June 12th, 2012

CDDRL honors student awarded top prize for undergraduate social science research

CDDRL congratulates Otis Reid on being awarded the David M. Kennedy Honors Thesis Prize for his original and rigorous research on the impact of concentrated ownership on the value of publically traded firms on the Ghana Stock Exchange. Reid is a member of the 2012 CDDRL Undergraduate Senior Honors Program. Read more »

July 21st, 2010

Rising international stars: 2010 Draper Hills Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development

Rising leaders from a diverse group of nations in transition, including China, Russia, Ukraine, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, and Nigeria arrived on July 25 for a three-week seminar with Stanford faculty, designed to foster linkages among democracy, development, and the rule of law. Initiated by FSI's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law six years ago, the program has created a network of some 139 leaders from 62 transitioning countries. "Draper Hills Summer Fellows are innovative, courageous, and committed leaders, who strive to improve governance, enhance civic participation, and invigorate development under very challenging circumstances," says CDDRL Director Larry Diamond. The program owes much to the vision and generosity of benefactors William Draper III and Ingrid Hills, emphasize Diamond and CDDRL Deputy Director Kathryn Stoner-Weiss. Read more »

August 18th, 2009

Draper Hills Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development complete training

Rising leaders from some of the world's most challenging nations, including China, Russia, Ukraine, Iraq, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, recently completed a three-week seminar at Stanford as Draper Hills Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development. This year's extraordinary fellows included members of parliament, government advisors, civic activists, jurists, journalists, international development experts and founders of non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The program, now in its fifth year, seeks to foster linkages among democracy, economic development, human rights, and the rule of law, and has received generous gifts from William Draper III and Ingrid von Mangoldt Hills. Read more »

December 1st, 2007

Summer Fellows Program brings civic activists, policymakers to Stanford

Larry Diamond---Hoover Institution senior fellow, CDDRL democracy program coordinator, and former senior advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq---has just discussed causes and consequences of corruption and international efforts to control it with a room full of visiting fellows. This is not just a group of learned political scientists, however, and Diamond does not hesitate to follow a sophisticated piece of analysis with a hard-nosed, view-from-the-ground assessment. He has, for instance, just told the fellows what he thinks of a major development institution. ("I think the World Bank needs to be ripped apart and fundamentally restructured.") He has extended the concept of a "resource curse" to include not just oil but also international assistance. ("In many countries, aid is like oil; it's used for outside rents.") He has recommended that institutions learn the "dance of conditionality" and exercise selectivity, choosing countries to invest in based on demonstrated performance. But the 27 fellows around the table know a thing or two about corruption. Most of them face it in their home countries; many of them have made fighting it part of their work. And almost all of their hands go up to tell Diamond that there is something he missed, or something he got right. Read more »

January 1st, 2007

Bright young stars pursue democracy and development, at home and abroad

In a 1999 article profiling six of "China's bright young stars," the New York Times described Junning Liu as "one of China's most influential liberal political thinkers." Today, sitting in a delegate-style conference room, Liu wants to add a point to Tom Heller's discussion of risk assessment and the role of law in doing business. "There are more businesspeople in Chinese prisons than dissidents," Liu says evenly, with a suggestion of a smile. "So you see--Chinese people mind the situation more than you [the foreign investors] do." Read more »