This paper brings together sociological
theories of culture and gender to answer the question – how
do large-scale development interventions induce cultural
change? Through three years of ethnographic work in rural
Bihar, the authors examine this question in the context of
Jeevika, a World Bank-assisted poverty alleviation project
targeted at women, and find support for an integrative view
of culture. The paper argues that Jeevika created new

The Country Opinion Survey in Côte
d’Ivoire assists the World Bank Group (WBG) in gaining a
better understanding of how stakeholders in Côte d’Ivoire
perceive the WBG. It provides the WBG with systematic
feedback from national and local governments,
multilateral/bilateral agencies, media, academia, the
private sector, and civil society in Côte d’Ivoire on 1)
their views regarding the general environment in Côte

The geo-economy presents Lebanon with
challenges associated with being a nexus for regional fault
lines and risks from its dependence on capital inflows.
Despite markedly improved security conditions since the
start of 2015, anxiety over regional turmoil and potential
spillover effectspersist. All the while, Lebanon continues
to be, by far, the largest host of Syrian refugees (in
proportion to the population). In addition, the economy’s

The Government of Jordan, the World Bank
Group (WBG), and the international community are working
towards a paradigm shift in their collective response to the
refugee crisis - a holistic approach which stresses the
continuum between the humanitarian response and the
country’s development agenda. In parallel, Jordan’s implicit
social contract by which the state provided citizens with
jobs and heavily subsidized public services is evolving.

This report speaks to the holistic nature of the development process, a process that should not only encourage all stakeholders to participate in the process but also directly engage them. This volume posits that such participation must be guided by the law and accord with the broader notion of justice for development as a concept to be meaningfully appreciated today.

After long suffering from benign neglect
if not outright contempt, industrial policy is almost
fashionable again. The global financial and economic crisis
known as the Great Recession has forced researchers and
policy makers to confront the reality that market forces
alone generally do not lead to (constrained)
Pareto-efficient outcomes. Many important national and
global policy objectives (equality of opportunity for all

The Country Opinion Survey in Bolivia
assists the World Bank Group (WBG) in gaining a better
understanding of how stakeholders in Bolivia perceive the
WBG. It provides the WBG with systematic feedback from
national and local governments, multilateral/bilateral
agencies, media, academia, the private sector, and civil
society in Bolivia on 1) their views regarding the general
environment in Bolivia; 2) their overall attitudes toward

This report summarizes the key themes
and findings from three in-depth case studies of EET
programs in Ghana, Kenya, and Mozambique. Each case study
produced rich information on the programs context, the
landscape of programs in each country, and the qualitative
insights from local EET stakeholders. This report
synthesizes information from across the case studies to
analyze the extent to which these countries programs are

The paper investigates determinants of
civic participation in local budget processes in rural areas
in the Kyrgyz Republic by using data from the Life in
Kyrgyzstan survey, conducted in 2012. The analysis of the
data suggests that although civic awareness and interest in
local budget processes is relatively high, the participation
rate in local budgeting processes is low. The paper also
shows that interest, awareness, and participation are

After decades of turmoil and
instability, a period of calm and progress evolved in
Guinea-Bissau in 2009. A military coup in April 2012
interrupted it. A fresh start is needed to alter the
dynamics that kept Guinea-Bissau poor. In 2013, Gross
National Income per capita was US$590. Average economic
growth barely kept pace with population growth. In 2010,
poverty at the national poverty line of US$2 a day was 70

Millions of coffee farmers and coffee
trading enterprises lack sufficient credit. This is partly
due to myriad challenges and considerable costs that formal
lending institutions face serving rural, often isolated
markets. A better understanding of coffee sector risks is
needed to respond with strategies, training, and tools that
can help farmers and enterprises, mitigate their exposure to
risk, and strengthen their resilience against inevitable

The inability to unlock natural resource
wealth for the benefit of developing countries’ local
populations, a phenomenon popularly known as the ‘resource
curse’ or the ‘paradox of plenty’, has spawned extensive
debate among researchers and policy makers in recent years.
There is now a well-established body of literature exploring
the links between natural resources and conflict, with some
sources estimating that over the past 60 years, 40 percent