Uploaded November 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
What are the difficult choices economists face in the pursuit of peace?
Professor Boyce outlines four basic dilemmas in the economics of peacebuilding. The first is the humanitarian dilemma: how to ensure that aid meant to relieve suffering does not have the unintended effect of perpetuating conflict. The second is corruption, which is sometimes seen as a cost of getting things done, but can fatally corrode state legitimacy, especially when it takes the form of “grand corruption” of high-level government officials. The third dilemma is how to handle legacies of external debt, maintaining access to credit without diverting scarce resources from other pressing post-conflict needs. As one way to address this dilemma, Boyce advocates for selective repudiation based on the doctrine of odious debt in international law. The final dilemma involves partition between the warring sides, which although often seen as a short-term solution can be a recipe for perpetual conflict in the long term. All four dilemmas force policy makers to confront trade-offs between short-run expediency and long-run impacts, trade-offs that conventional cost-benefit analysis is ill-suited to handle.
Learn more at econofwar.org
Directed by Matthew Kulvicki
Produced by Nick Alpha
What are the difficult choices economists face in the pursuit of peace?
Professor Boyce outlines four basic dilemmas in the economics of peacebuilding. The first is the humanitarian dilemma: how to ensure that aid meant to relieve suffering does not have the unintended effect of perpetuating conflict. The second is corruption, which is sometimes seen as a cost of getting things done, but can fatally corrode state legitimacy, especially when it takes the form of “grand corruption” of high-level government officials. The third dilemma is how to handle legacies of external debt, maintaining access to credit without diverting scarce resources from other pressing post-conflict needs. As one way to address this dilemma, Boyce advocates for selective repudiation based on the doctrine of odious debt in international law. The final dilemma involves partition between the warring sides, which although often seen as a short-term solution can be a recipe for perpetual conflict in the long term. All four dilemmas force policy makers to confront trade-offs between short-run expediency and long-run impacts, trade-offs that conventional cost-benefit analysis is ill-suited to handle.
Learn more at econofwar.org
Directed by Matthew Kulvicki
Produced by Nick Alpha
![Intellectual Property Is Broken [Dean Baker]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/cJJZUgt8kVM/mqdefault.jpg "Intellectual Property Is Broken [Dean Baker]
Why are we incentivizing wealth at the expense of health?
Dean Baker (@cepr) breaks down why our intellectual property system is in desperate need of reform.
Produced by Matthew Kulvicki & Nick Alpha")
![System Change - [ECO]NOMICS Part 4](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/eT0tp3OfF64/mqdefault.jpg "System Change - [ECO]NOMICS Part 4
Encouraged by economists, current mainstream policy on climate change has been too focused on green growth, and reliant on market-based solutions, which have proven inadequate to the challenge. Professor Juliet Shor emphasizes it is time to reject business as usual and build a new economy.
In this fourth and last part of [ECO]NOMICS, Prof. Schor explores the structural changes necessary to live within planetary boundaries.
For starters, we need to improve our understanding of human well-being. Public policy has focused on a single flawed number - GDP - ignoring that higher quality of life can be achieved on other dimensions, like fewer working hours. While growth is essential for poor countries to achieve decent standards of living, after a certain threshold, the incremental benefits of increasing GDP are fewer and unequally distributed. Prof. Schor shows it is both economically and technically feasible to achieve high levels of well-being without fossil fuels.
Climate policy should jettison the growth imperative, but it cannot overlook the equality imperative. We are in a climate crisis because of inequalities of power and resources, both within countries and globally. Prof. Schor outlines what needs to be done to address climate destabilization successfully and efficiently: mandate shifts to clean renewable energy, democratic control of investment flows, and a just transition with equity at its core. The State needs to be at the center of this response. But Prof. Schor warns that concentrations of wealth often translate into control of the State and policy inaction, so we need to also address the distribution of power and democratization. In light of recent tendencies, a large and vigorous social movement may be necessary to spur our governments to act.
Learn more at https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/videos/eco-nomics
Credits: Juliet Schor, Matthew Kulvicki, Nick Alpha, Gonçalo Fonseca, Kurt Semm")
![Sellers Inflation [Isabella Weber]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fjoDjv1R3to/mqdefault.jpg "Sellers Inflation [Isabella Weber]
Is inflation just a number game or does it hold deeper societal implications?
Join Isabella Weber (@UMass.Amherst) as she challenges traditional economic stances on inflation and delves into the social dimensions of pricing. Discover how context shapes our reactions to price hikes and why understanding this can be a game-changer.
Learn more about her work at https://www.isabellaweber.com/
Explore the subject of inflation at https://www.ineteconomics.org/search?q=inflation&sort=date
Produced by Matthew Kulvicki & Nick Alpha")
