Dambisa Moyo replied at the Huffington Post.

It’s funny that you and Dr Sachs have decided to post these articles in the HP now, as I’m currently re-reading The White Man’s Burden. While I sympathize with some of your ideas and also very much appreciate the good work you have done on the blog, I think Dr Sachs makes a good point in his post: sometimes the Searchers aren’t going to get to the destitute quick enough, which results in people dying in the short term. So, however inefficient and negatively correlated Planner-generated aid is with growth, the Planners have a role to play — perhaps unless foreign aid is reinvented in the way in which you desire.

Echoing the readers above, I ask that you please continue to educate us, instead of wasting your time going after Dr Sachs. Frankly, in my view, neither you nor Dr Sachs have been particularly fair or accurate when portraying each other’s positions. I could provide plenty of examples, but let’s let bygones be bygones and move on.

His ad-hom attacks about Moyo’s scholarship and Easterly’s funding would be laughable if it weren’t so hyppocritical. Sachs took it upon himself to grace the Communist world with “shock therapy” in the 90’s. Based on his logic, unless he had fully funded his own private education, healthcare and every other public service then he would be in no position to liberalize Communism. After all, wasn’t the Communist experiment a noble cause with the aim of helping the proletariat? Perhaps Communism simply didn’t work because they needed more aid and the West was too selfish to share their ideals?

As a western Europe country’s people use to say: the virtue is in the middle. Why these two great and brilliant minds (Bill and Jeff) just join together to produce great ideas? I know that some discussion is needed to bring up the best ideas, but do not exagerate so much.

I have personally worked (and I still work) in a NGO and I always bear in mind that the most important thing is to ask ourselves how much social return each euro/dollar invested in our project has. Therefore, I think that Easterly makes a good point when referring to the lack of accountability and supervision (at least, social and political) over the actions of the NGO’s. People just assume they are good and that is everything.

In addition, I worked in one “so called” great example of good governance in Africa: Maputo, MOZAMBIQUE (the land of the great president Chissano). I swear I do not understand why the IMF, the World Bank and the UNDP have three different buidings, different vehicles and so on. That is surely a waste of resources.

Finally, I do not know it is possible to call Mozambique a good example of governance when me and my colleagues were approached all the time by poorly-paid policemen, trying to get a bribe. Once, because of my ID was “irregular”, they literally stole me 15 euros (in local currency). And, given the testimonies of other black and indian mozambicans, europeans working there and south africans (both black and white), everyone suffers from that problem. And I did not visited the rural areas…

This is exactly what Bill was referring to when he said that Jeff Sachs was distorting his position.

If you read Bill’s books and papers carfully, it should be clear that he is NOT calling for ending aid. He is calling for ending aid where it is ineffective or harmful.

From a merely logical point of view it is impossible to agree with Jeff Sachs’ article because he employs statements that are simply wrong.

In this case, unusually, I also find myself siding more with Jeffrey Sachs. Aid has a lot wrong with it, but throwing the baby out with the bathwater is not the solution.

I am weary of the Easterly/Sachs donnybrook. I think you two have way more to offer your readers who are working with local change agents to improve lives. I read your blog for ideas and arguments to help me do a better job. I learn a lot from both sides of the argument, but the tone of your discussion with Dr. Sachs takes away from the substance.