Reframing the aid debateWhy aid isn't working and how it should be changedEveryone knows that foreign aid is not working as intended and that something must change. The big question is how to change the status quo. The current international aid debate is characterized by dichotomies and over-simplified generalizations, most recently fueled by Dambisa Moyo’s book Dead Aid. The aid debate needs to be reframed in order to get it out of its current cul-de-sac and to move it forward towards solutions for real change in the aid system. This working paper attempts to do just that. It argues that the most important factors undermining aid’s effectiveness have been neglected and need to retake center stage in the debate. These factors include reasserting what is at the core of economic development and the role of aid in achieving it; the politics of aid relationships in aid dependent countries and have they generate perverse incentives; and the everyday practices and bureaucratic routines of aid agencies and how they diminish the impact of aid. After addressing each of these factors, the paper offers some principles for reforming the way aid is given and some steps to put them into practice. Recent research shows that recent aid reforms inspired by the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness have largely failed to achieve the principles embodied in the Paris Declaration. |
| Thus, we need to start thinking outside the box. The principles and solutions presented in this working paper chart a different approach to changing the way donor countries think about aid and the way bilateral and multilateral agencies give aid. The working paper is written in a style that makes it accessible to the broader public interested in the issue of aid and Africa. Lindsay Whitfield is a Project Senior Researcher with the Politics and Governance Research Unit. She is currently working on a collaborative research project based at DIIS called Elites, Production and Poverty. For more information about this ongoing research, see the box. |
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