NEOM is Saudi Arabia's new mega city project. You can find the article here.

"What made the Chinese SEZs successful was their more decentralised, bottom-up nature, according to Lotta Moberg, a macroeconomic analyst at William Blair and author of The Political Economy of Special Economic Zones: Concentrating Economic Development. “What you had in China were business interests and others who wanted to do business between China and Hong Kong,” she told me in an interview. “They managed to lobby the right people who would reach the upper echelons of the government to grant these kinds of concessions.”Shenzhen’s reforms were not driven by the central state, instead, it was a product of local interests and local lobbying. “The institutional foundations of the Chinese examples created different dynamics from what is likely to occur in Neom, which is largely directed by the government,” said Moberg. Shenzhen was a response to demand, whereas Neom is an attempt to solve the ruling family’s political problems."

Here are my comments, which I supplied for this article, where they have been translated into Vietnamese:
“Lotta Moberg, PhD, Analyst at William Blair & Co. LLC
Most SEZs are political projects. Vietnam has many reforms that it should pursue country wide. Instead, it is happening within confined areas in the form of zones. There are two ways to interpret the government’s choice to pursue SEZs:

1. There is not enough political support for broader reforms, so SEZs is the best among feasible solutions.
   • If this is the reason, the people protest against the zones suggest that it has not been successful. The government will need to show the people that they benefit from it. If not the job creation and supply chain effects are evident enough, they should consider setting up a scheme where the people get checks from the government’s proceed s from the zones.
2. The government may pursue SEZs to look like reformers when they are actually trying to avoid reforms.
   • This is a common rationale for SEZs. The protests against the zones suggest they may not be the right way to go. More-general reforms may evoke less opposition  while also being less economically distortionary than SEZs tend to be. The government is nevertheless pursuing SEZ because it makes them look like reformers and they can point to particular projects ad take credit for them. Meantime, they can maintain the level of protectionism in the rest of the country that prevails today.

Which one of these two reasons for the SEZ is correct in this case matters. In the first case, SEZs may be the best thing for the country. In the second, they should be opposed to the benefit of general reforms.“

Link to the podcast is here. You can subscribe to the Podcast series though Itunes or most of your favorite podcast apps.

​The Center for Innovative Governance Research is an innovative non-profit organization dedicated to promote better governance. It is run by Mark Lutter (twitter). 

Videos for the Startup-Societies Summit were posted on the organization's Facebook page. Here is one panel, discussing the Jones Act and other goodies. Here is a short talk by me, starting at 26 minutes. And here is another panel. Here is me chatting after the conference.

Link to the summit is here.
The discount code for me is "speakerfriend". 

Available on YouTube here.

Made available at the Facebook page of the Institute for Competitive Governance.
.FB link to talk.

I am speaking on special economic zones and policy lessons for the United State's foreign trade zones. Location is Chapman University, Orange County.
From the symposium description:  

"Countries across the world have sought to encourage growth by creating Special Economic Zones (SEZs) that operate under different rules from the surrounding area. In the United States, these take the form of Foreign Trade Zones (FTZs)--secure areas located in or near its ports of entry, such as harbors or airports, but outside of its customs or duties territory, legally speaking. Despite the growing popularity of such zones, however, and their unusual features, they have largely escaped the attention of legal scholars.
​How do SEZs fit within conventional models of state authority? Does the extra-territorial status of U.S. FTZs, and their special tax statute, raise constitutional issues? Should the United States reconsider the growing popularity of FTZs or leverage their success to create new and even more comprehensive special jurisdictions?"

Link to previous sympsia here.

 The Startup Societies Foundation is hosting a conference at Georgetown in Washington D.C. The event was initially planned for January 19-20, but had to be postponed. Updates will follow with the new date.

Self recommended! The venue will "discuss the importance of special jurisdictions, blockchain technology, and green infrastructure in rebuilding Puerto Rico."

I am speaking on the 20th at 11:30 am. Link to the conference here. And you can gett your conference tickets here.

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