Posted July 17, 2009
Development Assistance & Foreign Aid | Health & Infectious Diseases | Humanitarian Assistance
Global Philanthropy and Remittances: Reinventing Foreign Aid
Adelman, Carol
The Brown Journal of World Affairs, Spring/Summer 2009, v15, #2, pp23-33
"Private Philanthropy is remaking the landscape of International development assistance. Remarkable new players have emerged who are finding innovative ways to help the world's poor, and in the process, are transforming the concept of foreign aid." This article also introduces the Index of Global Philanthropy and Remittances, published by the Hudson Institute - a comprehensive guide to the sources and magnitude of private giving and investment to the developing world.
Dr. Carol Adelman is the director of the Center for Global Prosperity at the Hudson Institute. Fulltext H1/04-09
The Millennium Development Goals Report 2009
United Nations, 2009, 60p
"More than halfway to the 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), major advances in the fight against poverty and hunger have begun to slow or even reverse as a result of the global economic and food crises, a progress report by the United Nations has found. The assessment, launched by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Geneva, warns that, despite many successes, overall progress has been too slow for most of the targets to be met by 2015." This report is based on a master set of data that has been compiled by an Inter-Agency and Expert
Group on MDG Indicators led by the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United
Nations Secretariat, in response to the wishes of the General Assembly for periodic assessment of progress towards the MDGs. Fulltext H2/04-09
Gates, Google, and the Ending of Global Poverty: Philanthrocapitalism and International Development
Edwards, Michael
The Brown Journal of World Affairs, Spring/Summer 2009, v15, #2, pp35-42
"'Philanthrocapitalism' - the use of business and the market to transform philanthropy and foreign aid - is a recent and much-contested entry into the international development dictionary. To some, it is another 'naked emperor' more hype than substance and at best a complement to other, more traditional form of assistance that can be useful in certain limited contexts. To others, it is a potentially transformative movement that will unlock new sources of money, energy and innovation in the fight against poverty, hunger, and disease - a movement that will literally save the world. The truth, as in most things, probably lies somewhere in between, since philanthrocapitalism
may not be as different as its proponents often claim. That is because there
are no magic bullets for international development or global security—only a neverending
effort to find better ways forward through diverse and unpredictable journeys. Nevertheless, the debate about philanthrocapitalism provides a fresh perspective on the future of foreign aid and raises the question: does this movement really exist, and if so, what exactly is it?"
Michael Edward is a senior visiting scholar at the Wagner School of Public Service, New York University. Fulltext H3/04-09
How Foreign Aid Can Foster Democratization in Authoritarian Regimes
Wright, Joseph
American Journal of Political Science, July 2009, v53, #3, pp552-571
"Donors in recent years have made some foreign aid conditional on progress toward democracy. This study investigates whether and how such conditionality works in practice. The promise of higher aid if the country democratizes only provides an incentive for democratization for political leaders who expect to remain in office after democratization occurs. [The author] show[s] that dictators with large distributional coalitions, who have a good chance of winning fair elections, tend to respond to aid by democratizing. In contrast, aid helps dictators with the smallest distributional coalitions hang on to power. [Wright] present[s] a model that shows a dictator’s decision calculus, given different a priori support coalitions and varying degrees of aid conditionality, and test the model implications with data from 190 authoritarian regimes in 101 countries from 1960 to 2002."
Joseph Wright is Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science, Pennsylvania State University. Order article H4/04-09
F as in Fat 2009: How Obesity Policies Are Failing in America
Trust for America's Health & The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, July 2009, online edition, 108p (PDF)
"Adult obesity rates increased in 23 states and did not decrease in a single state in the past year, according to F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies Are Failing in America 2009, a report released today by the Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). In addition, the percentage of obese or overweight children is at or above 30 percent in 30 states." Fulltext H5/04-09
Pandemic Flu: Lessons From the Frontlines
Trust for America's Health (TFAH), The Center for Biosecurity & The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), June 2009, online edition, 24p (PDF)
"This report examines early lessons learned
from the response and ongoing concerns
about overall U.S. preparedness for potential
pandemic flu outbreak." Trust for America's Health (TFAH), the Center for Biosecurity, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) analyzed the initial response to the H1N1 outbreak. The report found that U.S. officials executed strong coordination and communication and an ability to adapt to changing circumstances, but it "also revealed
how quickly the nation’s core public health capacity
would be overwhelmed if the outbreak
were more widespread and more severe." Fulltext H6/04-09
Trafficking in Persons Report 2009
U.S. Department of State, June 2009
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, June 16, 2009: "The ninth annual Trafficking in Persons Report sheds light on the faces of modern-day slavery and on new facets of this global problem. The human trafficking phenomenon affects virtually every country, including the United States. In acknowledging America’s own struggle with modern-day slavery and slavery-related practices, we offer partnership. We call on every government to join us in working to build consensus and leverage resources to eliminate all forms of human trafficking." Fulltext H7/04-09
The Fight to End Global Slavery
Skinner, Benjamin E.
World Policy Journal, Summer 2009, v26, #2, pp33–41
"Human trafficking may be just the latest topic du jour among U.S. foreign policy elites and UN humanitarian types, but mention the underlying crime—slavery— to foreign officials and the reaction is often
confused and explosive. “For God’s sake, don’t go talking about brutal slavery here,” says Jay Kumar, the Social Secretary of Araria, one of the poorest districts in Bihar, the poorest state in India. Waving his finger, speaking from his one-room office building, Kumar, whose position required
him to respond to allegations of child labor, is instead categorically denying that the two dozen recently freed child slaves that I had met in his district were ever in bondage."
E. Benjamin Skinner is a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School. Fulltext H8/04-09
Going Home? Prospects and Pitfalls for Large-Scale Return of Iraqis
Ferris, Elizabeth
Brookings Institution, Presentation at the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration Annual Conference,
Nicosia, Cyprus, June 28 - 2 July, 2009, 15p
"Recently discussion has turned to the prospects for the large-scale return of
refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) to Iraq. More than 4 million
Iraqis have been displaced, either internally or externally. And while the Iraqi
and US governments, policymakers in the region, and humanitarian actors assume
that most will return to Iraq in the near future, Elizabeth Ferris points out
that experience with other displacement crises indicates that return will be
neither automatic nor straightforward."
Elizabeth Ferris is senior fellow and co-director of the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement. Fulltext H9/04-09
Darfur and International Justice
Reeve, Eric
Dissent, Summer 2009, v56, #3, pp13-18
The author examines issues arising from the famine and genocide in the Darfur region of the Sudan and international justice. "On March 4, 2009, Pre-Trial Chamber 1 of the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced that it was charging Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir, with war crimes and crimes against humanity. Long anticipated, the arrest warrant was immediately used by al-Bashir’s National Islamic Front (NIF) regime as a pretext for expelling thirteen major international humanitarian organizations from Darfur and from other highly distressed regions of northern Sudan. In Darfur the expulsions represented over half the total humanitarian capacity. At the same time, Khartoum also shut down some of the most important Sudanese human service and human rights organizations. In all cases, the explanations offered for expulsions or shutdowns were not supported by any evidence made public. In particular, Khartoum’s claim to have evidence that the aid organizations had cooperated with the ICC was patently false."
Eric Reeves is Professor of English Language and Literature at Smith College in
Northampton, Massachusetts. He has spent the past ten years working full-time as
a Sudan researcher and analyst. Fulltext H10/04-09
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