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
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Recent Posts
Recent Comments
- Jeffrey K. Silverman on Statement from CARE on Bruckner FOIA Request: I hope that OIG is reading some of these postings, especially about...
- Jeffrey K. Silverman on NGO Transparency: Counterpart International to release budget: That might be giving AEI too much credit, and it...
- AA on IAD on A-i-d: @ Tulip: Your comment about rich taxpayers driving aid policy may be true for Europeans, but I see some trouble with...
- Jim on Africans do not want or need Britain’s development aid: The statistics posted by Terence are fascinating. If Bill Easterly...
- Katrina on Be Careful What You Export: Brendon, I think the NHS is a good boiler plate model that can be tinkered. I’m in Uganda...
- edinburgh photograph on Statement from CARE on Bruckner FOIA Request: Great favorite is usually most definitely the idea is usually these...
Archives
Bill Easterly tweets
- Dear Aid Watchers, Laura and I are gone for a week, Adam Martin is Guest Editor, starting with today's great post http://bit.ly/ces1l3 02:12:45 PM August 30, 2010 from bitly
- Have a happy Last Week of the Summer 01:52:50 PM August 30, 2010 from web
- Beloved tweeps: I am going off line for a week in a last-ditch effort to regain my sanity, no more tweets from me till after Labor Day. 01:52:30 PM August 30, 2010 from web
- What to learn from those wacky animal-shaped Sudanese urban plans: rich country urban planners are just as wacky http://bit.ly/ces1l3 01:50:42 PM August 30, 2010 from bitly
Aid Watch tweets
- IAD on A-i-d http://bit.ly/9Yqk1H. Claudia Williamson discusses Elinor Ostrom's work on development. 12:29:51 PM September 03, 2010 from web
- Be Careful What you Export: http://bit.ly/cE3e1v 11:11:33 AM September 02, 2010 from web
- TransparencyBrawl 2010 continues: http://bit.ly/aG1ytu 08:18:35 PM September 01, 2010 from web
- Hayek vs. the Intellectuals, in technicolor! http://bit.ly/cSnS8m 11:25:39 AM September 01, 2010 from web
Tag Archives: World Bank
Separating the wax from the gold: social accountability in Ethiopia
This post was written by Helen Epstein, author of The Invisible Cure: Why We Are Losing the Fight Against AIDS.
I was heartened to see that Shanta Devarajan, the World Bank’s Chief Economist for Africa, blogged about my article Cruel Ethiopia in the New York Review of Books.
The article—and Dr. Devarajan’s blog—deal with the extremely delicate and complex relationship between economic and social development and human rights. He and I agree that there…
The World Bank’s “horizontal” approach to health falls horizontal?
The history of foreign aid for global health has seen a cycling back and forth between two alternative approaches. The “vertical” approach focuses on fighting one disease at a time, and in Africa has been very effective in targeting smallpox, Guinea worm, measles, and river blindness, to name a few examples. After large initial successes though, diminishing returns to vertical programs set in. The “horizontal” approach instead invests sector-wide to make health systems work to…
Why the World Bank supports tyrants: the Gerund Defense
World Bank Ethiopia country director Ken Ohashi has a letter in the New York Review of Books responding to Helen Epstein’s charge that the Bank is supporting tyranny (which we also blogged). Ken’s letter defends World Bank aid to Ethiopia:
There are concerns about the overall governance of the country, efficiency and fairness of resource use, the risk of dependence on aid, and protection of basic human rights, as Ms. Epstein points out.
…
Posted in Aid policies and approaches, International organizational behavior, Language
Also tagged Ethiopia, Helen Epstein, Meles Zenawi
35 Comments
Oops, did I just prove “Confessions of a hit man” conspiracy?
Ray Fisman in Slate takes my paper with Daniel Berger, Nathan Nunn, and Shanker Satyanath on Commercial Imperialism as partial confirmation of John Perkins’ allegation of a global conspiracy to take down poor nations for the benefit of rich corporations. This is fun, so let’s run with it.
Of course there’s a eeny weeny difference between conspiracy theories and social science that just says, yes, CIA interventions could have been helpful to US corporations…
Are aid donors now running Haiti?
This post is written by Daniel Altman
Who will determine Haiti’s future? Probably not the Haitians. With aid groups enlarging their presence on the ground and foreign governments exercising control through their wallets, Haiti’s future may be out of the hands of the Haitians for years to come.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the recently convened Interim Committee for the Reconstruction of Haiti (CIRH), which will set the nation’s priorities during an 18-month state…
Posted in Aid policies and approaches, Disaster/ humanitarian aid
Also tagged Daniel Altman, donor capture, Haiti, IMF
15 Comments
Red Sea parts, Development data set free
This week, the World Bank unleashed data.worldbank.org, a website that provides free access to 2,000 indicators about development.
For years, only those who paid high subscription fees could access much of this data. One of us authors had been meaning for all those years to complain about this — how could a public organization like the Bank charge high fees despite the obvious case for a free public good of data on development?! I never got around to…
Posted in Accountability & transparency
Also tagged Doing Business, open data, World Development Indicators
8 Comments
Why are we not allowed to talk about individual rights in development?
| Individual rights for rich countries | Individual rights in development discourse |
|---|---|
| “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” | “Implementing the strengthened approach to governance … will require … …careful development of a … detailed results framework, consideration of budget and staffing implications … and further consultations with stakeholders…The specific initiatives needed to fully operationalize this strategy will be outlined in an Implementation Plan…” |
Who is best qualified to help Haiti? Why not the Haitian diaspora?
Toronto Globe and Mail columist Margaret Wente:
Who can offer the most help to the desperate children of Haiti? Is it Bill Clinton, Jeffrey Sachs, the World Bank or the UN? Is it the many experts who are calling for a Marshall Plan to “fix” Haiti once and for all, or the donor nations that have pledged billions for the task?
Personally, I would choose people like Eric and Nicole Pauyo. The Haitian-Canadian couple,
…
Posted in Disaster/ humanitarian aid, In the news
Also tagged Bill Clinton, Diaspora, earthquakes, Haiti, Jeffrey Sachs, Margaret Wente
7 Comments
Afghans and social entrepreneurs improvise when official aid fails
From the blog FabFi (HT to blog Whirled Citizen)
{A} World Bank funded infrastructure project to bring internet connectivity to Afghanistan began more than SEVEN YEARS ago and only made its first international link this June. That project, despite hundreds of millions of dollars in funding, is still far from being complete.
{Meanwhile} the Fabbed Long-Range Wireless Antenna Project, … as of December 2008 is working on an installation in Jalalabad Afghanistan.
…
This Friday: “Best and Worst of Aid” Conference
For aid watchers in New York, this post is a reminder of Development Research Institute’s upcoming conference this Friday, from 9 am to 2 pm, in NYU’s Kimmel Center.
Called “The Best and Worst of Aid: Incentives, Accountability and Effectiveness,” speakers and participants will present new findings and discuss and debate the best and worst of what happened in aid this year.
(According to some rumors, the irrepressible light-hearted side of DRI will give Oscar-style…
Posted in Meta/ about Aid Watch
Also tagged Andrew Mwenda, best and worst, Clare Lockhart, Lant Pritchett
8 Comments