Practical Economics - Economic Transformation and Government Reform in Georgia

CID Student Ambassador Mohamed Quamar interviews Nika Gilauri, former Prime Minister of Georgia. Nika talks about his book, Practical Economics, in which he provides a detailed analysis of the reforms made in Georgia from 2004-2012. Interview recorded on February 17, 2017. About "Practical Economics": The book starts by discussing why the Georgian case is exemplary for other countries and proceeds to describe the fight against corruption, the rightsizing of government, the creation of a business-friendly environment, tax and customs reform, the privatization of state-owned enterprises, energy sector reforms, and smart spending approaches applied to welfare, healthcare, education, and procurement. In some cases, the description draws on the experiences of other countries, either because they served as an inspiration for Georgia’s reforms or because approaches pioneered in Georgia were successfully applied there. In a nutshell, this book is an attempt to answer one question: how do you manage a transformation to bring about fast and sustainable growth?

Om Podcasten

Incredible progress has been made throughout the world in recent years. However, globalization has failed to deliver on its promises. As problems like unequal access to education and healthcare, environmental degradation, and stretched finances persist, we must continue building on decades of transformative development work. The Center for International Development (CID) is a university-wide center based at the Harvard Kennedy School that seeks to solve these pressing development problems—and many more. At CID, we believe leveraging global talent is the key to enabling development for all. We teach to build capacity, conduct research that guides development policy, and convene talent to advance ideas for a thriving world. Addressing today’s challenges to international development also requires bridging academic expertise with practitioner experience. Through collaborative, in-country partnerships, CID’s research programs, faculty, and students deploy an analytical framework and context-dependent approaches to tackle development problems from all angles, in every region of the globe.