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In the Shadows? Informal Enterprise in Non-Democracies

by Kristin Fabbe, Allison Spencer Hartnett, and Steve L. Monroe

With the informal economy representing a third of the GDP in an average Middle East and North African country, why do chronically indebted regimes tolerate such a large and untaxed shadow economy? Among this study’s findings, higher rates of public sector employment correlate with greater permissibility of firm informality.

Voter ID Laws Don't Work (But They Don't Hurt Anything, Either)

by Sean Silverthorne

Voter ID laws are often proposed as an antidote to election fraud. There's just one problem, according to Vincent Pons. They don't work. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Negotiating a Better Future: How Interpersonal Skills Facilitate Inter-Generational Investment

by Nava Ashraf, Natalie Bau, Corinne Low, and Kathleen McGinn

For many girls in developing countries, early adolescence is a time of key challenges: school dropout rates rise, and social and economic pressures increase for marriage and motherhood. This randomized control trial involving Zambian adolescent girls finds that negotiation skills can help them navigate these challenges. Girls taught negotiation skills had significantly better educational outcomes over the next three years.

What We've Learned from 101 Entrepreneurs in Emerging Markets

by Sean Silverthorne

Harvard Business School’s project exploring the evolution of business leadership in emerging economies has reached an important milestone. Project leaders Geoffrey Jones and Tarun Khanna discuss what's been learned from the Creating Emerging Markets study so far. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Emerging Markets and the Future of Business History

by Gareth Austin, Carlos Dávila, and Geoffrey Jones

This paper argues that there are important commonalities about the business history of countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America despite differences between countries and within regions of each country. It is possible to discern a distinctive body of scholarship different from that on the West.

How an African History Scholar Became a Modern Righter of Wrongs

by Carmen Nobel

A scholar of colonial-era African history, Caroline M. Elkins had dramatic success turning prior knowledge into real-world action—namely, with a groundbreaking lawsuit against the British government, which revealed a chillingly bureaucratic process for destroying evidence of torture. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Building India’s First $100 Billion Company

Re: Sunil Gupta

Startups welcome growth but are often strangled by it. In this podcast, Sunil Gupta discusses how entrepreneur Vijay Shekhar Sharma is meeting this challenge with his mobile payments company Paytm. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Making Health Insurance That Consumers Actually Like

Re: Regina E. Herzlinger

By motivating its insurance customers to take care of themselves, South African firm Vitality has expanded to the United Kingdom and China. In this podcast, Professor Regina Herzlinger discusses potential impacts of this model for health care in the United States. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Reputation is Vital to Survival in Turbulent Markets

by Sean Silverthorne

Reputation and resilience are key ingredients that determine whether companies will survive tumultuous markets, according to a new paper by Geoffrey Jones, Tarun Khanna, Cheng Gao, and Tiona Zuzul. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

What Africa Can Teach the United States About Funding Infrastructure Projects

by John Macomber

John Macomber explains why the solution to America’s infrastructure woes may lie in finance models that have proven successful in several nations in Africa. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

The $1 Trillion Link Between Mental Health and Economic Productivity

by Carmen Nobel

According to the World Health Organization, depression and anxiety disorders cost nearly $1 trillion annually. Nava Ashraf discusses the important link between mental health and economic productivity. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

World Health Organization Lacks Leadership to Combat Pandemics

by John Quelch

When it comes to emergency preparedness for pandemics, the World Health Organization is falling short, argues John A. Quelch. A better solution: The World Bank. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

The Perils of Building Democracy in Africa

by Benjamin Marx, Vincent Pons, and Tavneet Suri

Results from a text messaging experiment conducted before the 2013 National Election in Kenya show that basic information provided via short message service (SMS) resulted in small turnout increases but had a large effect on attitudes towards electoral institutions.

Diversity and Team Performance in a Kenyan Organization

by Benjamin Marx, Vincent Pons, and Tavneet Suri

A key question in organizations is whether there is an optimal balance between diversity and sameness within teams of workers. Findings from a field experiment within a nonprofit research organization based in Kenya suggest much of the tradeoff between diversity and sameness may come from the different effects diversity has along different dimensions of organizational structure. Diversity along the organization’s hierarchy improves both effort and performance.

The Problem with Productivity of Multi-Ethnic Teams

by Michael Blanding

Ethnically diverse teams can be less productive than more homogenous teams, according to research in Kenya by Vincent Pons. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

What Happens When Zambian Schoolgirls Receive Negotiation Training

Re: Kathleen L. McGinn

Research by Kathleen McGinn and colleagues shows how teaching negotiation skills to young Zambian women can greatly improve their health and educational outcomes. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

The Historian Who Came in from the Cold

by Dina Gerdeman

While much has been written about the conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, Jeremy S. Friedman’s Shadow Cold War: The Sino-Soviet Competition for the Third World is the first book to explore in detail the significance of the “Second Cold War” that China and the Soviet Union fought in the shadow of the communist and capitalist struggle. Open for comment; Comment(s) posted.

Six Lessons from Mobile Money Ventures in Developing Countries

by Dina Gerdeman

Improving access to financial services for the poor in developing countries seems an unmet market need. So why are so many mobile money efforts failing? Rajiv Lal says the problem begins with Marketing 101. Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Mobile Money: The Effect of Service Quality and Competition on Demand

by Karthik Balasubramanian & David F. Drake

Mobile money—the use of electronic money transfer through cellular networks—is rapidly expanding in developing countries, especially among the "unbanked." One persistent problem for mobile money agents, however, has been managing inventory and service quality. Using data from Kenya and Uganda, two East African countries at different stages of mobile money market development, the authors introduce an operations management lens for mobile money and explore the effects of competition and service quality on demand. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

Thriving in the Turbulence of Emerging Markets

by Geoffrey Jones

Entrepreneurs in developing market economies face special management challenges. Company leaders in India, Turkey, and Africa discuss their experiences with Harvard Business School's Creating Emerging Markets project. Open for comment; 4 Comment(s) posted.