China, India, US & Pol Eco of Pollution Statistics

We've been conditioned to believe that Chinese cities are the world's most polluted. After all, what would you expect from an authoritarian regime that brooks no dissent--especially about how damaged the environment is? With China becoming the world's factory--it seems every other consumer good is made there nowadays--this expectation is further reinforced. We all know who the environment's bad guys are...or do we, really?

Well surprise, surprise: actually, the country with the dubious distinction of having the most polluted cities in the world in terms of air quality is India, not China. Yes, precisely--the world's largest democracy that supposedly focuses on "clean" services like business process outsourcing is numero uno globally. The World Health Organization stats speak for themselves after I chart the concentration of particulate matter 2.5 micrometers or smaller in the air of these cities (PM2.5) that are particularly dangerous since they can penetrate deeply into our lungs. More information from the 2014 report can be found here. The top 15 are:

As per the country's travel campaign, it's incredible India although not in the manner intended. There's not even a contest going by this measure since Beijing, China ranks 77th worldwide among WHO monitoring stations (a PM2.5 of 56). As you can see, it's almost a lockout for the Indian subcontinent save for Qatar and Iran. Yes, Beijing PM2.5 peaks at unbelievably high levels with some regularity, but on average, particulates in these cities on the Indian subcontinent are much more plentiful. Statistically speaking, fixating on Chinese pollution by mentioning Beijing's spikes in PM2.5 is unwarranted. True, China is plenty polluted in many other ways--water, arable land and so forth--but on the measure it is most commonly criticized on, there are others doing much worse.

What, then, explains popular beliefs that China is the world's most polluted country? There is likely a political economy of statistics at play. The United States--a large democracy and service-oriented economy just like India--would of course prefer that a communist and authoritarian system be blamed for intolerably high pollution. CCP authorities hide how bad the situation is, etc. Hence the American Embassy in Beijing providing its own air quality stats to "embarrass" Chinese authorities over their environmental destruction:

Despite Beijing’s widespread reputation of having some of the most polluted air of any major city in the world, an examination of daily pollution figures collected from both cities suggests that New Delhi’s air is more laden with dangerous small particles of pollution, more often, than Beijing’s. Lately, a very bad air day in Beijing is about an average one in New Delhi...

The United States Embassy in Beijing posts on Twitter the readings of its air monitor, helping to spur awareness of the problem. The readings have more than 35,000 followers. The United States does not release similar readings from its New Delhi Embassy, saying the Indian government releases its own figures [my emphasis].

Aside from the questionable assertion that the Chinese government does not collect its own pollution figures, that Indian authorities do is also a convenient excuse:

“It’s always puzzled me that the focus is always on China and not India,” said Dr. Angel Hsu, director of the environmental performance measurement program at the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. “China has realized that it can’t hide behind its usual opacity, whereas India gets no pressure to release better data. So there simply isn’t good public data on India like there is for China.”

Putting 2 and 2 together, the picture we arrive at is that American scaremongering about Beijing's air quality is undoubtedly responsible for part of this misplaced focus. In order to bash an ideological rival, it harps on pollution in a city whose pollution isn't nearly as bad as that of others--like chummy India whom it shares nuclear technology with. Petty American political points scoring, however, distracts focus from where the real problems lie. What to do with air pollution on the Indian subcontinent is a particularly urgent one for serious-minded people to tackle. If you are genuinely concerned about the environment, blindly listening to frivolous Americans will lead you astray. I won't even go into who exactly buys all those China-made products.

The political economy of pollution statistics it is.

Screw Asian Dev't Bank: PRC's Asian Infra Invsmt Bank

The PRC looks to storm ADB strongholds.

What's a country to do with (nearly) $4 trillion in FX reserves? To paraphrase Captain Kirk, China has boldly gone where no other country has gone before in accumulating them since Japan at full pomp "only" had slightly over $1 trillion; Japan now has about $1.3 trillion. Obviously, buying friends and subsidizing people is on the agenda--witness China in Africa--but this approach has its drawbacks. First, precisely because they are viewed as PRC-only endeavors, others are suspicious of its motives. Second, there is limited interaction with international institutions China seeks to be more influential with in going it alone.

Hence, China's recently mooted plans to set up an Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) to address both these points. The PRC has made limited inroads at the region's multilateral lending institution, the Asian Development Bank (ADB).  After all, the ADB cast of characters aren't Japan's natural allies: the largest shareholders in the ADB are Japan and the United States. Meanwhile, it is headquartered in the Philippines, the nation that has taken China to  court over its, how should I put this, expansive territorial claims over warnings not to "internationalize" the dispute. So if you can't join 'em, beat 'em by setting up your own regional lender. As for the present ADB ownership structure:

As of 31 December 2013, ADB’s five largest shareholders are Japan (with 15.7% of total shares), the United States (US) (15.6%), People’s Republic of China (6.5%), India (6.4%), and Australia (5.8%). ADB members who are also members of OECD hold 64.6% of total subscribed capital and 58.5% of total voting power.

This Bloomberg article makes much of China having territorial disputes with India, but then again, it has them with a lot of folks--add Brunei, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines "Taipei," Vietnam and so forth. To ensure this bank is not viewed as someone's pet project--it is, but similar criticisms can be leveled against the ADB--the supposed plan is for China to provide half the $50B over a period of five years with other Asian nations contributing the rest:

The planned bank was first announced by Chinese President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang during visits to Southeast Asia last October as part of efforts by China to boost its regional clout. The planned bank would have start-up capital of US$50 billion, half of which will be contributed by China and the rest by other Asian countries. China estimates fund contributions would hit $50 billion billion within 5-7 years, and the bank would then be ready to become a channel to fund infrastructure projects with a low [interest] rate.

The Chinese foreign minister proposing the AIIB is none other than the former chairman of the China Investment Corporation (CIC) sovereign wealth fund, Lou Jiwei. CIC started with a cool $200B, but its capitalization has increased to $500B. So, who's to say that AIIB is not going to increase in size over time if it fulfills its role in serving Chinese interests?

When he was appointed CIC chairman, a minister-level post, he was put in charge of investing US$200 billion. The fund is now valued at US$500 billion thanks to additional capital injections from the government and heavy dividend payouts by the biggest state-owned banks, and has recorded an annualised 5.03 per cent return since its inception.

Lou, 62, kept a low profile while CIC chairman, but the sovereign wealth fund became involved in several controversies due to unsuccessful investments and the blocking of some attempts to acquire foreign assets.

Just as China proposes the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) to counterbalance the TPP, so does it put forward the AIIB idea to set up an alternate, China-centric group of development and trade institutions. What is its unique selling proposition? Simple: aside from offering substantial fresh loanable funds, it will impose few to no conditionalities and will certainly not insist on Western-style "good governance" so beloved by ADB folks:

The AIIB will differ from the ADB by focusing on building infrastructure rather than prioritizing poverty reduction, Lou said at the Boao Forum in April. The bank is unlikely to attach political conditions to its loans due to Beijing’s policy of not interfering in other countries’ internal affairs, according to Zhao Jianglin, a researcher with the National Institute of International Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciencesin Beijing.

Territorial disputes aside, the Indonesians are already eyeing it...

China’s recent initiative to establish the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is a potential game-changer. Indonesia has welcomed this initiative and stated its intention to participate in the new development bank. The AIIB can be expected to accelerate investment in economic infrastructure to boost Asia’s productivity.

...and so are the Thais for megaprojects:

Thailand can tap the Chinese-initiated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) as a funding source for its infrastructure megaprojects now that the 2-trillion-baht borrowing bill has been derailed by the Constitutional Court, says a senior Finance Ministry official. Somchai Sujjapongse, director-general of the ministry’s Fiscal Policy Office, said establishing the AIIB, whose function would be to fund infrastructure projects in the region, could be a boon to countries that need funding for their infrastructure developments.

The Chinese are quite canny in focusing on infrastructure. Not only can they (conveniently) claim that they are not in competition with the ADB which is more into poverty alleviation, but they also can tap a widely-shared need throughout the region for infrastructure lending. Heck, even its territorial disputants can probably be swayed by that. If the Chinese can provide technical assistance on top of it all, then AIIB would represent a formidable new international institution in comparison to the ADB which has been around since 1966.

White Man's e-Burden: Can Facebook & Google Save the World?

Don't fret; the male and pale will sort out us backward colored people with tech.

There is an outdated naivete behind the conceit that the world's social problems can be solved by technological fixes. In development studies, this idea exemplifies the modern idea that "progress" has put in mankind's reach solutions to problems our predecessors could not solve. I certainly wish that were the case, but the world is infinitely more complicated than that. For a number of years now, tech people have fixated on the notion that the Internet is as close to a magic bullet to sociopolitical woes as you can get in this day and age. If the "digital divide" were bridged, then us unenlightened coloreds could be just as civilized as they are.

Despite the abject failures of OLPC, "Twitter revolutions" and all sorts of schemes to improve the plight of humanity, we keep going back to the same modern premise that a game-changing technology is all it takes to solve all sorts of sociopolitical problems. Even if most Americans have moved on to a Battlestar Galactica view of the world, Silicon Valley bigwigs that matter are still in Star Trek mode. Hence this space cadet competition between Facebook and Google to come up with increasingly outlandish ideas for providing Internet access to benighted places of this world. Witness Google's plans to fly balloons over Internet-challenged parts of Africa. Not to be outdone and to be even more up-to-date, Facebook plans to fly drones instead. Behold, variations on the white man's e-burden:


Iain Marlow captures the ludicrousness of the idea that Silicon Valley can remotely pilot development from African skies in order to not get involved with, gee, real live Africans. I've heard of top-down development thinking that views poverty as a technological problem, but these grand plans will literally take it to new heights. When Google Maps currently slights Africa because there are not enough Starbucks in the Sahel, wouldn't it make sense to be at least concerned with what's happening on the ground so commerce worthy of Google's attention finally brings recognition to the continent?

[T]he ideas gain outsized attention (and funds and credence) by playing on simplistic assumptions by people who know absolutely nothing about the situation on the ground. There are thousands of smart Africans already working in technology in Africa, and doing amazing things, and I don’t hear many of them talking about balloons and drones (except those other sorts of drones)...
 
Why do Google and Facebook want to soar over extremely complicated but opportunity-rich countries such as Nigeria, Mali and the Central African Republic? The answer is obvious: They want to avoid the messy realities on the ground...

Like with the one-laptop-per-child idea and other lofty “connectivity” schemes, the ideas and goals of these types of ideas tend to misdiagnose the problem and then dramatically over-promise on results. By the time these plans come to fruition, everyone has generally moved on to something else, and the original euphoria is forgotten.

There are two unexamined premises here IMHO. The first one Marlow brings up elsewhere in his article is that Internet access is not yet available to those who need to make use of it--especially in Africa. The second one I am more concerned with is that Internet access automatically implies development. Once more, aren't there potentially more cost-effective fixes that directly tap into the local knowledge and ingenuity of Africans and others in "emerging markets" instead of remotely piloting progress? There is no mystery about the popularity of TEDx to crowds of mostly white people where glib and slick presenters proffer tech fixes to problems us thick coloreds haven't been able to come up with since we are so technologically backward. What would their reception be outside of NorCal among people who have to live with the complexities of everyday life in the third world?

Speaking of which, for people so keen on changing the world for better, I suggest that they look at what's happening in their own backyard, the Bay Area, to see whether their presence is making a positive impact. It seems to me that these tech types are merely reinforcing the inequality and racialization they profess to abhor in NorCal as their transportation and even their garb are continually under attack.

How does the saying go? Think globally, act locally. If these tech firms have worsened rather than improved social problems in their own communities, what makes them think they can fix problems on a global scale? It is typical American hubris unaccompanied by any track record to back it up.

UPDATE: Google now discloses that its employees are predominantly male and white. I am unsurprised especially given their naivete in addressing poverty issues.

A Visit to Dartmouth

I will be talking at a public event, along with Jared Bernstein, at Dartmouth on Monday.  If you are in the area and want to attend, information is available here.

Alan Krueger

The Princeton Alumni Weekly profiles the former CEA chair.

Leno, Branson & Brunei: On Boycotting Shari'a Law

Can Jay Leno and other white people "save" us foreign primitives from shari'a law?

Life is a series of endless annoyances you just wish would go away. This latest brouhaha started when big-chinned American funnyman Jay Leno publicized his boycott of the landmark Beverly Hills Hotel which is part of the Dorchester Collection hotel chain owned by the Sultan of Brunei. His recent implementation of shari'a law in Brunei has provoked an outcry among Western activists. Instead of blowing away, however, it's gotten worse as the glitterati have followed suit. The Hotel Bel Air which is also part of the Dorchester Collection has also been targeted. Not to be outdone, Sir Richard Branson decided to wade into the fray by prohibiting all Virgin employees from patronizing the sultan's properties--including the flagship Dorchester Hotel favored by the late Michael Jackson--citing "human rights violations."

I have four points:

(1) Ignorant Westerners living in their white people's worlds and applying their biased interpretations of morality on others is hardly unusual. Shari'a law with its--how shall we say--vivid punishments is a favorite target of Westerners since these include storing to death of adulterers and homosexuals. However, there is a not-insignificant difference between the literal interpretation of shari'a law and the punishments most commonly meted out. Take for instance, how shari'a is followed in the UAE:

Consider the courts' interpretation of family law. The UAE mandates that Sharia is used as the primary legal justification on matters involving family legal issues. But the UAE personal status law, which covers marriage, divorce and succession, also states in Article 1 that "the law shall apply to all UAE nationals except where non-Muslim UAE nationals have special rules relating to their specific creed or sect".

What's more, Article 1 adds that the law will apply to non-UAE nationals as well, unless they choose their own law. Elements of the nation's criminal code offer similar distinctions. For instance, payment of blood money in the event of a death or injury is allowed according to Sharia. Crimes such as the desertion of Islam, fornication, murder, theft, adultery and homosexuality - all crimes classified as "Al Hudud" in Arabic - are punishable by predetermined penalties (flogging and arm amputation among them). And yet some emirates have suspended Al Hudud provisions pursuant to their rulers' decrees and replaced the Sharia penalties with jail terms and fines as determined by the law according to each case respectively [my emphasis].

I am less concerned with the archaic punishments a literal interpretation of shari'a demands--the Old Testament is hardly more palatable in this respect to modern eyes. Rather, less concern should surround a country's legal system adopting aspects of shari'a law--usually the civil code--and  more with what punishments are actually meted out. Not having sentenced anyone to death by stoning for adultery yet--the sultan's brother, the dissipated wastrel Prince Jefri, should be first in line with his global philandering [1, 2]--Brunei still has the benefit of the doubt.

(2) If these Westerners were truly aghast at shari'a law in any way, shape or form, then their boycott should not only be confined to tiny Brunei. In the UK, it puzzles me why the Emiratis have not been subject to the sort of boycott the sultan has when Emiratis bankroll even more visible bits of the UK in the football clubs Arsenal (which plays at the Emirates Stadium) and Manchester City (which is owned by a member of Abu Dhabi's royal family). Doing so would bring football, the country's most-watched sport, to an absolute standstill since Manchester City looks likely to win this year's championship while Arsenal gains another Champions League berth. British royal warrants notwithstanding, Sir Richard Branson and his high society pals should also refrain from shopping at the world's most famous department store, Qatari owned Harrods. Similarly, Virgin Atlantic ought to stop flying out of Heathrow airport since it's part-owned by the Qataris.

In America, even the right-wingers at Breibart have a laundry list of other concerns that should be boycotted if shari'a law was to be avoided at all costs. Me, I'll stick to Jay Leno's other passion here--collecting automobiles. With so many big-engined exotic cars to fuel up in his garage, how sure is Jay Leno that his petrol has not been sourced from Kuwait, Saudi Arabia or another homosexual-hating hydrocarbon supplier? Last I checked, Saudi alone supplied 13% of US-consumed oil, likely making Leno a rather famous consumer of products originating from a shari'a law-abiding nation (20% come from the "Persian Gulf"). To be safe on the safe side, he should also sell all his Ferrari car(s) since the automaker has a longstanding commercial tie-up with Abu Dhabi, including a theme park.

(3) Implicitly, there is also this typically condescending Western conceit that they "know better" about the barbarity of others and have a responsibility to "save" us colored people from our despotic rulers. Did it ever occur to them that some Muslims actually prefer the implementation of shari'a law--especially in civil matters? It is not uncommon for even predominantly non-Islamic countries to bow to such wishes granting shari'a courts powers of interpretation over these matters.

From Political Science 101, there is this notion of political legitimacy. Jay Leno and others only focus on extreme punishments not usually meted out by shari'a courts. Would so many people--especially in non-Islamic countries--tolerate or even demand these courts if the decisions made were completely out of line with people's expectations? I do not believe so. Rather, most courts issue rulings that pass muster even in non-Islamic countries which sufficiently meet the expectations of Islamic and other communities. In other words, the operation of these courts passes the test of legitimacy. Granted, some rulings may be abhorrent to Western sensibilities, but consider first what citizens' expectations are of their legal systems. Just because rulings are made by "authoritarian" figures does not mean they are bereft of popular support. If Brunei's citizens want to turf Sultan Bolkiah over enacting shari'a law, then it's their call and not anyone else's.

(4) If Jay Leno, Richard Branson and all these busybody celebs were truly concerned with human rights violations, then they should focus less on a country which hasn't stoned a single offender to death but rather their own countries that actually commit human rights violations on a massive scale. The United States invades other countries on false pretenses resulting in tens of thousands of deaths and then leaves them worse off in the name of democracy and freedom. It also kills innocent people indiscriminately the world over via drone strikes in the name of the global war on terror.

Complain if you will with the interpretation of shari'a law, but at least there is due process. The United States reserves the right to indefinitely detain and Guantanamo Ghraib people without any legal recourse whatsoever, Americans included. Unlike a certain other government, Brunei's doesn't abduct persons in 50+ countries Boko Haram-style and torture them somewhere else. Speaking of excessive punishment, there is also the matter of the United States jailing a larger proportion of its own people than any other country on earth--especially African-Americans not lucky enough to be well-off, white activists who have all the time in the world to pick on things of limited consequence outside the Beverly Hills Hotel.

Following the Gandhian principle of "peaceful disobedience"--he's, like, big in Hollywood since his biopic won 8 Oscars--I suggest that Jay Leno and his followers stop paying taxes to the US government which inflicts death and misery worldwide on an unprecedented scale instead of picking on a country that *may* issue an inhumane punishment in the future. My guess is they won't because they pick targets that are easy to demagogue against.

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Bottom line for these Western activists: As sung by the late Michael Jackson, if you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make that change.  Start with your own country since these holier-than-thou attitudes certainly don't impress us after years and years of American hypocrisy. It's "We the People," right? The IPE Zone does not suffer religious intolerance gladly  coming from Western left-wing or right-wing crusaders. They are too secure in their smug self-superiority. In the end, however, their differences are small since they share largely similar, narrow-minded whitebread views of the world.

To show you just how asinine these protests are, some desperately uninformed soul wearing designer shades [natch] in Leno's protest is seen urging Brunei to be excluded from the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) expansion negotiations. My dear, Brunei is a founding member of the TPP. Your country is merely trying to join it. Should your country press for what you suggest, it's far more likely that Brunei will "kick out" the United States. As many a blog post here will attest, Americans are this proud of parading their ignorance for all the world to see.

Rogoff on Piketty

Here, via Project Syndicate.  A tidbit:

Would Piketty’s followers be nearly as enthusiastic about his proposed progressive global wealth tax if it were aimed at correcting the huge disparities between the richest countries and the poorest, instead of between those who are well off by global standards and the ultra-wealthy?