Country Risks
India: Committed to combating money laundering
A Downgrade of Confidence
Political risks know no vacation. August 2011 will be remembered as a month of misery, not simply because of the politically induced crash on the stock markets during the first two weeks, but also because of the spreading sensation of angst that the industrialized world might be facing a new economic recession. Put in a…
Central Asia – Part II AML/CTF Regimes
Analyzing the Role of Politically Exposed Persons in Tender Projects
A major concern for a company getting engaged in a tender project in a foreign country is the opaque role that Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs) might play through the relationship between business and politics surrounding the project. This article builds on previous explorations of approaches to political risk research, and ties in with the recent…
The UK Bribery Act and the Call for Integrity Due Diligence
The United Kingdom Bribery Act 2010 that came into effect on July 1, 2011, marks a new development in extraterritorial jurisdiction in the context of the worldwide campaign against corruption. This article aims to explore, in how far foreign companies are affected by the Bribery Act and what they can do in order to avoid…
Breaking the Cycles of Violence
Organized violence, be it politically or criminally motivated, poses the most prominent risk to the socio-economic development of a country. Some 1.5 billion people worldwide are affected by violence, a disturbing number, revealed by the World Bank in “The World Development Report 2011: Conflict, Security, and Development”. The Report contains a major shift in focus…
Political Risk and Political Due Diligence (I)
The dramatic and still undecided processes of regime change in the Arab world highlight the fundamental relevance of political risk for doing business in countries that were wrongfully regarded as stable, until the outbreak of civil unrest. Even though political violence in host countries is the most vivid case of political risk, there are other…
Regime Change by the People
The popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt pose the fundamental question of how best to analyze regime change driven by the power of the people. This article explores dynamic patterns of behavior both on part of civil protest movements and targeted autocratic regimes. These patterns of interaction rule the confrontation and its ultimate outcome, and…