Joseph E. Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate in economics and University Professor at Columbia University, is a former chief economist of the World Bank (1997-2000) and chair of the US President’s Council of Economic Advisers, was lead author of the 1995 IPCC Climate Assessment, and co-chaired the international High-Level Commission on Carbon Prices.
YANGON – Here in Myanmar (Burma), where political change has been numbingly slow for a half-century, a new leadership is trying to embrace rapid transition from within. The government has freed political prisoners, held elections (with more on the way), begun economic reform, and is intensively courting foreign investment.
Understandably, the international community, which has long punished Myanmar’s authoritarian regime with sanctions, remains cautious. Reforms are being introduced so fast that even renowned experts on the country are uncertain about what to make of them.
But it is clear to me that this moment in Myanmar’s history represents a real opportunity for permanent change – an opportunity that the international community must not miss. It is time for the world to move the agenda for Myanmar forward, not just by offering assistance, but by removing the sanctions that have now become an impediment to the country’s transformation.
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