Search

After decades of internal conflict, Colombia is experiencing economic growth and urbanization. It remains, however, one of the most socially unequal countries in Latin America. Medellín, acclaimed the most innovative city, implemented large-scale transport infrastructures to link socially excluded areas to the city; new educational and cultural facilities; new public spaces and housing projects, rooted in the Barcelona model. This so-called ‘social urbanism’ has shifted local perceptions, though its socio-economic impact has been questioned. This paper focuses on the less analysed transformations in planning policy and management through two instruments: the Land Use Plan (Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial - POT) and the ‘Plan Parcial’. The research, based on a desktop review, interviews and site visits, examines the application of these instruments in Medellín, reflecting on how they contribute to achieving the aims of ‘social urbanism’. The paper explores the differences between ‘rhetoric’ and practice that are reflected in those between the city’s overarching plan (POT) and the implementation of ‘planes parciales’, focusing on redevelopment, urban renewal and urban expansion. Such differences mirror the deficiencies in the adaptation of the ‘urban project’ Barcelona model in Medellín, and provide the basis for a call to develop ‘social urbanism’ that is genuinely more socially, territorially comprehensive and inclusive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The problem of impunity has dominated the Colombian political landscape against the backdrop of almost non-stop war in the country since independence. The focus here shall be upon impunity in relation to human rights abuses regarding Colombian workers and union members. The central argument is that impunity is socially entrenched in Colombia due to an historical legacy of a weak state, a concomitant lack of institutionalised conflict resolution mechanisms and the stigmatisation of unions as havens for the revolutionary Left. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholarly attempts to explain aid subversion in post-conflict contexts frame the challenge in terms of corrupt practices and transactions disconnected from local power struggles. Also, they assume a distinction between organised crime and the state. This comparative analysis of aid subversion in Colombia and Afghanistan reveals the limits of such an approach. Focusing on relations that anchor organised crime within local political, social and economic processes, we demonstrate that organised crime is dynamic, driven by multiple motives and endogenous to local power politics. Better understanding of governance arrangements around the organised crime–conflict nexus which enables aid subversion is therefore required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article estimates the impact of Familias en Acción, a human development conditional cash transfer programme, on adult labour market outcomes in urban areas in Colombia. Relying on a regression discontinuity design and a large panel dataset, the article finds significant, largely positive, but heterogeneous programme effects on labour market outcomes. The findings suggest that antipoverty transfers enable a re-allocation of household productive resources among participant households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The knowledge of the innovation–productivity relationship in Latin America, and particularly in the Colombian service sector, is scant. In this study, we explore such relationship comparing the Colombian service industry with manufacturing. Following the Crépon-Duguet-Mairesse empirical approach, the four major findings are as follows: Indeed, Colombian service firms undertake (technological and nontechnological) innovation processes. Regardless of the industry, the probability of innovation increases when there is investment in research and development (R&D) labs and firms are large. The more intensive innovation investment is, the higher the probability of innovation implementation. Finally, labor productivity is enhanced after the introduction of innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We study the use of labour markets to mitigate the impact of violent shocks on households in rural areas. Because the incidence of violent shocks is not exogenous, the analysis uses instrumental variables. As a response to violent shocks men decrease the time they devote to off-farm agricultural activities and increase off-farm non-agricultural activities, while women decrease their leisure time and increase the time they devote to household chores and childcare. Labour markets appear unable to fully absorb the additional labour supply. Policies in conflict-affected countries should aim to prevent labour markets from collapsing. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Whether or not Colombia has improved is a controversial topic. If improvement has occurred, what, if any, lessons from the Colombian model can be learned? The first lesson is that Colombia's problems were caused more by a weak state than by drugs. The second lesson is that improving state capacity requires more than just increased security. The state must also provide the basic social services that citizens require to gain and maintain their support. Additionally, government institutions need to improve their professionalism, protect human rights, and root out impunity and corruption. The alternative is to suffer from new cycles of violence as old foes are vanquished, but new ones emerge. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a simple ordered probit model to analyse the monetary policy reaction function of the Colombian Central Bank. There is evidence that the reaction function is asymmetric, in the sense that the Bank increases the Bank rate when the gap between observed inflation and the inflation target (lagged once) is positive, but it does not reduce the Bank rate when the gap is negative. This behaviour suggests that the Bank is more interested in fulfilling the announced inflation target rather than in reducing inflation excessively. The forecasting performance of the model, both within and beyond the estimation period, appears to be particularly good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we modelled the Colombian long run economic growth (1925-2003) using a two-regime first order Markov switching model. We found evidence of nonlinearity in the annual rate of economic growth. The results show that changes between regimes are sudden and sporadic. The Colombian economy remains in the sustainable growth regime most of the time. The turning points from the Markov switching model capture very well the behaviour of real output through time. In fact, they identify the four main depressions of the century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the relationship between manufacturing exports and firm performance in Colombia from 1981 to 1991. Effect of trade openness on economic growth; Details of the strategy used by Colombia as a response to the collapse of the international trading system during the Great Depression; Determinant of Colombian manufacturing exports in the 1970s and 1980s; Differences between the levels of exporters and non-exporters.

Interest in regional vector autoregressive models (VARs) stems from the recognition of the varying economic behaviour of different regions, the desire of provincial and local governments to design improved development policies and improve budget plans, and the desire of business firms to produce better market strategies. These studies do not take into account certain recent developments in the analysis of time series data. Specifically, the importance of testing for unit roots and possible cointegration between economic time series in a seasonal context has not yet been considered in the formulation of a regional VAR model. This paper adds to the relatively small literature regarding the VAR forecasting performance and causality testing between economic variables at the regional level. In this study, the formulation of the model is based on appropriate testing for the presence of unit roots and cointegration, with due allowance for the use of seasonal data. The data used in this study comprise quarterly series for the period 1961.1 to 1995.2. The end of quarters are March, June, September and December. The series chosen for the analysis are employment, prices and real GDP for the BC economy and real Canadian GDP.

This paper argues that we need to broaden the understanding of political economy beyond the circulation of 'things' so as to include forms of production, transformation and exchange of meanings. To illustrate the argument, the paper focuses on the contradictory encounter between two regimes of representation in nineteenth-century Colombia: the 'will to civilization' and laissez-faire. Because political economy was founded upon the desire to civilize classes, races and gender, the premises for laissez-faire could not be achieved. Arguments about local artisanship, the causes of poverty or the international division of labour were embedded in distinctions between the local and the European: ignorant artisans were contrasted with English workers, theory was preferred to reality and coarse textiles were compared to imported ones. Negative representation of female and Indian dresses increased the desire for imported textiles, which in turn led to the displacement of local manufactures in favour of European ones. In those nations imagined as deprived of civilization, the idea of a self-regulatory principle did not prosper. In Colombia, the formation of gender, class and racial identities within the 'will to civilization' regime of representation arrested the formation of an 'indifferent' capitalist labour market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent empirical studies have discredited the hypothesis that there exists a strong, or even reliable, relationship between expenditures by income class and the distribution of income. A weakness in all of these studies is that the composition of firm size in each industry is not permitted to vary in response to a redistribution of income. This paper examines the importance of such an aggregation bias. Within the framework of a partially closed input-output model for Colombia, the following question is posed. To what extent will a fiscal redistribution favouring the poor be reinforced if the poor (rich) purchase their goods and services exclusively from small (large) firms in every industry? Reinforcement in these circumstances is found to be substantial: a dollar of income transferred to the poor will ultimately raise their incomes by as much as two, or perhaps even three, dollars. There may thus be a high payoff to designing future expenditure surveys that are linked directly to the firm size characteristics of the supplier. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts an explanation for the low rate, of growth of employment in Colombia's manufacturing sector. It provides evidence that this phenomenon can be explained in large part by the effects on output growth of the industrialisation pattern fostered by trade policies. Although the paper does not refute the alternative hypothesis that low labour absorption has resulted from distortions in factor prices, it does argue that the evidence for this hypothesis is weak, and that estimates of the elasticity of substitution between capital and labour obtained by regressing output per worker on wage rates may reflect the shift in output from small to large firms which accompanies modernisation, rather than actual substitution possibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the demand for energy in the Cauca River Valley of Colombia. Factors which the rapid expansion of the industry in the Valley appears to have been related; Description of the process of economic growth in the Upper Cauca Valley; Estimates of the relative importance of fuel use and electricity use in industry.