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Dambisa Moyo (2010): Dead Aid -Why Aid Is NotWorking and How There Is AnotherWay for Africa Penguin Books, London, 208 pages ISBN13: 9780141031187;GBP 9.99 (paperback)
"The problem is that aid is not benign - it's malignant.No longer part of the potential solution, it's part of the problem - in fact aid is the problem." (p. 47)
Provocative, daring and innovative; these are certainly appropriate to describe the reader's impression from DAMBISA MOYO's "Dead Aid" tackling a very sensitive issue in international development community: the effectiveness of aid. Shortly after its publication in 2009,"DeadAid" figured on the NewYorkTimes bestseller-list.Born and raised in Zambia, DambisaMOYO holdsMaster of PublicAdministration in InternationalDevelopment from Harvard University and a Doctorate in Economics from Oxford University. MOYO has worked at theWorld Bank and for eight years at Goldman Sachs. The Time Magazine named MOYO one of the world's 100 most influential people.
In "Dead Aid",MOYO argues that development aid has harmed Africa and that it should be stopped.According to the author,"in the past fifty years more than $1 trillion in development- related aid has been transferred from rich countries toAfrica" (p. xviii).However, in spite of this aid,Africa's situation has not improved.According toMOYO it has even regressed. The central thesis of the book is therefore that aid itself is the cause of a "neverending- cycle" of economic, political and social problems maintainingAfrica in a perpetual state of poverty.The long-termglobal effects of aid are the opposite to their intended goals: economic growth is reduced, poverty increased and in response more aid is given. It is thus time to change the approach to development and reduce "aid-dependency".The author argues that alternatives to the current aid system do exist in the private sector. The book's purpose is therefore to offer a set of free-market tools as alternatives to aid, enabling poor countries to efficiently finance development that would lead to sustainable long-term growth and a reduction of poverty.MOYO consequently proposes to set a deadline to aid in order to gradually reduce it.The idea is that whereas aid decreases, alternatives are automatically implemented in order to maintain a certain level of spending resulting in an "aid-free world" (p. 76).Basing development's success on financial tools,MOYO challenges the role of international institutions such as theWorld Bank and the IMF...