Vox’s Global Crisis Debate

Today VoxEU.org is launching a new initiative – the Global Crisis Debate.

We are partnering with the UK government to collect the views of economists from around the world on how to fix the global economy. The analysis and proposals that appear on Vox's "Global Crisis Debate" page will feed directly into the UK's preparation for the April summit of world leaders in London. This debate will be featured on the UK government's own web site, LondonSummit.gov.uk, which also goes live today.

1) To broaden the discussion into a truly global debate.

The crisis debate has, to date, been largely dominated by a narrow range of economists from a fairly limited set of nations. The Global Crisis Debate will allow economists from around the world to share their analysis, views, and perspectives via the “Commentary” feature.

We have two main filters to avoid the ‘comment clutter’ typically seen on fully open forums. First, only professional economists can post Commentaries, and they must include their real name and professional affiliation in each Commentary. (First time writers must have their bona fides verified, but we hope to turn these around in less than 24 hours.) Second, each Commentary must be substantial, i.e. 200-1000 words.

2) To make the Global Crisis Debate the dominant intellectual forum on the crisis and ways to redress it.

The plan is to use the connection to the UK’s preparation of the April Summit to leverage Vox’s intellectual and reputational capital. Apart from feeding directly into the UK’s preparation of the April summit agenda, the UK website that will surely be read by decision makers from around the globe in the run-up to the April meeting. The Global Crisis Debate will continue well beyond the April summit.

The Global Crisis Debate has 5 themes:

·     Development (Moderator: Dani Rodrik)

·     Macro (Moderator: Philip Lane)

·     Regulation (Moderator: Luigi Zingales)

·     Institutional reform (Moderator: Francesco Giavazzi)

·     Open markets (Moderator: Richard Baldwin)

The Scientific Committee consists of Hadi Soesastro (Jakarta) and Barry Eichengreen (Berkeley).

The Editors invite all professional economists to write 200-1000 word Commentaries on the crisis. These need not be original (for example you might cut-and-paste-and-update a recent column posted or published elsewhere); our aim is to agglomerate all the best thinking in one place to better foster dialog and exchange.