EuropaWorld 13/7/2001Lawlessness is Linked to Poverty Says World Bank President

Speaking in St Petersburg this week World Bank President James D. Wolfensohn called on governments and the international community to recognise that an effective legal and judicial system was not a luxury, but a key component of a well-functioning state and an essential ingredient in long-term development. According to Wolfensohn empirical evidence shows a large, significant and causal relationship between improved rule of law and income of nations, and also between law and literacy, and reduced infant mortality. The difference in income per capita and in reduced infant mortality can be about 3 to 1 between a country with relatively good rule of law institutions and those with inadequate institutions, he said.

Addressing more than 350 judges, parliamentarians, scholars, lawyers, government and civil society representatives from 75 countries, gathered in this city for the Second Global Conference on Law and Justice, the World Bank President said that the rule of law was essential in the fight against corruption, to the empowerment of the poor - especially women - and the proper functioning of the economy.

"There can be no good and clean government without respect for the rule of law, nor transparent and well-functioning financial markets, nor equitable and sustainable development," Wolfensohn said. "What do legal and justice systems have to do with powerlessness, vulnerability and lack of opportunity? Almost everything: the quality of the legal norms in a society and the manner in which they are administered have clear and direct impacts on the extent to which citizens have a voice in the government decisions that affect their lives, the extent to which there are official safety nets and mechanisms that help them cope with economic and natural shocks, and the ways open to them to overcome disadvantages and to grasp opportunities."

We need to think through, he said, how the rule of law needs to be improved in developing and transition countries to deal most effectively with three key dimensions of poverty - powerlessness, vulnerability and lack of opportunity. "Only with progress in all three of these areas will poverty reduction be possible. Only with poverty reduction will peace be possible: an unequal planet will be a planet of war and violence. What we are discussing is not a course in jurisprudence - it is the basis of peace itself. It is at the core of the future that we will leave our children."