After last week’s hiatus due to travel, here’s your Saturday morning reading…
1. Duncan Green and Angus Deaton debate aid | From Politics to Power
Part 1: Why Angus Deaton is (mostly) wrong to attack aid for undermining politics and accountability
“Before taking an axe to the aid budget, I would say the burden of proof should be on the aid critics, and they haven’t done very well so far.”
Part 2: Angus Deaton makes the case against aid
“Duncan agrees that such undermining is a possibility, but doubts the evidence. Yet we need only look at the (very large) historical (and recent) literature on the resource curse; rulers who need not raise revenue from their people will often behave badly, sometimes spectacularly so.”
2. Evidence of aid effectiveness may reduce charitable giving for some | An Africanist Perspective – Ken Opalo
“Ever wondered why so many charitable campaigns often lack contextual information on their aid recipients? Well, it turns out charitable groups might just be responding to some of their contributors’ need for as little information as possible, the result of which are the often simplistic silly campaigns to help starving people in nameless war-torn countries in the developing world.”