This study uses loan-level data on syndicated lending to a large sample of developing countries between 1993 and 2017 to estimate the mobilization effects of multilateral development banks (MDBs), that is, their ability to crowd-in capital from private creditors. Controlling for a large set of...

This article documents a positive and sizable correlation between the location of historical Christian missions and the allocation of present-day World Bank aid at the grid-cell level in Africa. The correlation is robust to an extensive set of geographical and historical control variables that...

The adoption of the shared prosperity goal by the World Bank in 2013 and Sustainable Development Goal 10, on inequality, by the United Nations in 2015 should strengthen the focus of development interventions and cooperation on the income growth of the bottom 40 percent of the income distribution...

A number of recent studies have empirically documented links between characteristics of World Bank projects and their ultimate outcomes as evaluated by the World Bank's Independent Evaluation Group. This paper explores the in-sample and out-of-sample predictive performance of empirical models...

Aid is good for the poor. This paper uses detailed aid data spanning 60 developing countries over the past two decades to show that social aid significantly and directly benefits the poorest in society, while economic aid increases the income of the poor through growth. This new and unequivocal...

The focus of trade policy has shifted in recent years from economy-wide reductions in tariffs and trade restrictions toward targeted interventions to facilitate trade and promote exports. Most of these latter interventions are based on the new mantra of "aid-for-trade" rather than on hard...

This paper provides an overview of the various ways in which mixing qualitative and quantitative methods could add value to monitoring and evaluating development projects. In particular it examines how qualitative methods could address some of the limitations of randomized trials and other...

Paul Wolfowitz, President of the World Bank, remarked that the millennium development goals (MDGs) created a metric of accountability for which humanity will hold the World Bank answerable. It also created a vital tool for measuring progress. The MDGs call for developing countries to improve...

Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank Group, discussed the following topics. The Bank is helping many manage the humanitarian and development challenge. The Bank supports the global knowledge partnership on migration and development (KNOMAD), which helps countries develop evidence-based...

Robert B. Zoellick, President of the World Bank Group, spoke about leaving behind the past and facing today's challenges squarely, constructively, and creatively. This is not the 1944 world that surrounded the creation of the Bank. Old models no longer fit current problems. The new "normal" will...