"Hot Off the Presses"

Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter

Summer 2008

Starved for Science: How Biotechnology Is Being Kept Out of Africa

By Robert Paarlberg; Harvard University Press (February 2008)

Nearly two-thirds of Africans are employed in agriculture, yet on a per-capita basis they produce roughly 20 percent less than they did in 1970. Although modern agricultural science was the key to reducing rural poverty in Asia, modern farm science — including biotechnology — has recently been kept out of Africa.

In Starved for Science, Robert Paarlberg explains why poor African farmers are denied access to productive technologies, particularly genetically engineered seeds with improved resistance to insects and drought. He traces this obstacle to the current opposition to farm science in prosperous countries. Having embraced agricultural science to become well-fed themselves, those in wealthy countries are now instructing Africans — on the most dubious grounds — not to do the same.

"Except for South Africa, no African state has legalized the planting of GMOs for production and consumption. While citizens of rich countries have the luxury of deciding what kinds of foods — organic, nonorganic, GMO, non-GMO — to eat, droughts and insect infestations continue to wipe out crops, and rural African children die because they have no choices." — Joshua Lambert, Library Journal

Worst of the Worst: Dealing with Repressive and Rogue Nations

Edited by Robert Rotberg; Brookings Institution Press and World Peace Foundation (2007)

Repressive regimes tyrannize their own citizens and threaten global stability and order. Worst of the Worst identifies and characterizes the world's most odious states, singling out those few that are aggressive beyond their own borders and can hence be characterized as rogue states.

Robert Rotberg and his colleagues present an innovative, transparent approach to determining which of these nations are most problematic and thus demand immediate policy attention. Previous determinations have been based on inexact, impressionistic criteria. Tyranny was like obscenity — hard to define but recognizable when it occurred. This volume establishes a framework for measuring and assessing repression, helping policymakers to establish priorities.

Worst of the Worst defines the actions that constitute repression and proposes a method of measuring human rights violations. It provides an index of nation-state repressiveness, ranking nations on a ten-point scale and classifying them as "gross," "high," or "aggressive" repressors. Aggressive repressors are those nations that may truly be labeled "rogue states." This diagnostic tool—based on arms trafficking, support for terrorism, WMD possession, and cross-border attacks—will guide the international community in crafting effective policies to deal with injustice in the developing world.

"This volume makes an unparalleled contribution to the growing and vital field of measurement and human rights. Rotberg offers a useful categorization and assessment of repressive and 'rogue' states, allowing us to measure the extent of repressive state behavior more accurately." — Sarah Sewall, Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, Harvard University

High Performance with High Integrity

By Ben W. Heineman, Jr.; Harvard Business School Press (Forthcoming June 2008)

Heineman, senior fellow at the Belfer Center and former senior vice president-general counsel of GE, argues that high performance with high integrity should be the goal of contemporary corporations — and global capitalism — to avoid catastrophic legal and ethical lapses but also to achieve affirmative benefits inside the company, in the marketplace and in the broader society. He argues that CEOs must create an affirmative culture by driving eight core integrity principles and associated practices deep into business operations — and addresses some of the toughest issues for international companies including emerging markets, acquisitions, crisis management, public policy, and reputation. Based on his experience in senior management, he also seeks to refocus current debates on corporate governance, corporate citizenship, global ethics, CEO succession, and pay for performance.

La République de Dieu

By Charles Cogan; Editions Jacob-Duvernet (February 2008)

La République de Dieu is a collection of essays on the idea of God ("Comment peut-on croire?"), on evangelism and its influence on public policy ("La République de Dieu"), and on Islamic fundamentalism ("L'Islam médiéval"). It is followed by empirical chapters analyzing a number of conflicts between the Muslim and non-Muslim world — "Iran 1979: First Major Conflict with Radical Islam," "Afghanistan: The Struggle Against the Soviets and the Myth of bin Laden," "Iraq 2003: The Unbearable Lightness of Decision," and "Israel: The New Jamestown?"

"The author presents a series of reflections on the relations between religion and the state and characterizes the United States today as a 'Republic of God' which has 'found its champion in George W. Bush.' He then analyzes the conflicts between revolutionary Islam and the United States during the second half of the 20th century including a description of the crisis of 1979 in Iran and of the 'unprecedented strategic error' represented by the American invasion of Iraq in 2003." — L' Hemicycle

Financing Entrepreneurship

Edited by Philip Auerswald and Ant Bozkaya; The International Library of Entrepreneurship Series; Edward Elgar (April 2008)

This important collection comprises 24 previously published papers. These include foundational papers which offer an understanding of the conceptual and historical substructure of entrepreneurial finance and more recent seminal works about entrepreneurs and the obstacles that they systematically seek to overcome.

Further articles describe the variety of institutional forms that have evolved to address the challenges inherent in entrepreneurial finance and the role of government in the process of innovation, entrepreneurship and the financing of new ventures. These papers, complemented by the editors’ comprehensive introduction, are essential for scholars, researchers, policymakers, and entrepreneurs wishing to advance their understanding of this important and expanding field of study.

For more information about this publication please contact the Belfer Center Communications Office at 617-495-9858.

For Academic Citation:
Communications Office. "Hot Off the Presses." Belfer Center Newsletter (Summer 2008).