Stanford University

Poverty

New FSI initiative expands global research opportunities for students

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Zack Bonzell came to Stanford with a strong interest in human biology and political science. Last summer, the undergraduate had the chance to fuse his interests while doing field research with faculty at the university’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI). 

During a two-week internship, he travelled to Guatemala with FSI senior fellows Paul Wise, Beatriz Magaloni, Alberto Díaz-Cayeros and Scott Rozelle to learn about the country’s rural health care system by shadowing doctors and interviewing mothers in an impoverished area about the issues leading to the area’s high rates of child malnutrition.

“That experience was an ideal way to blend my interests and gave me a better idea of how to craft my course of study at Stanford,” said Bonzell, who is now a junior. “One of the things that really struck me was when Paul Wise said the health outcomes we were seeing are the result of extreme material deprivation. These people are sick because they are poor. That gave me more of an interest in political economy.”

Students conduct interviews about nutrition with REAP in China. Photo Credit: Matt Boswell

FSI is now expanding its educational opportunities for students, like Bonzell, who want to do research on global issues in Asia, Latin America, Europe and Africa.

The Stanford Global Student Fellows program (SGSF) is being funded in large part through a $1.25 million anonymous gift that will help grow existing programs and create new offerings for graduates and undergraduates.

“This program deepens FSI’s commitment to its mission of educating the next generation of leaders in international affairs,” said FSI Director Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar. “It also offers outstanding opportunities for Stanford students to work closely with the leading thinkers on global policy issues.”

The program, which is part of FSI’s efforts to expand student opportunities, will build on the institute’s undergraduate mentorship programs that allow students to work on faculty research projects each quarter. Those positions will now be available during the summer. Some of the positions will be connected to projects in FSI’s new International Policy Implementation Lab, an initiative that gives students a close-up view of how academics and policy influencers can address some of the world’s thorniest issues.

PoliSci 114S students work together in a UN conflict simulation. Photo Credit: Rod Searcey

Building on FSI’s experience placing students in research opportunities, the program will create and expand summer field research internships. The two- to six-week internships this summer will give undergraduates the opportunity to work with FSI senior fellows in China, Guatemala, India and Mexico who study global health, conflict resolution, governance and poverty reduction.  In coming years, the program will likely include additional fieldwork projects in Rwanda, Tanzania and Brazil. The SGSF program covers all travel expenses for students and provides students with an opportunity to work closely with a faculty member and a team of other students on an ongoing research project addressing real-world problems in a specific region. 

“What makes FSI such an incredible institution is that it attracts faculty who have very pragmatic interests,” Bonzell said. “It seeks to wed academic work with a more direct impact, and there’s a lot of potential for more students to think along similar lines.”

The Stanford Global Student Fellows will also allow FSI to work closely with its partners, including the Program in International Relations, the Haas Center for Public Service, and Stanford in Government to provide opportunities for graduate and undergraduate students. 

Mexican Ambassador Eduardo Medina Mora and Jorge Olarte, '13, speaking with students at the US-Mex FoCUS event. Photo Credit: Rod Searcey

One of the program’s new initiatives geared toward undergraduates is the Global Policy Summer Fellowships. The fellowships help secure placement and a $6,000 stipend for students interested in interning at international policy and international affairs organizations. This summer,The Europe Center at FSI is placing students at the Center for European Policy Studies and Bruegel, two Brussels-based think tanks. Future positions will be created with six offerings abroad and two based in the United States.including the Program in International Relations, the Haas Center for Public Service, and Stanford in Government to provide opportunities for graduate and undergraduate students. 

The Stanford Global Student Fellows program will also commit $400,000 to create a Mentored Global Research Fellowship that will provide research opportunities for students to conduct their own overseas research under the close mentorship of a faculty member. The program will award stipends of $6,000 for summer undergraduate projects and $9,000 for summer graduate projects, and $1,500 for smaller projects executed during the school year.

Thomas Hendee '13 chatting with children in rural Guatemala. Photo Credit: Maria Contreras

The faculty advisory committee overseeing the development and implementation of these new programs includes Scott Rozelle, the Helen F. Farnsworth Senior Fellow and the co-director of FSI’s Rural Education Action Program; Stephen Stedman, a senior fellow at FSI and the deputy director of CDDRL; and Lisa Blaydes, assistant professor of political science.

The application deadline for all summer programs is Feb. 28, 2015. The deadline to apply for academic quarterly programs is the end of the first week of each quarter, beginning in the fall of 2014. 

For more information, students should contact Elena Cryst at ecryst@stanford.edu and watch for postings on FSI’s student program Facebook page. Students can also sign up for the program’s distribution and announcement list.

 

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Contemporary Challenges in Global Public Health: A Discussion on How Health is an Integral Aspect of the Overall Development and Sustainability Landscape

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For nearly 70 years, CARE has been serving individuals and families in the world's poorest communities. Today, they work in 84 countries around the world, with projects addressing issues from education and healthcare to agriculture and climate change to education and women's empowerment. Helene Gayle, president and CEO of CARE USA, will discuss her work with CARE and her experiences in the field of international development. Dr. Gayle will discuss how access to global health is integral to CARE's effort in addressing the underlying causes of extreme global poverty.

Dr. Michele Barry, director of the Center for Innovation in Global Health, will moderate a conversation between CARE President and CEO, Dr. Helene Gayle and former Prime Minister of Norway and United Nations Special Envoy, Dr. Gro Brundtland. 

This event is sponsoredy by CARE USA, the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law and the Haas Center for Public Service.

A reception will follow the event. 

Dr. Gro Brundtland Bio:

Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland is the former prime minister of Norway and the current deputy chair of The Elders, a group of world leaders convened by Nelson Mandela and others to tackle the world’s toughest issues. She was recently appointed as the Mimi and Peter E. Haas Distinguished Visitor for spring 2014 at the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University. Dr. Brundtland has dedicated over 40 years to public service as a doctor, policymaker and international leader. She was the first woman and youngest person to serve as Norway’s prime minister, and has also served as the former director-general of the World Health Organization and a UN special envoy on climate change.

Her special interest is in promoting health as a basic human right, and her background as a stateswoman as well as a physician and scientist gives her a unique perspective on the impact of economic development, global interdependence, environmental issues and medicine on public health.

 Dr. Helene Gayle Bio:

Helene D. Gayle joined CARE USA as president and CEO in 2006. Born and raised in Buffalo, New York, she received her B.A. from Barnard College of Columbia University, her M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.P.H. from Johns Hopkins University. After completing her residency in pediatric medicine at the Children's Hospital National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., she entered the Epidemic Intelligence Service at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, followed by a residency in preventive medicine, and then remained at CDC as a staff epidemiologist.

At CDC, she studied problems of malnutrition in children in the United States and abroad, evaluating and implementing child survival programs in Africa and working on HIV/AIDS research, programs and policy. Dr. Gayle also served as the AIDS coordinator and chief of the HIV/AIDS division for the U.S. Agency for International Development; director for the National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention, CDC; director of CDC's Washington office; and health consultant to international agencies including the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank and UNAIDS. Prior to her current position, she was the director of the HIV, TB and reproductive health program for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Hewlett 201
Hewlett Teaching Center
370 Serra Mall
Stanford, CA 94305

Dr. Gro Brundtland Mimi and Peter E. Haas Distinguished Visitor Panelist Haas Center for Public Service, Stanford University
Dr. Helene Gayle President and CEO Panelist CARE USA
Michele Barry Director Moderator Center for Innovation in Global Health
Conferences

Governance of Public Health in Mexico

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Abstract:

Around the world, public health interventions have dramatically changed the life chances of millions. Life expectancy has increased, and fewer children die prematurely at an early age. However, health performance is characterized by large inequalities. Patients are often treated with little dignity, particularly when they are poor. And health systems tend to be relatively unaccountable to citizens. The project “The Governance of Public Health in Mexico” seeks to offer citizens, researchers and policy makers a set of tools that may enable them to evaluate, visualize and interpret the performance of the Mexican health system from a bottom up accountability perspective. The presentation will center around the development of a municipal dashboard that allows for the measurement of the relative performance of local governments in health, and the use of visualization tools to understand the epidemiological profiles of municipalities, based on the methodology of the Global Burden of Disease.

Speaker Bio:

Alberto Diaz-Cayeros joined the FSI faculty in 2013 after serving for five years as the director of the Center for US-Mexico studies at the University of California, San Diego. He earned his Ph.D at Duke University in 1997. He was an assistant professor of political science at Stanford from 2001-2008, before which he served as an assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles. Diaz-Cayeros has also served as a researcher at Centro de Investigacion Para el Desarrollo, A.C. from 1997-1999. His work has primarily focused on federalism and economic reform in Latin America, and Mexico in particular. He has published widely in Spanish and English. His forthcoming book is entitled Strategies of Vote Buying: Democracy, Clientelism and Poverty Relief in Mexico (with Federico Estevez and Beatriz Magaloni).

Encina Ground Floor Conference Room

Alberto Díaz-Cayeros

Encina Hall, C149
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305

(650) 725-0500
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Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Professor, by courtesy, of Political Science
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Alberto Díaz-Cayeros is a Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), and co-director of the Democracy Action Lab (DAL), based at FSI's Center on Democracy, Development and Rule of Law (CDDRL). His research interests include federalism, poverty relief, indigenous governance, political economy of health, violence, and citizen security in Mexico and Latin America.

He is the author of Federalism, Fiscal Authority and Centralization in Latin America (Cambridge, reedited 2016), coauthored with Federico Estévez and Beatriz Magaloni, of The Political Logic of Poverty Relief (Cambridge, 2016), and of numerous journal articles and book chapters.

He is currently working on a project on cartography and the developmental legacies of colonial rule and governance in indigenous communities in Mexico.

From 2016 to 2023, he was the Director of the Center for Latin American Studies at Stanford University, and from 2009 to 2013, Director of the Center for US-Mexican Studies at UCSD, the University of California, San Diego.

Affiliated faculty at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law
Co-director, Democracy Action Lab
Director of the Center for Latin American Studies (2016 - 2023)
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Alberto Díaz-Cayeros Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Associate Professor, by courtesy, of Political Science Speaker
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Has the Food Price Bubble Burst?

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A reception in the lobby of Encina Hall will follow the event.

Bursting the Bubble: A Long Run Perspective

What are the long run drivers of global food prices? Given current market developments, what are the prospects for food price changes over the coming decades?

Thomas Hertel is Distinguished Professor of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University, where his research focuses on the global impacts of trade, climate and environmental policies. In 2013 he was awarded the inaugural Purdue University Research and Scholarship Distinction Award.  Professor Hertel is a former Cargill Visiting Fellow at the Center on Food Security and the Environment at Stanford.

Dr. Hertel is a Fellow, and Past-President, of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association (AAEA). He is also the founder and Executive Director of the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) which now encompasses more than 10,000 researchers in 150 countries around the world (http://www.gtap.org). This Project maintains a global economic data base and an applied general equilibrium modeling framework which are documented in the book: Global Trade Analysis: Modeling and Applications, edited by Dr. Hertel, and published by Cambridge University Press in 1997.

Professor Hertel’s most recent research has focused on the impacts of climate change and mitigation policies on global trade, land use and poverty. During the 2011-12 year he was on leave at Stanford University, where he was engaged in inter-disciplinary research on these topics.

Previously, Professor Hertel has conducted research on the impacts of multilateral trade agreements, including the linkages between global trade policies and poverty in developing countries. His book: Poverty and the WTO (co-edited with L. Alan Winters) received the AAEA Quality of Communication award. Other AAEA awards include: Distinguished Policy Contribution and Outstanding Journal Article.

If the Food Price Bubble Burst, Would It Matter?

What are the economic and political implications of a bursting of the food price bubble?

Johan Swinnen is President of the International Association of Agricultural Economists, a Fellow of the AAEA (Association of (the US) Agricultural and Applied Economists ); a Fellow of the ERAE (European Association of Agricultural Economists). He is also President of The Beeronomics Society. He holds a Ph.D from Cornell University and a Honorary Doctorate from the Slovak Agricultural University.

He is currently Visiting Professor at the Centre for Food Security and the Environment at Stanford University and (since many years) Professor of Economics and Director of the LICOS-Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance -- a Centre of Excellence -- at the KU Leuven, Belgium. He is also Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Brussels, where he directs the programme on EU agricultural and rural policy.

He was previously Lead Economist at the World Bank and Economic Advisor at the European Commission. He is a regular consultant for these organizations and for the OECD, FAO, the EBRD, and several Governments and was coordinator of several international research networks on food policy, institutional reforms, and economic development.

He has published widely on political economy, institutional reform, trade, global supply chains, product standards, agricultural policy and global food security. His publications have appeared in leading academic journals, such as the Journal of Economic Literature Science, and Nature.

This lecture is the first installment of FSE's Food and Nutrition Policy Symposium Series.

Bechtel Conference Center

Johan Swinnen

LICOS Center for Transition Economics
K.U.Leuven
Deberiotstraat
34 3000 Leuven, Belgium

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Professor at the University of Leuven (KUL) in Belgium. Research Affiliate, Rural Education Action Project, FSE Visiting Scholar
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Johan Swinnen is Professor of Development Economics and Director of LICOS Center for Institutions and Economic Performance at the University of Leuven (KUL) in Belgium. He is also Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Brussels, where he directs the programme on EU agricultural and rural policy. From 2003 to 2004 he was Lead Economist at the World Bank and from 1998 to 2001 Economic Advisor at the European Commission.

He is a regular consultant for these organizations and for the OECD, FAO, the EBRD, and several governments and was coordinator of several international research networks on food policy, institutional reforms, and economic development. He is President—Elect of the International Association of Agricultural Economists and a Fellow of the European Association of Agricultural Economists. He holds a Ph.D from Cornell University.  

His research focuses on institutional reform and development, globalization and international integration, media economics, and agriculture and food policy. His latest books are “Political Power and Economic Policy” (Cambridge Univ Press),  “The Perfect Storm: The Political Economy of the Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy” (CEPS),  “Global Supply Chains, Standards, and the Poor” (CABI), “Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in the Transition Economies of Europe and Central Asia” (World Bank Publications), and “From Marx and Mao to the Market” (Oxford University Press -- and Chinese translation by Beijing University Press). He is the president of The Beeronomics Society and editor of the book “The Economics of Beer” (Oxford Univ Press).

Johan Swinnen Professor of Development Economics and Director of LICOS Center for Institutions and Economic Performance at the University of Leuven (KUL) in Belgium Speaker

Thomas Hertel

Center on Food Security and the Environment
473 Via Ortega, room 365
Stanford, CA 94305-4205

(650) 721-2203
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Cargill Visiting Fellow
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Hertel is a Distinguished Professor of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University. His research focuses on the economy-wide impacts of global trade and environmental policies with a particular interest in the impacts of energy and climate policies on global land use and poverty. He is also Executive Director, and founder of the Center for Global Trade Analysis, and Past-President of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association (AAEA).

During his stay at Stanford he undertook research into the impacts of climate change and climate policy on agriculture, food security and poverty. In the winter quarter he co-taught an FSE seminar (with David Lobell) on the long run determinants of global agricultural land use.

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Thomas Hertel Distinguished Professor of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University Speaker
Lectures
Food and Nutrition Policy Symposium Series

Strengths and weaknesses of the smallholder oil palm sector in Cameroon

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The present study is an evaluation of the current strengths and weaknesses of the oil palm smallholder sector in Cameroon, or more precisely of the non-industrial sector, as some holdings owned by elites can reach hundreds of hectares. A randomized sample of oil palm producers was chosen after categorization into elites, migrants, natives and company workers (past and present) in four palm oil production basins in the Southern part of the country. 176 semi-structured questionnaires were administered. The production basins included: Eseka, Dibombari, Muyuka, and Lobe. Results from the study revealed that elites owned larger average areas (41.3 ha) than the other categories of oil palm producers. All categories recorded low average plantation yields, ranging from 7 to 8.4 t FFB/ha/year (with minimum yields of 3 t FFB/ha). Though the elites showed better bargaining power and higher income, all categories of producers faced similar problems such as the high cost of inputs with no governmental subsidies, the difficulty in accessing loans with low interest rates and the use of rudimentary working tools. Despite such weaknesses, the sector also demonstrates some strengths such as the ability to impose little threat to the primary forest when compared to agro-industrial plantations, the availability of a domestic and sub-regional market for red palm oil, the availability of artisanal mills with low extraction rates although able to generate more income for the producers. There is a need for governmental policies that will strengthen partnership between small and medium oil palm producers and agroindustries as it was the case during the Fonader period, in order to converge with the poverty reduction strategy initiated by the government of Cameroon.

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Oil crops and supply chain in Africa
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Poverty and Violence: The Hidden Plague the World Has Missed

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We invite you to join Gary Haugen, former director of the UN investigation of the Rwanda Genocide and President and CEO of the International Justice Mission, to discuss his latest book The Locust Effect: Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence. Haugen will discuss the devastating impact that everyday violence is having on the global fight to reduce poverty and how we can help make the poor safe enough to thrive. Haugen has been recognized by the U.S. State Department as a Trafficking in Persons “Hero” – the highest honor given by the U.S. government for anti-slavery leadership. Book purchase and signing available.
 

Book purchase and signing available.

 

This event is sponsored by: IJM, Bay Area Anti-Trafficking Coalition & the Stanford Program on Human Rights.

 

For more Information please contact:

Betty Ann Boeving   bettyann@baatc.org

 

 

 

 

Bechtel Conference Center

Gary Haugen President and CEO of International Justice Mission Speaker
Conferences

Information, College Decisions and Financial Aid: Evidence from a Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial in China

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Past studies find that disadvantaged students in the United States are often misinformed about college costs and financial aid opportunities and thus may make sub-optimal decisions regarding college. This information problem may be even more serious in developing countries. We therefore conducted a cluster-randomized controlled trial to examine the effects of providing information on college costs and financial aid to high school students in poor regions of northwest China. We find that information increases the likelihood that students receive some types of financial aid. Information also positively affects the choice to attend college but does not seem to affect more specific college choices.

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Economics of Education Review
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Prashant Loyalka
Scott Rozelle

Neglected Rural Public Health Issue: The Case of Intestinal Roundworms

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Despite increasing institutional and financial support, certain public health issues are still neglected by the Chinese Government. The present paper examines the soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infection and reinfection rates by conducting a survey on 1724 children in Guizhou Province, China. Our results indicate that 37.5 percent of children had been infected with one or more of the three types of tested STH. However, only 50.4 percent of children reported having taken deworming medicine during the 18-month period before the survey. Of those who reported being dewormed, 34.6 percent tested positive for STH infections. Poverty and number of siblings are significantly and positively correlated with infection and reinfection, and parental education is significantly and negatively correlated with infection and reinfection. Given the ineffectiveness of treatment in these areas to date, for anthelminthic campaigns to actually succeed, China must pay more attention to locallevel incentives to improve children’s health.

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China & World Economy
Authors
Alexis Medina
Scott Rozelle
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