We’re excited to introduce the 1st cohort of Next-Geo - our new research & training program for the next generation of geoeconomists. Funded by @stiftungmercator.bsky.social and implemented in cooperation with @cepr.org, @oxfordecondept.bsky.social & IEP@Bocconi!

www.thestandard.com.hk/sup/national... "Several Hong Kong politicians reminded the public that the government maintains a zero-tolerance stance toward acts endangering national security and urged all sectors of society to stay highly vigilant."

Christian missions in colonial Congo weakened kin and ethnic ties, eroded communal values, and durably redirected loyalties toward religious affiliation, from @abergeron.bsky.social https://www.nber.org/papers/w34262

The Flemish government’s unexpected decision not to renew IOB’s agreement puts €2.64M funding, 32 jobs, key programmes and global partnerships at risk. Support us! https://bit.ly/saveIOB #saveIOB #developmentpolicy #developmentpolicy #iobcommunity

Over the next 18 months, the United States will overhaul its role in global health. A new state department policy, published on Friday, outlines a slower, more orderly pullback than this year’s abrupt closure of USAID.

Anne Applebaum on the war everyone chooses to forget: www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

I've been working on a new tool, Refine, to make scholars more productive. If you're interested in being among the very first to try the beta, please read on. Refine leverages the best current AI models to draw your attention to potential errors and clarity issues in research paper drafts. 1/

"...Anciens Établissements Eiffel had originally planned to send the materials to Vietnam to build railway bridges. However, due to France's withdrawal and the Cold War, these materials were instead sent to Taiwan by the US as aid for the construction of the Central Cross-Island Highway."

Finally read the @thelancet.com article claiming US foreign assistance cuts will lead to 14mill deaths up to 2030 which has garnered much media attention. It's problematic to say the least, X-country regression with mortality on left and US spending per head on right. 1/ 🧵

Just published in @jpube.bsky.social: "Landmines: The local effects of demining" By Mouno Prem, Miguel E. Purroy, & @jvargas.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... #econsky

New R package alert: 📦 mbg for model-based geostatistics Run spatial ML & geostatistical models to estimate continuous surfaces from point data + raster covariates. Built on sf, terra, data.table, caret, and R-INLA. https://cran.r-project.org/package=mbg #rspatial #rstats #geostatistics

❓Why do the Nordics & Dutch speak English so much better than the Germans, Italians & French? ➡️ New Working Paper: Out-of-School Learning: Subtitling vs. Dubbing and the Acquisition of Foreign-Language Skills w/ F. Baumeister & E. Hanushek www.nber.org/papers/w33984 A 🧵 1/12

Researcher assumptions shape not just how experiments run—but what questions we ask. Outlining best practices for designing context-aware lab experiments in non-Western settings, from Sara Lowes and @nathannunn.bsky.social https://www.nber.org/papers/w33981

Subjects who play the risky but efficient action in a simple coordination game are more likely to cooperate in repeated games: susceptibility to strategic uncertainty matters for cooperation, from Pedro Dal Bó and Guillaume Fréchette https://www.nber.org/papers/w33980

Great report on Uganda’s economic and political interests in Eastern DRC—its competition with Rwanda, tactics to secure its influence, and ties with Nande elites. Very informative!

Derrière le "deal" à la Trump entre la #RDCongo et le #Rwanda "l’exportation de minerais à l’état brut rappelle le pacte colonial d’autrefois, lorsque le cuivre et l’uranium étaient extraits du Katanga pour être traités en Belgique" écrit Colette Braeckman dans l'edito de notre lettre hebdomadaire⤵️

"We use our estimates on the impact of Gavi funding on child mortality to calculate the number of lives saved by Gavi support, which is approximately 1.5 million lives." Kartini Shastry & Daniel Tortorice's research highlights the importance of Gavi ⤵️ voxdev.org/topic/health...

With the price of gold climbing to new records every month, eastern Botswana has become inundated with unlicensed miners who are reopening old mines to scrape for leftovers. They leave behind gaping holes, eroded grasslands and water sources contaminated by the mercury used to extract gold.

the culprit here is variation in the size of geographic units being displayed. One possible way to try to overcome that is to interpolate to a consistent zonal system bsky.app/profile/paul... knaaptime.com/urban_analys...

Here's the text version of that investigation into Rwanda's covert three-and-a-half-year war in Democratic Republic of Congo. It was a pleasure working alongside the team at NBC. www.nbcnews.com/world/africa...

"Organized #crime groups in #Africa have embedded themselves in #gold supply chains to such a degree that they now present “a serious global threat,” a new #UN report warned" www.semafor.com/article/05/2...

📚 Who protects artisanal miners? This literature review delves into how formal and informal associations shape social protection in eastern DRC’s artisanal mining sector—where miners often view cooperatives as both support and source of conflict. loom.ly/ycRetnU #ArtisanalMining #SocialProtection

You can get announcements about new economics working papers in your field(s) in various ways: email, Mastodon, BlueSky (see started pack below) nep.repec.org #RePEc #Economics

What do Kenya’s refugees think of the aid cuts that slashed rations and services? Dadaab Voices – a project between The New Humanitarian and Radio Gargaar – spoke to 10 refugees about how it’s impacting their lives.

📉 Global trust is in crisis A new WIDER Working Paper by @apvjustino.bsky.social and Melissa Samarin reveals how declining trust in governments and between people is weakening the social fabric in countries around the world. 📄 Read the paper: go.unu.edu/LqJgS...

What happens when we view protests not as static episodes, but as dynamic contests with distinct phases—rising tensions and potential concessions? Read today's article w/ Sofía Correa to learn more:

🚨 New publication 🚨 : Happy to share that my paper, "Losing Touch: The Rhetorical Cost of Governing" is now forthcoming at @cpsjournal.bsky.social. Short 🧵 about the paper here 👇 1/10

The more you analyze a big data set, the less big it seems... #econsky marketdesigner.blogspot.com/2025/05/susa...

With USAID funding terminated, thousands of life-saving programs have lost billions. To help fill the gap, the Project Resource Optimization (PRO) team—hosted by @cgdev.org—is mobilizing private funding to keep cost-effective, high-impact efforts alive: www.cgdev.org/blog/buildin...

Is it "good" or "bad" when skilled people leave low-income countries? We summarized the evidence in favor of "brain gain" vs. "brain drain": www.science.org/doi/epdf/10.... Ungated PDF: johanneshaushofer.com/research

Very excited about this special issue of the Journal of International Economics on Geoeconomics. Submission deadline September 15, Conference at Stanford February 2026. Hoping to include papers across a number of fields!

Looking forward to participating in the conference at my alma mater! esoc.princeton.edu/events/2025/...

Wrote about the start of John Mahama's ambitious GoldBod play in the latest edition of @thecontinent.org Full issue here: thecontinent.org

The UN is abuzz over donor cuts. A leaked UN80 paper proposes reforms to make it “more streamlined, impactful, and fiscally responsible” but diplomats warn it could fall flat. @richardgowan1.bsky.social explains. www.crisisgroup.org/global/can-u...

"Taiwaneseness is a complicated concept. The island has been colonised by various empires: the Dutch, the Spanish, the Qing dynasty, and the Japanese... Running roughshod over the local population’s feelings...He put the island under martial law, which lasted four decades."

"Many members of local armed groups (including CODECO) are at the same time artisanal miners." "Landownership, customary land rights, and access to land in general, are important drivers of conflict in eastern DRC...Mining is intrinsically linked to land." ipisresearch.be/publication/...

"China’s grey-zone tactics are designed to exploit the third factor, which is the chronic dysfunction of Taiwan’s politics. While few Taiwanese want to be part of a communist-run China, their politics suffers from a toxic blend of polarisation and complacency." www.economist.com/leaders/2025...

"#Türkiye is #Africa 's top supplier, with a total of 32 agreements, 28 of which have occurred since 2021" Last picture - check out three-border area between #Mali, #Burkina & #Niger africacenter.org/spotlight/dr...

What are the impacts of economic sanctions on informal employment? @rnistico.bsky.social and Ali Moghaddasi Kelishomi investigate that using the case study of Iran. Read about their findings here: go.unu.edu/lqJKF

Forthcoming in the AER: "The Long-Run Effects of Government Spending" by Juan Antolin-Diaz and Paolo Surico. www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...

The battle for Darfur is nearing a bloody endgame and setting the stage for what many fear could prove a de facto partition of Sudan. www.crisisgroup.org/africa/horn-...

It's been 5 years since Lennart Kaplan and I initiated the @3dseminar.bsky.social. We're incredibly grateful for the many outstanding speakers, for the great support of our partnering institutions and for the amazing audience whose continued interest and participation has kept the series going.

Amid Trump's trade war, the debate over TSMC's strategic investment intensifies. (KMT retreated to Taiwan after losing the civil war and has shifted to a pro-unification, pro-China stance. They now hold the majority in Taiwan's Legislative Yuan, while the president is from the DPP.)

Once again, there are casualties and injuries from a Russian strike.Children have been killed. Another blow to the psyche of an entire nation living in a constant state of tension& pain —every time our people are killed Today,many are crying,feeling fear,anger,exhaustion.Today, I have no words left

NEW PHOTO ESSAY | The Spillover of Sudan’s War into Eastern Chad War in Sudan has pushed about one million refugees and returnees into isolated and impoverished parts of neighbouring Chad. We visited the region to learn how it is coping with the influx. www.crisisgroup.org/africa/horn-...

🆕 The uneven reach of the state: Using machine learning to map local state presence Today on VoxDev, Gustav Agneman (NTNU), Christoffer Cappelen (NTNU), Kasper Brandt (Kraka Economics), and David Sjoberg (Epista Life Science) outline research on sub-Saharan Africa: voxdev.org/topic/method...