This volume presents the work of experts (in most cases the very advisers who designed and helped implement the reforms) on the tax reform efforts of a dozen developing nations—from the restructuring of the economy of postwar Japan to the 1986 reforms in Jamaica. Among the many lessons learned from these efforts are that tax reform is most successful when tax administration is a central (rather than peripheral) focus of reform efforts, and when tax reform is specifically directed toward economic rather than noneconomic objectives.
Other conclusions include the apparently mutually reinforcing nature of tax simplification and tax rate reduction, and the role of indirect tax reforms (such as the value-added tax) in successful reform undertakings.

Today the colonial empires of the world are shrinking, and the new nations which have emerged from the colonial past are rapidly developing into an important force in international affairs—the "third world." They are faced by a common problem, the urgent necessity to transform a peasant society into a modern industrial economy, and they are united by a common outlook, absolute opposition to all forms of colonialism and neocolonialism.

In this work Peter Worsley analyzes the unique political forms that have evolved as a result of these two basic conditions. In his view the third world has rejected both of the great ideologies of today. Their new solutions are unique in world history, being based on populism, socialism, and, often, the one-party state, which, although anathema to the Western liberal, is a natural development in societies united by the common enemy of colonialism.

"No one seriously concerned with the greatest problem of our time, the division of the world between the developed, industrialized, 'affluent' countries and les nations prolétaires, can afford to miss this book. . . . Professor Worsley has succeeded in giving us more solid information about underdeveloped parts of the world than can be found in any other book of comparable length."—The Times Literary Supplement

"Peter Worsley . . . has written an excellent descriptive analysis of the evolution and present state of a third force in world politics. Africa, Asia, and the Middle East have . . . given society not only a new philosophy with new goals but charismatic philosophers who have the potential to make the philosophy of the third world a vital presence to be reckoned with. . . . a brilliant book."—Peter Schwab, Journal of Modern African Studies

In 1968 the Third World Liberation Front at San Francisco State College demanded the creation of a Third World studies program to counter the existing curricula that ignored issues of power—notably, imperialism and oppression. The administration responded by institutionalizing an ethnic studies program; Third World studies was over before it began. Detailing the field's genesis and premature death, Gary Y. Okihiro presents an intellectual history of ethnic studies and Third World studies and shows where they converged and departed by identifying some of their core ideas, concepts, methods, and theories. In so doing, he establishes the contours of a unified field of study—Third World studies—that pursues a decolonial politics by examining the human condition broadly, especially in regard to oppression, and critically analyzing the locations and articulations of power as manifested in the social formation. Okihiro's framing of Third World studies moves away from ethnic studies' liberalism and its U.S.-centrism to emphasize the need for complex thinking and political action in the drive for self-determination. 

A major, eclectic work of extraordinary scope and unprecedented vision, The Three Worlds is much more than a study of the contemporary Third World. It examines the constituents of development—cultural as well as political and economic—throughout the world from prehistory to the present.

Peter Worsley first considers existing theories of development, synthesizing the Marxist approach with that of social anthropologists and identifying culture—in the sense of a shared set of values—as the key element missing in more traditional approaches to the sociology of development. Worsley then examines successive forms of rural organization, develops a new definition of the urban poor, considers the relation of ethnicity and nationalism to social class and to each other, and, finally, discusses the nature of the three worlds implied in the term Third World.

This vitally important volume places the problem of wife beating in a broad cultural context in a search for strategies to reform societies, including our own, that are prone to this pernicious form of violence.   Based on first hand ethnographic data on more than a dozen societies, including a number in Oceania, this collection explores the social and cultural factors that work either to inhibit or to promote domestic violence against women. The volume also includes a study of abuse among nonhuman primates and a cross-cultural analysis of the legal aspects of wife beating.   By presenting counterexamples from other cultures, contributors challenge Western assumptions about the factors leading to wife beating. Through a close examination of societies where wife beating is infrequent or absent, To Have and To Hit identifies the factors—economic, social, political, and cultural—that must be explored and transformed in order to combat this violence and eventually eliminate it.
 

This first book of a three-volume study examines the way trade policies in developing countries affect the level and composition of employment. There is special emphasis on the effects of import substitution policies that attempt to make a country self-sufficient by producing local substitutes for imports, as compared with policies that further the expansion of imports.

Ten countries are studied: Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Indonesia, the Ivory Coast, Pakistan, South Korea, Thailand, Tunisia, and Uruguay. The contributors to the volume analyze the link between trade strategies and employment within a common framework, and the analyses of trade policy include the level and structure of protection, the relation of trade policy to labor demand, the labor intensiveness of trade, and the extent of distortions in factor markets and their effects on trade.

Factor Supply and Substitution, the second in a three-volume study entitled Trade and Employment in Developing Countries, extends the analysis of trade regimes and employment both in depth for single countries and through cross-country analyses. It provides important new evidence of the effects of different trade policies and of the effects of the various factors that make up these policies—exchange rates, wages, social insurance and other taxes, credit, prices, and so on. All six studies reflect a carefully coordinated research strategy that has been carried out by a first-rate team. The researchers combine technical expertise with specialized knowledge of the individual countries.

The NBER project on alternative trade strategies and employment analyzed the extent to which employment and income distribution are affected by the choice of trade strategies and by the interaction of trade policies with domestic policies and market distortions. This book, the third and final volume to come from that project, brings together the theory underlying the trade strategies-employment relation and the empirical evidence emanating from the project.

Accomplished political leaders have a clear strategy for turning political visions into reality. Through well-honed analytical, political, and emotional intelligence, leaders chart paths to promising futures that include economic growth, material prosperity, and human well-being. Alas, such leaders are rare in the developing world, where often institutions are weak and greed and corruption strong—and where responsible leadership therefore has the potential to effect the greatest change.

          

In Transformative Political Leadership, Robert I. Rotberg focuses on the role of leadership in politics and argues that accomplished leaders demonstrate a particular set of skills. Through illustrative case studies of leaders who have performed ably in the developing world—among them Nelson Mandela in South Africa, Seretse Khama in Botswana, Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore, and Kemal Ataturk in Turkey—Rotberg examines how these leaders transformed their respective countries. The importance of capable leadership is woefully understudied in political science, and this book will be an important tool in exploring how leaders lead and how nations and institutions are built.