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The Future of Aid

December 15, 2010 by bettyallen Leave a comment

As 2010 comes to an end, the effectiveness of the fundamental mechanisms of the current foreign aid system has become a much discussed and ever more pertinent issue. Robert Riddle in his 2007 book Does Aid Really Work? highlights the traditional principle that underpins all foreign aid as:

Those who can should help those who are in extreme need…What could be simpler?

However, as Riddle elaborates, the realities of foreign aid are far from simple. Indeed, the current global financial crises, climate change challenges, natural disasters and political volatility are all contributing factors in an increasingly complex international concern.

These issues have resulted in an extensive diversity in both the attitude and approach to aid. Some, such as William Easterly and Dambisa Moyo, argue that foreign aid has stunted the growth of countries in Africa and instead created a circle of aid dependency, corruption and further poverty.

Other aid practitioners believe that aid can be successful, but only if delivered correctly.

GDN 12th Annual Conference Plenary Speaker: Professor Helen Milner

December 14, 2010 by bettyallen 1 Comment

Plenty of leading scholars will address the key issues relating to this year’s conference theme, Financing Development in a Post-Crisis World. Five plenaries top and tail each of the three day’s proceedings, with one of the most exciting taking a particularly topical theme of Development Aid: The Emerging New Landscape.

The international context of foreign aid has changed profoundly in the last few years due to multiple, interrelated global crises and challenges. Food insecurity, volatile energy and commodity prices, climate change, and above all, the global financial crisis, have recently left many fragile countries struggling to cope. This session asks the demanding question of what the next decade might hold for aid effectiveness; explores how ‘aid’ is defined; and promises to look at the macroeconomic impact of aid and the recent emergence of new donors from the South.

Global Financial Governance: Quo Vadis?

January 20, 2010 by Pier Andrea Pirani Leave a comment

The final Roundtable Session of the GDN conference discussed Global Financial Governance, and revealed a range of views and perspectives on the causes of the recent crisis, and some consensus on what needs to be done to avoid – or at least mitigate the worse effects of – the next one.

Ernesto Zedillo, Chair of GDN and Director of Yale Center for the Study of Globalisation, made the simple case for new forms of global governance. He said “We have more intense globalisation, more interdependence and therefore we need more global governance.” He said that the initial impetus for such reform during the 1990s, catalysed in part by the late Willy Brandt’s book ‘Our Global Neighbourhood’, had gone nowhere.

GDN Conference Calls for New Global Financial Authority

January 16, 2010 by Pier Andrea Pirani Leave a comment

Professor Guillermo Calvo has called for the creation of a new Global Financial Authority which would protect the global economy from future financial crises. He was speaking at a press conference to launch the forthcoming 11th Annual Global Development Network conference in Prague on Friday January 15th, the day before the conference officially opened.

The esteemed economist who predicted the 1994 ‘Tequila Crisis’ in Mexico, the Russian financial crisis, and the recent global financial crisis – despite many claiming that it was an impossibility – said that lessons must be learned if the world is to cope with future financial crises. He said that the sub-prime mortgage, originally little more than a minor problem, turned into a crisis because it expanded beyond the authority of national Central Banks. He added that it was completely understandable that politicians make policy responses to local circumstances, because they are put into positions of power by local people. But this makes obvious the need for a higher order institution to work outside of national borders. Read more of this post

Filed under 11th Annual Conference, Conferences and Events, GDN Annual Conference Tagged with financial authority, financial crisis, gdn2010, global development network