This paper is a short history of the Indian economy since 1968. India today is a changed country from what it was half a century ago, when Myrdal published his Asian Drama. The stranglehold of low growth has been broken, its population below the poverty line has fallen markedly, and India has...

This study takes as its starting point what Gunnar Myrdal had to say about Viet Nam in the context of his seminal work, Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations, published in 1968. Myrdal pointed to the decisive nature of the Vietnamese people; and subsequent developments, which are...

A recent trend in the study of poverty is to consider a relative poverty line, one that is responsive to the nature of the income distribution. We develop an axiomatic approach to the determination of an amalgam poverty line. Given a reference income (e.g. the mean or the median), the amalgam...

Efforts to tackle discrimination in access to basic services have shown mixed results in different country settings. This study examines the positive and negative outcomes attributed to anti-discrimination measures adopted in different country contexts and analyses the factors contributing to...

This paper undertakes an empirical analysis of the adoption of various components of social security systems as well as contribution rates. Apart from economic determinants of the adoption, the empirical analysis features determinants relating to countries' political systems and contagion. We...

This study evaluates which type of benefit-a universal benefit, a proxy mean-tested benefit, or a categorical benefit- better cushions the poverty effects of income shocks in a developing economy. We compare the effectiveness of the three benefit schemes on poverty first conceptually and then by...

In recent decades, Africa has received a large share of official development assistance compared to other regions of the world. Using AidData for 2000-13, this paper examines the effects of aid to productive sectors on manufacturing growth in Africa. Econometric results show that increased...

The objective of this paper is to focus on fragility research findings and examine what works or does not work in development aid and development cooperation in fragile and conflictaffected contexts. We draw on our own research findings as well as country-level studies. We examine questions of...

When India became a republic in 1950, the economy was primarily agrarian, with threefifths of output originating from agriculture. In the sixty years since independence, there has been a significant transformation of economic activity away from agriculture, with less than one-fifth of output now...

The aid effectiveness principles have limits if the recipient is fragile. The problem of relevance exists if the recipient has an authoritarian or totalitarian regime. In situations of weak statehood and fragility, a large portion of aid would likely bypass the state because of high demand for...