Most of the global economy is now subject to positive economic trends: unemployment is falling, output gaps are closing, growth is picking up, and, for reasons that are not yet clear, inflation remains below the major central banks’ targets. On the other hand, productivity growth remains weak, income inequality is increasing, and less educated workers are struggling to find attractive employment opportunities.

There are 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which aim to tackle problems including poverty, hunger, disease, inequality, climate change, ecological degradation, and many others in between. Clearly, 17 is too many. As Frederick the Great supposedly said, “He who defends everything defends nothing.” Similarly, those who emphasize everything emphasize nothing.

The world is becoming increasingly urbanized, as more people are choosing to live in towns and cities than ever before. The trouble is, most urban areas are unprepared to manage the influx.

Since the 2008 financial crisis, policymakers and international institutions have regularly expressed concerns about widening income inequality and its unwelcome political consequences. More often than not, they attribute the problem to “exogenous” factors such as global trade and new technologies.

As the Chinese Communist Party’s 19th National Congress has unfolded, much of the focus has been on who will occupy the key positions in President Xi Jinping’s administration for the next five years. But China’s future trajectory depends crucially on another group of leaders, who have received far less attention: the technocrats who will carry out the specific tasks associated with China’s economic reform and transformation.

 In July 2014, in its Ethio¬pia Economic Update entitled ‘Strengthening Export Perfor-mance through Improved Com¬petitiveness’ the World Bank advised the Ethiopian government to devalue its currency to speed up the growth of exports. Empirical evidence presented in this report suggests that a 10Pct lower real exchange rate could increase export growth in Ethiopia by more than five percentage points per year and increase eco¬nomic growth by more than two percentage points.