CMI Briefs

Health workers’ knowledge and skills are much better than their practice suggests. By closing the gap between knowledge and action, the quality of health services will increase substantially.  

Thousands of children die every year from diseases that are easy to diagnose and treat. A study from rural Tanzania shows that health workers usually don’t do those investigations that are required...

Islamic organisations’ role in improving women’s position in society is often dismissed. Instead, they are believed to be devoted to charitable work and entrench patriarchal structures in line with traditional...

Is right-to-health litigation a suitable strategy for advancing the right to health, or does it reinforce inequalities and undermine health authorities in their attempts to control costs and set fair priorities? Colombia...

This brief argues that even a successful reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah will fall short of providing the leadership the Palestinians need. Their domestic legitimacy are simply too frayed. Instead it argues...

تزعم هذه الورقة أنه حتى لو تم تحقيق مصالح ناجحة بين حركتي فتح وحماس، فإنذلك لن يوفر للفلسطينيين القيادة التي يحتاجونها، حيث أن شرعيتهم الداخلية قدتآكلت جداً. وبدلاً من ذلك...

Over the last ten years the new “Emerging Southern Powers” – China, India, Brazil and South Africa – have increased their economic and political engagement in Sub-Saharan Africa. They have introduced new...

In the spring of 2011, dramatic political changes and events took place in the Arab World. The Arab Spring was comprised of popular uprisings and civil unrest across the Arab world. However,...

Improvements having taken place in Maputo between 2007-2010 in the areas of poverty reduction, education, health, water, electricity, sanitation etc. seem – ironically – to have brought further challenges to...

As melhorias que tiveram lugar em Maputo entre 2007 e 2010 nas áreas de redução da pobreza, educação, saúde, água, electricidade, saneamento, etc. parecem – ironicamente – ter trazido mais desafios aos...

Recent elections in Uganda produced the outcome “everyone expected”: President Museveni and the NRM-party won. After 25 years of Museveni in power, the opposition has failed to pose any significant...

In 2004 Angola’s Ministry of Finance and China’s Ministry of Trade signedthe first of several financing packages for public investment projects inAngola. These packages provided for oil-backed concessional loans fromChinese...

On 14 February 2005, former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and 22 members of his staff and security detail were killed by a massive bomb in downtown Beirut. The murder gave...

Gender equality and women’s empowerment are high on the government and donor agendas in Sub-Saharan Africa, but have largely failed to have an impact. Rather than ‘mainstreaming’ gender, more attention...

A igualdade de género e o empoderamento das mulheres estão no centro das agendas do governo e dos doadores na África Sub-Sahariana, mas no geral não conseguiram ter impacto. Mais...

This brief presents the main conclusions from the fourth in a series of six studies monitoring and evaluating Mozambique’s poverty reduction strategy PARPA II by using a combination of quantitative...

Este resumo apresenta as conclusões principais do quarto estudo duma serie de seis de monitoria e avaliação da estratégia de redução da pobreza em Moçambique PARPA II, usando uma combinação...

”Free and fair” elections depend not only on factors like adequate election management bodies, election transparency and the absence of coercion. For election to be truly free and fair citizens...

Once a vibrant and dynamic society, Zimbabwe has since the turn of the millennium gone through a complex multilayered and pervasive series of catastrophes. Political instability, lawlessness, misgovernment and a...

Since the early 1990s, legislative and presidential multiparty elections have taken place in 42 out of Sub Saharan Africa’s 48 states. For a majority, fourth and fifth elections have now...