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Doing Business, An Independent Evaluation : Taking the Measure of the World Bank-IFC Doing Business Indicators

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  • Independent Evaluation Group

Abstract

Doing Business (DB), the annual World Bank- International Finance Corporation (IFC) benchmarking exercise launched in 2004, is one of the Bank Group's flagship knowledge products. It aims to measure the costs to firms of business regulations in 178 countries and ranks the countries along 10 dimensions. It also aims to advance the World Bank Group's private sector development agenda by motivating and informing the design of regulatory reforms, enriching international initiatives on development effectiveness, and informing theory. By ranking countries and spotlighting both leaders and laggards, DB has attracted the interest of senior policy makers and is claimed to have inspired reforms on business climate issues. DB's lively communications style has helped give the DB indicators an international profile. The report has five sections: the first chapter reviews the intellectual underpinnings of the DB indicators. The second chapter reports on how DB collects and assembles data. The chapters third and fourth discuss the relevance of the dimensions measured by the exercise and their use inside and outside the Bank. And finally, chapter fifth presents findings and recommendations.

Suggested Citation

  • Independent Evaluation Group, 2008. "Doing Business, An Independent Evaluation : Taking the Measure of the World Bank-IFC Doing Business Indicators," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 6467, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbpubs:6467
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Jorge García García & María Mercedes Collazos & Enrique Montes Uribe, 2015. "Las instituciones en el sector externo colombiano: ¿Apoyo o escollo al comercio?," Borradores de Economia 12995, Banco de la Republica.
    2. Pinheiro-Alves, Ricardo & Zambujal-Oliveira, João, 2012. "The Ease of Doing Business Index as a tool for investment location decisions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(1), pages 66-70.
    3. Arruã‘Ada, Benito, 2017. "Property as sequential exchange: the forgotten limits of private contract," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 13(4), pages 753-783, December.
    4. Patrícia Bernardes & Petr Iakovlevitch Ekel & Sérgio Fernando Loureiro Rezende & Joel Gomes Pereira Júnior & Angélica Cidália Gouveia Santos & Maurício Andrade Rodrigues Costa & Rafael Lopes Carvalhai, 2022. "Cost of doing business index in Latin America," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 56(4), pages 2233-2252, August.
    5. repec:ces:ifodic:v:7:y:2009:i:2:p:14567123 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. International Finance Corporation & World Bank, 2008. "Doing Business 2009 : Comparing Regulation in 181 Economies," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 6313, December.
    7. Hannah Murphy, 2014. "The World Bank and core labour standards: Between flexibility and regulation," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 399-431, April.
    8. Maričić Milica & Bulajić Milica & Radojičić Zoran & Jeremić Veljko, 2019. "Shedding Light on the Doing Business Index: a Machine Learning Approach," Business Systems Research, Sciendo, vol. 10(2), pages 73-84, September.
    9. Takaaki Masaki & Bradley C. Parks, 2020. "When do performance assessments influence policy behavior? Micro-evidence from the 2014 Reform Efforts Survey," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 371-408, April.
    10. Thomas Strobel, 2010. "Entry and Exit Regulations - The World Bank's Doing Business Indicators," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 8(01), pages 42-53, April.
    11. Wolfgang Ochel, 2009. "Employment Protection: Concepts and Measurement," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 7(2), pages 30-38, 07.
    12. repec:ces:ifodic:v:8:y:2010:i:1:p:14566902 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. International Monetary Fund, 2009. "Union of the Comoros: Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix," IMF Staff Country Reports 2009/046, International Monetary Fund.
    14. Rogge, Nicky & Archer, Geoffrey, 2021. "Measuring and analyzing country change in establishing ease of doing business using a revised version of World Bank's ease of doing business index," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 290(1), pages 373-385.
    15. Danielle Venn, 2009. "Legislation, Collective Bargaining and Enforcement: Updating the OECD Employment Protection Indicators," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 89, OECD Publishing.
    16. Wolfgang Ochel, 2009. "Employment Protection: Concepts and Measurement," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 7(02), pages 30-38, July.
    17. Chiara Guglielmetti, 2010. "Measuring the Business Environment for Entrepreneurship in Fragile States," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2010-014, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    18. Tilman Altenburg & Aimée Hampel-Milagrosa & Markus Loewe, 2017. "A Decade On: How Relevant is the Regulatory Environment for Micro and Small Enterprise Upgrading After All?," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 29(2), pages 457-475, April.

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