About Aid Watch
The Aid Watch blog is a project of New York University's Development Research Institute (DRI). This blog is principally written by William Easterly, author of "The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics" and "The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good," and Professor of Economics at NYU. It is co-written by Laura Freschi and by occasional guest bloggers. Our work is based on the idea that more aid will reach the poor the more people are watching aid.
"Conscience is the inner voice that warns us somebody may be looking." - H.L. Mencken
Recent Comments
- Rukmini on Aid Watch blog ends; New work on development begins : This has been a valuable resource for me and I’m sorry to see it...
- Jesse on From Hell to Prosperity: I would like to see this graph with a comparative one which shows the number of people in each religion...
- Ellie on Aid Watch blog ends; New work on development begins : Sad to see you go, but I certainly respect the decision. Hope it is...
- Vivek Nemana on From Hell to Prosperity: Jeff, Well, the billionaire effect might explain a disproportionately high mean income, but...
- M on Aid Watch blog ends; New work on development begins : I agree that Bill and Laura should think about how they can get their message...
- Mr. Econotarian on Are Lax US Gun Laws Spilling Violence into Mexico? : The paper says: “DHS data gives the number of illegal...
Archives
Bill Easterly tweets
- New book identifies this as 1st rock and roll album -- in 1938 http://t.co/umXVgRlXeQ about 5 hours ago from bitly ReplyRetweetFavorite
- Warning sign that Lenin was centrally planning toilet time on train back to Russia http://t.co/bV8SuNLvF3 about 5 hours ago from bitly ReplyRetweetFavorite
- Why are they singing pro-Confederacy song "Maryland, my Maryland" at Preakness horse race? about 21 hours ago from Twitter for iPad ReplyRetweetFavorite
- RT @hangingnoodles: "a self-satirizing plan…pouring in money to a fictional government” http://t.co/K9yCiLgs06 @bill_easterly NYT on Mali … 09:29:12 PM May 17, 2013 from Twitter for iPad ReplyRetweetFavorite
Aid Watch tweets
- Where is the line between marketing social impact and exploitation? | http://t.co/YTc7AoLRMc via @Thehumanosphere 06:25:08 PM May 17, 2013 from Buffer ReplyRetweetFavorite
- Why the rise in global trade may have less to do with policy and more to do with metal boxes. http://t.co/QN6uw0wLys via @TheEconomist 05:57:06 PM May 17, 2013 from Buffer ReplyRetweetFavorite
- “I thought you were here to help.” http://t.co/z7hbKP8RtX via @NYTimes 05:29:12 PM May 17, 2013 from Buffer ReplyRetweetFavorite
- African traders flocked to Guangzhou for the cheap goods but are staying to run manufacturing operations http://t.co/gK7jmSS3qW via @qz 05:03:40 PM May 17, 2013 from Buffer ReplyRetweetFavorite
Monthly Archives: July 2009
Make Aid Watch Better
That Aid Watch blog — you must be thinking — always insisting on accountability and responsiveness from others. When are we going to see a little accountability and responsiveness from them?
Well . . . how about now?
Please help us improve this blog by taking our 3-minute, completely painless reader satisfaction survey. The survey closes this Monday, August 3rd at 5 pm EST.
Posted in Meta 18 Comments
USAID funding Iraqi insurgents? Well, on the plus side, they finally answered one of our emails
USA Today ran a story this week on a $644 million program in Iraq suspended by USAID four months short of its end date.
The program was launched three years ago to create jobs and infrastructure in cities throughout Iraq. The Community Stabilization Program, said one hopeful report from 2006, “will provide safe and productive alternatives to insurgent activities while reinforcing democratic values and processes.”
…
R2P: A Priest, A Linguist, and an Economist Walk into the General Assembly…
Miguel D’Escoto, GA president
What kind of issue would cause a left-wing priest, a radical linguist, and a free market economist to take the same side? The answer: opposition to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) at the United Nations. The priest is the nutty General Assembly President Miguel D’Escoto, the linguist is the flaming radical Noam Chomsky, and the economist is the sensible young academic Christopher Coyne.
R2P is the principle that the international community…
Posted in Grand plans and aid targets 20 Comments
From the “aid agency” that nobody knew existed
We received this response to today’s post on the Global Forum for Health Research, from Susan Jupp:
Dear Professor Easterly,
It’s not surprising that we are not known as an aid agency because we’re
not one!
The report of the Independent Evaluation Group of the World Bank to which you refer is not yet available on the Bank’s website so you probably saw an advance copy, perhaps still in draft. That could explain the…
Posted in Global health 7 Comments
The aid agency nobody knew existed is even worse than nobody realized
I recently saw a June 2009 World Bank (Independent Evaluation Group) evaluation of the Global Forum for Health Research, an 11-year-old international organization that had received $56 million (through 2007) in official aid funding, about half from the World Bank. The Global Forum’s mission is “demonstrating the essential role of research and innovation for health and health equity, benefiting poor and marginalized populations.”
The evaluation report is 162 pages long, but two sentences in…
Posted in Organizational behavior 7 Comments
Smart rules and stupid outcomes: the Skip Gates teachable moment
This teachable moment is not only about race. It includes understanding why the Cambridge MA police department would arrest Skip Gates for breaking into his own home, and then continue to insist after a huge outcry that they did the right thing.
My guess is that Sergeant James Crowley was following an inflexible rule that you arrest anyone who shouts angrily at a cop. This may be a good general rule to identify dangerous…
Posted in Aid policies and approaches, In the news 15 Comments
You’re rational after all: unconscious development insights from unreadable books
Vernon Smith is a Nobel Prize winner. You quickly realize on reading this book that he got it for economics, not literature. But if you can slog through this book (which took me about 4 months), you will be rewarded with some great insights about development. (But why I am working so hard when Tyler Cowen’s blog is about topless French sun-bathers?)
His big picture is familiar to readers of Hayek: societies develop…
Posted in Academic research 12 Comments
Shameless aid behavior awards of the month
3. Bono sings “Every generation gets a chance to change the world.” Another inspirational call to arms to fight African poverty? No, Bono is commercially exploiting his “save Africa” image to shill for Blackberry, who are sponsoring the latest U2 tour.”
2. “Children trust adults to keep their promises.” A parental advice web site?
No, World Vision UK is manipulating our feelings about children to campaign for increased aid.
Children rely on
…
Posted in Badvocacy and celebs 16 Comments
Official Global Development Network Management Response to our post on GDN Research
The following entry was written by the management of the Global Development Network in response to our June 15 2009 post, A $3 million book with 8 readers? The impact of donor-driven research.
The main point of our post was that GDN’s annual budget of $9 million had produced paltry results in publications, readers, or citations. We attributed this partly to a decision made early on to administer research through a bureaucracy rather than…
Posted in Data and statistics 4 Comments