Essay from the year 2018 in the subject Politics - Topic: Development Politics, grade: 62.00, University of Reading, course: Development Finance, language: English, abstract: Ever year billions of dollars are channeled to developing countries to help them escape the poverty traps they are stuck in. According to the OECD statistics development aid given to the countries in need accounted for USD 142,6 billion in 2016. And, yet foreign aid remains a very controversial issue and its effectiveness has been highly debatable. The aim of this essay is to explore the reasons behind problematic aspects of development aid as well as to try to find a solution to them.
A response to the pressing need to address and clarify the substantial ambiguity within current literature, this edited volume aims to deepen readers’ understanding of the impact of foreign aid on development outcomes based on the latest findings in research over the past decade. Foreign aid has long been seen as one of two extremes: either beneficial or damaging, a blessing or a curse. Consequently, many readers perceive aid’s effectiveness based on the work of scholars who are assessing the impact of aid from one of two antithetical perspectives. This book takes a different approach, shedding light on recent research that can deepen our understanding of the complex relationship between aid and its aftereffects. Drawing from an extensive set of studies that have explored micro and macro impacts of foreign aid for recipient nations, chapter authors highlight more layered and nuanced findings, with a focus on donor characteristics, political motives, and an evaluation of aid projects and their effectiveness, including the differential impact based on type of aid. This volume is the first of its kind to unpack aid as a complex rather than a unitary concept and explore the wide areas of grey that have long enshrouded foreign aid.
First published in 1971, this reissue considers the main aspects of foreign aid to developing countries in terms of economic concepts and principles. The author gives an economic definition of aid and considers the motives for giving aid and the principles on which it may be allocated. He looks at the effect on the economic growth of developing countries of both the aid given and the need to repay the debt, and the effect on trade patterns and resource allocation of tying aid to one particular project, or one source of goods. While economic analysis is only a first step in providing a basis for policy decisions on foreign aid, Dr Healey shows that many issues can be clarified by looking at them from the economists’ point of view.
Foreign aid to developing countries is a subject of heated debate among politicians, economists, and development specialists. Does aid promote economic growth and reduce poverty? Some argue that foreign aid has no effect on growth and may sometimes even undermine growth in aid recipient countries. Others suggest that foreign aid positively influences economic growth. Still others suggest that foreign aid has a positive impact on growth but this impact is conditional on a good institutional and policy environment. This debate has high stakes, given that foreign aid in the form of official development assistance (ODA) by leading donor nations reached over US$120 billion in 2010, the highest level ever recorded. This study contributes to the debate by taking a different approach from conventional analyses of the aid–growth relationship. Analysis of the aid–growth relationship shows no significant connection between aggregate aid and per capita GDP growth. Rather than treating ODA as a single category, the study disaggregates it into several different categories, based on which sector of a recipient’s economy the ODA is meant to help or promote. The study investigates whether changes in sectoral allocation of ODA influence the effectiveness of foreign aid in promoting economic growth. Although this is not an entirely new direction for research in this area, little is known about the possible causal impacts of aid to different sectors on economic growth. The results of the study are presented in Foreign Aid Allocation, Governance, & Economic Growth, recently published by the University of Pennsylvania Press for IFPRI.
Assessing Aid determines that the effectiveness of aid is not decided by the amount received but rather the institutional and policy environment into which it is accepted. It examines how development assistance can be more effective at reducing global poverty and gives five mainrecommendations for making aid more effective: targeting financial aid to poor countries with good policies and strong economic management; providing policy-based aid to demonstrated reformers; using simpler instruments to transfer resources to countries with sound management; focusing projects oncreating and transmitting knowledge and capacity; and rethinking the internal incentives of aid agencies.
Peter Hjertholm, Editorial Assistant Aid has worked in the past but can be made to work better in the future. In this important new book, leading economists and political scientists, including experienced aid practitioners, re-examine foreign aid. The evolution of development doctrine over the past fifty years is critically investigated, and conven
Master's Thesis from the year 2019 in the subject Economics - Case Scenarios, University of Lusaka (University of Lusaka UNILUS), course: Economics and Finance, language: English, abstract: This research study has analyzed the effects of foreign aid in promoting economic growth in Zambia. The study used available data in Zambia from 1986 – 2018. The study adopted the ARDL model for investigating the short and long time relationship between foreign aid and Gross Domestic Product GDP. The hypothesis of foreign aid having an effect on economic growth was explored and examined. This study sought to archive the following objectives: To establish whether there is a connection between foreign aid and economic growth in Zambia and determine whether foreign aid significantly contributed to Zambia’s economic growth in the period under review. For policy implications, this study also analyzed the determinant of economic growth in Zambia over the same period. The results clearly revealed a positive relationship between foreign aid and Zambia’s economic growth in a given period that was under investigation. The findings in this study affirm that foreign aid may be important in promoting economic growth. This study also asserts that foreign aid may be effective in improving the quality and lives of people if used effectively. Thus, the outcome of this study recommends that foreign aid be directed towards the promotion of investment because its proper use can promote and boots the country’s economic growth. For policy implications, this study also found that independent variables such as Foreign Direct Investment FDI, Population Growth, Government Expenditure and Consumer Price Index as important and determinants of economic growth in Zambia over the same period. Thus, this study found that important drivers of economic growth included foreign aid inflow, population growth, investment whilst government expenditure and inflation affected GDP negatively, thus their impact was insignificant and negligible. This study furthers found efficiency and effectiveness of programs by government supported by foreign aid being effective to promote growth, hence, the reason why it is important for traditional donors to support government in many sectors.
Foreign aid is one of the few topics in the development discourse with such an uninterrupted, yet volatile history in terms of interest and attention from academics, policymakers, and practitioners alike. Does aid work in promoting growth and reducing poverty in the developing world? Will a new 'big push' approach accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals or will another opportunity be missed? Can the lessons of almost half a century of aid giving be learnt? These are truly important questions in view of the emerging new landscape in foreign aid and recent developments related to the global financial crisis, which are expected to have far reaching implications for both donors and recipients engaged in this area. Against this shifting aid landscape, there is a pressing need to evaluate progress to date and shed new light on emerging issues and agendas. This volume brings together leading aid experts to review the progress achieved so far, identify the challenges ahead, and discuss the emerging policy agenda in foreign aid. A central conclusion of this important and timely volume is that, since development aid remains crucial for many developing countries, a huge effort is needed from both donors and aid recipients to overcome the inefficiencies and make aid work better for poor people. After all, as global citizens, we have a moral obligation to do the best we can to lift people out of poverty in the developing world. The findings of this book will be of considerable interest to professionals and policymakers engaged in policy reforms in foreign aid, and provide an essential one-stop reference for students of development, international finance, and economics.
There are significant weaknesses in some of the traditional justifications for assuming that aid will foster development. This paper looks at what the cross-country aid effectiveness literature and World Bank Operations Evaluation Department reviews have suggested about effective aid, first in terms of promoting income growth, and then for promoting other goals. This review forms the basis for a discussion of recommendations to improve aid effectiveness and a discussion of effective aid allocation. Given the multiple potential objectives for aid, there is no one right answer. However, it appears that there are a number of reforms to aid practices and distribution that might help to deliver a more significant return to aid resources. We should provide aid where institutions are already strong, where they can be strengthened with the help of donor resources, or where they can be bypassed with limited damage to existing institutional capacity. The importance of institutions to aid outcomes, as well as the fungibility of aid flows, suggests that programmatic aid should be expanded in countries with strong institutions, while project aid should be supported based on its ability to transfer knowledge and test new practices and support global public good provision rather than (merely) as a tool of financial resource transfer. The importance of institutions also suggests that we should be cautious in our expectations regarding the results of increased aid flows.
