The current debate in Europe has pitted proponents of structural reforms (to make governments more efficient and the environment for enterprise more business-friendly) against those who see fiscal austerity as hurting rather than helping. The World Bank has just completed a comprehensive report on the European economic model. Its findings shed light on this debate. The report documents the achievements of the European growth model over the last 50 years. Accounting for the stresses it is experiencing and the longer-term challenges that Europe will face, the report evaluates the principal components of the model: Trade, Finance, Enterprise, Innovation, Labor, and Government. The discussion during the webinar will help participants identify the main adjustments needed to make European finance work better, to better facilitate enterprise in parts of Europe which have begun to lag, and to address the shortcomings of Europe's labor markets and governments.

Meeting climate change goals requires significant efforts to diffuse existing technologies and to develop and deploy new ones. Public and private investment need to be ramped up by a combination of “technology-push” and “market-pull” policies. Diffusing low carbon technology requires much more than shipping ready-to-use equipment to developing countries; it requires building absorptive capacity and enhancing the ability of the public and private sectors to identify, adopt, adapt, improve, and employ the most appropriate technologies. In this webinar, Dr. Nathan Hultman, Director of Environmental Policy program at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, and Fellow at the Brookings Institution, explains the importance of innovation in the energy sector and how innovation policies can support a transition towards a low carbon economy.

The rapid rise of China and India is reshaping our global economic and environmental systems – raising major issues of stability, governance, and sustainability. This webinar will discuss framework that shows the interdependence between economic size, trade, finance, technology, environment, security, and global governance. Mr. Dahlman uses this framework to provide data on the speed of global power shifts and to trace the implications for nations worldwide.

Speaker: Carl J. Dahlman, Luce Professor of International Relations and Information Technology at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service

Georgetown University.

The analysis of the economic growth of cities is no different from that of countries: High performing cities, which can serve as engines of growth, are those that excel at mobilizing resources from domestic and external sources and channeling them into productive tradable activities with the greatest longer term potential. Moreover these are cities that are successful in maximizing productivity growth through efficiency gains, by building human and research capital and through innovation. The "engines" that have demonstrated the most traction and staying power are also the ones that have complemented supply push with demand for their products and services from within and beyond national borders. Becoming and remaining an engine of growth calls for a central - municipal strategy that coordinates macro with sectoral and industrial policies which the webinar will explore with examples from East Asia and elsewhere.

The monthly Webinar Series on “Cities as Engines of Economic Growth” provides a forum for leading experts, policy makers and the private sector to discuss timely topics on city competitiveness. The first event in this series will be delivered by Professor Stanley Nollen from the Georgetown University, McDonough School of Business. He will discuss the main findings from his paper on “Improving City Competitiveness: City Management and the Business Climate” which was prepared as part of this initiative.

Professor Nollen will apply a business perspective to the question of how to make cities competitive. What do cities need to become globally competitive? What can city leaders do to generate sustainable economic growth through the channel of attracting private investment, especially foreign businesses? Research show that cities need one or more of the following features in their location to be competitive: (1) attractive factor conditions, especially for labor; (2) large or growing and well-functioning product markets; and (3) conducive investment climate. Cities within the same country vary significantly on their competitiveness, suggesting there is scope for local city leaders to make a difference. While one city cannot and need not achieve top ranks on all dimensions of city competiveness, the most frequently occurring features of most competitive cities are good human capital, well-functioning markets and institutions, good infrastructure, and good government.

Urban flooding is a serious and growing development challenge, particularly for the residents of the rapidly expanding towns and cities in developing countries. Against the backdrop of demographic growth, urbanization trends and climate changes, the causes of floods are shifting and their impacts are accelerating. Direct impacts from major events represent the biggest risk to life and property. Indirect and often long-term effects, such as disease, reduced nutrition and loss of livelihoods, also erode community resilience and development goals, as does the need to constantly cope with regular, more minor, flooding. The poor and disadvantaged often suffer the most from flood impacts.

Cities and Flooding: A Guide to Integrated Urban Flood Risk Management for the 21st Century gives practical technical guidance to key policy and decision-makers and technical specialists in cities in developing countries. The Guide provides forward-looking operational guidance on how to manage the risk of floods in a quickly transforming urban environment and changeable climate. It takes a strategic approach to managing flood risk, in which appropriate measures are assessed, selected and integrated in a process that both informs and involves the full range of stakeholders. Robust solutions can contribute to flood risk reduction, while at the same time create opportunities to promote better and more sustainable urban development. Visit http://www.gfdrr.org/urbanfloods to learn more.

In the face of ongoing global financial turmoil, governments that wish to sustain PPP programs are having to innovate and fill financing gaps that have arisen because of the declining appetite of banks for long-term lending for PPPs. This webinar will look at approaches governments around the world are using to tap into new sources of financing for PPPs and to design innovative structures that combine public support with private finance to maximize value for money.

This webinar session will present key findings of the Mayor's Task Force on Climate Change, Disaster Risk and the Urban Poor which has developed a set of broad actions that cities can undertake to build resilience particularly for those at greatest risk. Among these are i) a cost effective approach to understanding risk in cities, ii) ways to integrate climate change and disaster risk reduction policies for the poor into urban planning and management, iii) approaches for building institutional capacity to deliver basic services and reduce vulnerability to climate and disaster risk, iv) examples of how communities and local governments to work together on local solutions, and financing opportunities for cities.

At 4:30 am on the morning of Sunday December 11, 2011, some 36 hours later than the official closing time, the 17th meeting so the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (or COP-17) came to an end in Durban. The 194 participating countries arrived at broad agreement on a new legal instrument (or on an “agreed outcome with legal force”), called the Under the Durban Program for Enhanced Action. What are the implications of this agreement for future actions on climate change, particularly in developing countries? Are the proposed actions to stop 21st Century warming from exceeding the desired maximum of 2° Celsius or better?

In this webinar, we will outline the key outcomes of the Durban Conference. We will touch on the agreement to negotiate a global deal by 2015, which would be effective by 2020 with "legal force" applying to all countries. We will summarize the developments under the Kyoto Protocol, and the possible impacts on carbon markets as we know them. We will discuss the emerging framework of the Green Climate Fund and review possible time-lines. We will also review other key developments that should be of interest.

The recent social unrest and political uprisings in the Middle East have underscored the perils of high rates of unemployment, especially among youth. Youth unemployment is high in all regions of the world, much higher than adult unemployment. In 2010, the world average for youth unemployment was 12.6 percent, roughly 2.5 times higher than that of adults.

This webinar will discuss some of the key issues and policy challenges relating to employment creation and workforce development for youth. It describes trends in the labor market for youth, and raises some key issues that policy makers will need to address in trying to reduce the high unemployment rates among youth.