April 2014
Featured Publication
Many public sector reforms in developing countries fail to make governments more functional. This typically occurs because reforms introduce new solutions that do not fit the contexts in which they are being placed. In this new research piece, Matt Andrews uses the documented data access problems in Mozambique's judicial sector to examine how the Problem Driven Iterative Adaption (PDIA) approach to 'capability traps' can explain limits to reform success. After 8 months, this action research project is producing significant evidence of how a PDIA intervention can work in complex hierarchical developing country governments. Read more >>
Featured Publication
In India, growth accelerated in the 1990s. In Brazil, growth decelerated dramatically in 1980. Just how big were these events? We know that economic growth in developing countries consists of episodes of growth accelerations and decelerations and, while there has been some research into the dating of those episodes, the question of which episodes are big and which are small, hasn't been addressed. Researchers Lant Pritchett, Kunal Sen, Sabyasachi Kar and Selim Raihan tackle this question in their new paper, Trillions Gained--and Lost. Their key insight is to combine the magnitude of the change in growth rate associated with an episode (relative to a plausible counter-factual) with the duration of the episode. The combination gives an estimate for each year of the episode; how much higher or lower growth would have been without the episode. Read more >>
Featured Project
Greater use of data and research evidence by policymakers has the potential to dramatically improve policy outcomes and contribute to poverty reduction and enhanced socioeconomic wellbeing. But for policy decisions to be grounded in evidence, policymakers must have the technical capabilities as well as the incentives and motivation to access, appraise and apply data and evidence. In partnership with UK Department for International Development (DFID), CID's Evidence for Policy Design program is carrying out a comprehensive capacity building program to increase the use of rigorous data and research evidence. The program targets three focus countries - India, Pakistan and Afghanistan - where it's working with a consortium of local implementing organizations and policy counterparts. The multi-pronged and multi-level capacity building approach features four primary activities: assessment, training programs, pilot projects, and policy dialogues. Read more >> 


El Conocimiento Productivo como la Riqueza de las Naciones

Watch Ricardo Hausmann's TEDx talk - Productive Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations." 

Marriage, Education and Assortative Mating in Latin America

Ina Gangulia, Ricardo Hausmann and Martina Viarengo in Applied Economics Letters

Implied Comparative Advantage 

R. Hausmann, C. Hidalgo, D. Stock and M. Yildirim 

Graduate Student
Luncheon Seminar

with Erdin Beshimov

Digital Learning, MITx

Fri May 2   |  11:45am - 1pm  

Perkins Room, Rubenstein

The Mismeasure of Technology

Ricardo Hausmann - Project Syndicate

What Big Data Can't Tell Us About Healthcare

Amitabh Chandra - The New Yorker

Ricardo Hausmann at WEF Latin America

Fake seeds force Ugandan farmers to resort to 'bronze age' agriculture

David Yanagizawa-Drott - The Guardian

CID, ICSS to study Sports Complexity and Governance Indicators

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The Center for International Development (CID) at Harvard University is a university-wide center that works to advance the understanding of development challenges and offer viable solutions to problems of global poverty.