Tag Archives: Policy
Policy & regulatory actions to help achieve Digital Bangladesh
Today I delivered the keynote at well attended workshop on how the Telecom Sector could contribute to Digital Bangladesh. It was organized by the Bangladesh Enterprise Institute. Attendees included the Ministers of Post and Telecom, ICT and Information. The Chair of BTRC and the Secretary of the Ministry of ICT, a key actor in Bangladesh’s [...]
Evidence-based policy advocacy
It was President Truman who wished for a one-armed economist. One who would not qualify every statement, with “on the other hand . . . .” We have taken positions and pushed them hard. That leads to clarity of communication and effectiveness in taking research to policy. But it also creates risk. It’s quite possible [...]
What a government should not do: License renewal in Bangladesh
Sitting at a session in TPRC40 listening to LIRNEasia Research Fellow Faheem Hussain presenting his paper. Impressed that this kind of study, analyzing an issue that is not of great relevance to US telecom policy scholars, is accommodated at TPRC. The challenge, of course, is to pull back from the temptation to give too much [...]
Adventures in behavioral economics
Universal acclaim rarely comes to a theorist who tries to implement his ideas. As administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, he reviewed the rules implementing President Obama’s health care act and the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform law. He backed major environmental initiatives, including higher fuel efficiency standards for cars and [...]
India National Telecom Policy approved
Yesterday, the Indian Cabinet approved the National Telecom Policy, with five changes. I really would like to comment on it (and see if any of our suggested changes were incorporated) but at this point the Department of Telecom site says nothing. So all we have are news reports.
What are the limits of scholarly advocacy?
LIRNEasia’s signature has been a focus, you could even say a single-minded fixation, on taking the results of its research to the policy process. There is a line between evidence-based advocacy and just plain advocacy that we have tried not to cross. The NYT article below, explores that line in the context of Amicus briefs [...]
India overtakes Pakistan in mobile SIMs/100
Since 2004, India has been behind Pakistan on a key indicator: mobile SIMs/100. Few in India wanted to talk about this. But we did. Now finally, India has pulled ahead, as it should. I discuss the reasons in a recent piece done for Pioneer. The loss of momentum for Pakistan started in 2008, and by [...]
Asia Internet Coalition gets going
I recently learned that a colleague, John Ure, who has been active in telecom reforms efforts in Hong Kong for many years, has been appointed to head the Asian Internet Coalition. Appears they have been quite active in East and South East Asia, with emphasis on privacy and intellectual property issues. I hope they will [...]
The workaround that connected Sri Lanka to the Internet
Workaround, a term that describes an improvisation when the optimal solution is not available, is a key element in LIRNEasia’s work. Not that we particularly like them, but it seems that workarounds are all there are in our region, because governments fail to provide the optimal solutions. I was planning to write a short piece [...]
Relevant social science
LIRNEasia has been pretty successful at doing policy-relevant research and communicating the results to the policy process. Interestingly we have gone deeper into the use of statistics over this period, without giving up on institutional analysis. In this context, it is quite interesting to see how the debate is playing out in the context of [...]
Communication for Policy Impact
A clinic on Communication for Policy Impact was conducted by Dr. Rohan Samarajiva, Helani Galpaya and Nilusha Kapugama of LIRNEasia at the recently concluded IDRC PAN-All conference in Penang, Malaysia. The necessity of communicating or disseminating good research results to stakeholders such as the policymakers, private sector and media was one of the underlying themes [...]
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