Ben Heineman
Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
Contact:
Telephone: 617-496-7305
Fax: 617-495-8963
Email: ben_heineman@harvard.edu
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March 31, 2010
"Obama's Afghan Dilemma: Managing Hamid Karzai"
Op-Ed, Harvard Business Review
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"President Obama has committed the prestige of the United States, his personal credibility, billions of taxpayer dollars and, most importantly, the lives of American military personnel to a war which depends — as his top generals, Petraeus and McChrystal have said — on attaining a key civilian, not military, objective: creating an Afghan state with security, order, rule of law and accountable institutions that protects and serves its people. That goal depends on defeating the corruption and instability which have plagued Afghanistan for centuries."
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November 30, 2009
"18-month Miracle?"
Op-Ed, On Leadership at washingtonpost.com
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Why do we think we can change the complex Afghan culture when our "outsider" attempts to influence it -- including billions of dollars in assistance -- have, to date, been unsuccessful?"
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October 2, 2009
"Corruption--The Afghan Wild Card"
Op-Ed, The Atlantic
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"But-- and here it becomes vexatious-- how can this be done by a weak, corrupt government during a dangerous insurgency, especially after a contested election marked by serious fraud? And, if corruption is not effectively addressed in a short time frame, does this undermine -indeed checkmate--- the ultimate military mission as expressed by President Obama earlier this year to disrupt, dismantle and eventually defeat al Qaeda and prevent their return to Afghanistan by defeating the Taliban insurgency."
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August 11, 2009
"Beware the Idolatry of Numbers"
Op-Ed, The Atlantic
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Whether in the public sector or the private sector, leaders must at a minimum have the intellectual courage and strength to form red teams and blue teams which fight over the fundamentals of the analysis and isolate and challenge the assumptions which, when eroded, erode in turn the apparent precision of mathematical or systems models."
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July 22, 2009
"Anti-Corruption Rhetoric - and Reality"
Op-Ed, The Atlantic
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"The pervasive problem, however, is that anti-corruption rhetoric exceeds commitment and accomplishment on all fronts. Corruption is deeply entrenched because it is based on lust for money and for power."
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April 3, 2009
"G20 Fails to Take on Global Bribery"
Op-Ed, Harvard Business Review
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"The irony of the G20s silence about erratic and incomplete enforcement of the OECD anti-bribery convention is that the summit made a big deal about "taking action against...tax havens," citing an OECD list of nations not conforming to international standards for exchange of tax information."
May / June 2006
The Long War Against Corruption
Journal Article, Foreign Affairs
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
Corruption is widely acknowledged to distort markets, undermine the rule of law, damage government legitimacy, and hurt economic development. The global anticorruption movement has gained ground since the mid-1990s, but its key agents -- developed and developing countries, international organizations, and MNCs -- must do more to prevent and punish misbehavior systematically.
AP Photo
April 27, 2009
"SARS Corporate Playbook"
Op-Ed, On Leadership at washingtonpost.com
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Multinational corporations have seen this movie before. It was a horror flick called "SARS" (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome)."
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April 3, 2009
"G20 Fails to Take on Global Bribery"
Op-Ed, Harvard Business Review
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"The irony of the G20s silence about erratic and incomplete enforcement of the OECD anti-bribery convention is that the summit made a big deal about "taking action against...tax havens," citing an OECD list of nations not conforming to international standards for exchange of tax information."
January 12, 2009
"Bribery Warrants Global War"
Op-Ed, Bloomberg
By Ben Heineman, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
"Anti-corruption rhetoric exceeds commitment and accomplishment, especially in emerging-market nations. Building durable, transparent and accountable institutions in the highly diverse developing world -- with failed, failing, fragile and rising states -- is key, though complex and time-consuming."
