Foreign Aid & Civil Society
India’s Foreign Aid Program
India has a longstanding foreign aid program and with economic growth has come the ability to play like the big boys, even if not with them. Yet, very little information is available, so I decided to do some web research. Here is what I learnt:
Development Aid: Critical Views by Becker-Posner and Friedman
Becker and Richard Posner have two wonderful critiques of International Development Assistance. They are long and worth every moment needed to read them, with a simple conclusion (Posner):
The focus of my discussion has been on the question whether the recipient nations benefit at all. My guess is that they do not. It is just a [...]
Gates Foundation Asset Investments: To Review or Not
The Guardian reported earlier that the Gates Foundation will review its asset investments to address concerns that the companies it supports cause the very problems it is trying to fight.
The announcement comes after a major investigation by the Los Angeles Times discovered that some of the billions spent by the Gates Foundation on improving health [...]
Development Aid: If and How?
On this blog, in class, and in arguments with friends I have often criticized the paradigm of International Development Assistance - and the belief that aid will help poor countries, especially the poorest in Africa. I believe it will not.
Yet, this past weekend I was forced to admit a weakness in my own stand. I [...]
An Institutional Perspective on Development Aid
The World Bank’s excellent PSD Blog mentioned a report by ActionAid, criticizing development aid spent on expatriate consultants. The entry started a thought process to expand on that issue.
As I’ve argued with friends, the incentives of development aid are all wrong - meant to preserve the very poverty it is supposed to cure. I will [...]
A Book on Development Aid
So, international development assistance and aid does not work. Surprise, surprise! Now, we have a book - The White Man’s Burden - to tell us why.
I learnt of it in today’s International Herald Tribune. With little pressing work at the office, I read some more and finally found this review that for me is authoritative [...]
A Week of Philanthropy
Time for some reflection. The past two weeks were spent organizing and attending a conference on philanthropy. Bringing together a select crowd, we discussed NGOs, family foundations, world disasters, and development.
I am now full of statistics. About US$270 billion donated in philanthropic funds in 2005 to charitable causes in the USA - 75% from individuals. [...]
The Power of the NGO
Back in university, I had heated debates with my colleages from the US and Europe, on labor and environmental standards. As I’ve said before, I am vehemently against them. For me, they constitute at best protectionism by other means. At worst, for some it is neo-colonialism by means of the NGO.
I do not, necessarily subscribe [...]
