Commission on Africa and addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations This collection of Collier’s major writings, with assistance from Anke Hoeffler and Jan Gunning, and accompanied by a new introduction, provide the definitive account of a wide range of macroeconomic, microeconomic and political economy topics concerned with Africa. Within macroeconomics, there is a focus on external shocks, exchange rate and trade policies, whilst microeconomic topics focus upon labour and financial markets, as well as rural development. Collier’s book The Bottom Billion had become a landmark book and this summation of the research underpinning it will be a superb guide for all those concerned with African development.

Paul Collier’s contributions to development economics,and in regard to Africa in particular, have marked him out as one of the most influential commentators of recent times. His research has centred upon the causes and consequences of civil war, the effects of aid, and the problems of democracy in low-income and natural-resource-rich societies. His work has also enjoyed substantial policy impact, having seen him sit as a senior adviser to Tony Blair’s Commission on Africa and addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations This collection of Collier’s major writings, with assistance from Anke Hoeffler and Jan Gunning, and accompanied by a new introduction, provide the definitive account of a wide range of macroeconomic, microeconomic and political economy topics concerned with Africa. Within macroeconomics, there is a focus on external shocks, exchange rate and trade policies, whilst microeconomic topics focus upon labour and financial markets, as well as rural development. Collier’s book The Bottom Billion had become a landmark book and this summation of the research underpinning it will be a superb guide for all those concerned with African development.