The objectives of international development cooperation have undergone profound changes in recent decades. To the traditional goals constituted by the fight against poverty and the development of less developed countries the promotion of global public goods has been added. It is in terms of all...

In this paper we examine whether absorptive capacity can constitute sufficient justification for rejecting the proposal of a large aid increase to support the ?big push?. We argue that the probability of a poverty trap exists for many countries, in particular the least developed countries (LDCs)...