Somalia has lacked a recognized government since 1991. In extremely difficult conditions the private sector has demonstrated its much vaunted capability to make do. To cope with the absence of the rule of law, private enterprises have been using foreign jurisdictions or institutions to help with...

The market for aid is changing. These days donors use a far greater array of instruments than in the past, and operate in a context of far larger private financial flows. Poor countries are growing richer, but there are legitimate doubts about whether the aid industry deserves credit....

Private financial flows such as foreign direct investment seem toencourage economic growth and relieve poverty in part because theycreate excellent incentives for transferring know-how and in partbecause they are subject to a stern market test that ensures they areallocated and monitored...

Many studies have found that countries with abundant natural resources grow more slowly than those without a phenomenon often known as the resource curse or the curse of oil. Some development specialists are concerned that foreign aid may also cause a resource curse. Recent research is not...

Private financial flows to developing countries, such as debt,equity, remittances, and private charitable giving, have increaseddramatically over the past 20 years. One commentator has eventrumpeted the privatization of foreign aid. Since privatecharitable giving remains small and developing...

More than ever, governments in developing countries have access to capital markets, but most are not using it. Instead, they have restructured their debt portfolios, cutting the share of private sector debt and increasing the share of longer-term multilateral debt. While some argue that this...

This note considers the future of aid from the perspective of the 2005-2030 time frame. It offers a possible scenario for the future, with booming private remittances and nongovernmental aid flows put to innovative uses, eclipsing a less agile, more politically driven official aid industry. A...

This note considers the future of aid from the perspective of the 2005-2030 time frame. It offers a possible scenario for the future, with responses of the aid industry to falling numbers of people in absolute poverty and to the growing ability of poor countries to borrow from the market. A...

Some people think the best way to give aid is through grants. Others advocate aid embedded in subsidized loans. Mostly, incentive effects on donors and recipients are ignored in this debate. But grants and loans carry different incentives and in some settings can be complementary. Donors should...

Critics of the aid industry have accused it of acting like a cartel (Easterly 2002). The accusation has some bite-globally the industry remains somewhat concentrated, and for the typical recipient country, highly concentrated. Yet the most striking fact about the industry is how relentlessly...