Finalllyyyy Flashcards
(31 cards)
What are the 3 main takeaways from this class?
- Development takes a long time.
- Institutions count
- You have to have local buy-in or the programs will collapse once the funding stops
What are the major disciplines of Development?
Public Health Economic Growth Crisis Management Environment & Natural Resource Management Infrastructure - roads, bridges, ports Education Democracy & Governance Agriculture
What is the Paris Declaration for Aid Effectiveness?
Over 100 countries and international agencies came together to endorse specific commitments for donors and partner countries to improve aid effectiveness.
What are the 5 core principles of the Paris Declaration of Aid Effectiveness?
- Ownership
- Alignment
- Harmonization
- Managing for Results
- Mutual accountability
What is the significance of the Paris declaration?
It helps stress countries’ responsibility to own their process of development
What are the downsides of the Paris Declaration for Aid Effectiveness?
The Paris Declaration has not been implemented fully because there is an aid accountability problem with developing countries. Also, if you are an aid administrator with a choice between violating an international agreement or violating accountability rules of the United States…you’re gonna violate the international agreement and stick with what the US government tells you to rather than violate federal law.
Does foreign aid work? Under what circumstances? How do you define success?
Foreign aid does not work if the programs are imposed by the donor government and do not have the approval of the local government. The local government needs to take ownership of the program for it to be successful long term.
Success comes when people are brought above the poverty line, when they are no longer sick, when they are fed…any improvements that can be measured.
What is the FAR and how does it affect USAID?
FAR stands for Federal Acquisition Regulation. It is a statute that gives OMB the power over how all procurements will be done for federal contracts.
One of the provisions says that you can write a memo of understanding for no competitive bidding that you won’t take their money and they won’t take yours.
In your view, what is the most important factor in whether countries develop and what is marginal vs. what is peripheral?
Institutions are one of the most important factors in whether countries develop, because they impact every other area - governance, economy, education, etc. You must have strong institutions to develop.
Culture is marginal.
What role does politics play in the development programs from the donor perspective and from the recipient perspective?
Politics, both domestic and international, can get in the way of development, as explained in one of the 5 clashes.
What is ICT? What principles determine the success of ICT programs?
Information and Communications Technology
- Enabling environment
- Accessibility and Affordability
- Ruggedization
- Appropriateness
- Sustainability
- Availability
What is an open access order?
According to Douglas North, in open access societies, there are many nonprofits and organizations. The US and Western democracies are open access orders. They are likely to be highly stable, so ideally countries with natural or limited access orders will become open access. To have open access orders, you need a pervasive and effective government.
Highly decentralized system of decision making
What is a limited access order/natural order?
According to Douglas North, in limited access societies, the governing coalition runs a society and dominates the political and economic system - nonprofit institutions are small in number in these countries. It is a highly centralized society like China. Limited access orders are a characteristic of underdeveloped states that are hard to work with.
What is Easterly critique of foreign aid?
According to Easterly, the failure of economic development is that there are not incentives and monitoring to ensure that people in countries follow through.
His recommendation is not to abandon the quest, but to improve the institutions of governments and international actors to create incentives that promote growth.
His basic conclusion: loans only work if the policies of the country work
What is community development and how has it affected development programs? Who carries it out? Where did it come from?
Community Development upholds local government and social services. It is the opposite of High Modernism.
Small-scale community development didn’t work well in the US, but it did in Ethiopia. The problem arises when you leave that country to work on your own.
New Directions was a part of community development under Nixon, which moved away from high modernism infrastructure projects towards more human service projects like agriculture, health, and water.
What is an MDG? What are the upsides and downsides? How and why were they created?
Millenium Development Goals (MDG)
The United Nations used to have a set of eight UN Millennium Development Goals or MDG. The UN established these goals during a summit back in the year 2000. The idea was to achieve these goals by 2015. On Sept. 25, 2015, the Sustainable Development Goals replaced the MDG. Each country in the UN aims to achieve these goals by the year 2030.
What are Collier’s four traps?
- Conflict
- Natural Resources
- Landlocked Countries
- Bad Governance
How does the foreign policy of donor governments affect their aid programs?
Unfortunately the foreign policy and domestic politics of the donor country does affect aid in that country heavily.
If the foreign policy does not lend to development happening in a certain country, then USAID will have no choice but to shut their office down
Another major effects that domestic politics has on aid is through the budget. The aid budget can change year to year and many times this responsibility falls upon policy makers domestically.
What is private foreign aid? How does it affect ODA?
Private foreign aid is when a private organization either works with an NGO or a public institution to deliver foreign aid to a country
One of the main reasons why it is important for these partnerships to exist is simply because these private forms can bring a lot of funding to these programs and their business in these countries is influential
What is a Complex Humanitarian Emergency and its five characteristics?
War Poverty Overpopulation Environmental Damage Natural Disasters
What are the 4 pillars of democracy and governance programs?
- Build civil society organizations (the most successful pillar)
- Rule of Law (maybe the most important of the 4 according to North & Sen)
- Institutions of Democratic and Accountable governance
- Political freedom and electoral competition
What are the Bretton Woods Institutions? Why were they created? Who created them? Do they work effectively or not?
The main institutions that were created were the IMF and World Bank
The World Bank was previously known as the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development
They were created to bring a stability to the international financial system when crisis hits different areas of the world
Privatize state owned enterprises
Balance Budget
Independent central bank for each country
Encourage private investment and export economies
What is the Marshall Plan, what did it do and how? Was it successful?
The Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, was a U.S. program providing aid to Western Europe following the devastation of World War II. It was enacted in 1948 and provided more than $15 billion to help finance rebuilding efforts on the continent.
Marshall plan became AID, was originally part of the 4 Point Program
Beginning of foreign aid effort of US government
A significant amount of money in our budget was spent on this
Originally, most people were opposed to the marshall plan
It was very successful
What is Point 4?
Foreign aid program for the United States government; using benefit of scientific knowledge to help countries develop AKA technical assistance to help countries around the world
US government’s distribution of foreign aid
Creation of UN
Marshall Plan
NATO
