World Development Report

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The World Bank’s World Development Report, published annually since 1978, is an invaluable guide to the economic, social, and environmental state of the world today. Each report provides in-depth analysis and policy recommendations on a specific and important aspect of development—from agriculture, the role of the state, transition economies, and labor to infrastructure, health, the environment, and poverty. Through the quality and timeliness of the information it provides, the report has become a highly influential publication that is used by many multilateral and bilateral international organizations, national governments, scholars, civil society networks and groups, and other global thought leaders to support their decision-making processes. This corporate flagship undergoes extensive internal and external review and is one of the key outputs of the World Bank's Development Economics unit.

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  • Publication
    World Development Report 2017: Governance and the Law
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2017-01-30) World Bank Group
    Why are carefully designed, sensible policies too often not adopted or implemented? When they are, why do they often fail to generate development outcomes such as security, growth, and equity? And why do some bad policies endure? This book addresses these fundamental questions, which are at the heart of development. Policy making and policy implementation do not occur in a vacuum. Rather, they take place in complex political and social settings, in which individuals and groups with unequal power interact within changing rules as they pursue conflicting interests. The process of these interactions is what this Report calls governance, and the space in which these interactions take place, the policy arena. The capacity of actors to commit and their willingness to cooperate and coordinate to achieve socially desirable goals are what matter for effectiveness. However, who bargains, who is excluded, and what barriers block entry to the policy arena determine the selection and implementation of policies and, consequently, their impact on development outcomes. Exclusion, capture, and clientelism are manifestations of power asymmetries that lead to failures to achieve security, growth, and equity. The distribution of power in society is partly determined by history. Yet, there is room for positive change. This Report reveals that governance can mitigate, even overcome, power asymmetries to bring about more effective policy interventions that achieve sustainable improvements in security, growth, and equity. This happens by shifting the incentives of those with power, reshaping their preferences in favor of good outcomes, and taking into account the interests of previously excluded participants. These changes can come about through bargains among elites and greater citizen engagement, as well as by international actors supporting rules that strengthen coalitions for reform.
  • Publication
    World Development Report 1997: The State in a Changing World
    (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997) World Bank
    This is the twentieth in the annual series assessing major development issues. The report is devoted to the role and effectiveness of the state: what it should do, how it should do it, and how it can improve in a rapidly changing world. Governments with both centrally-planned and mixed economies are shrinking their market role because of failed state interventions. This report takes an opposite stance: that state's role in the institutional environment underlying the economy, that is, its ability to enforce a rule of law to underpin transactions, is vital to making government contribute more effectively to development. It argues against reducing government to a minimalist state, explaining that development requires an effective state that plays a facilitator role in encouraging and complementing the activities of private businesses and individuals. The report presents a state reform framework strategy: First, focus the state's activities to match its capabilities; and second, look for ways to improve the state's capability by re-invigorating public institutions. Successful and unsuccessful examples of states and state reform provide illustrations.