We analyze the aid portfolio of various bilateral and multilateral donors, testing whether they have prioritised aid in line with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In doing so, we combine sectorally disaggregated aid data with indicators reflecting the situation of recipient countries...

This paper (i) traces the historical origins of foreign aid, (ii) investigates tren­ds in the volume, composition, allocation and quality of aid flows, and (iii) reviews the empirical literature on aid allocation. The paper concludes that, historically, aid has served a multitude of objectives....

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are widely expected to provide better targeted aid than state agencies with a hidden agenda of commercial and political self-interest. However, principal-agent models question that NGOs decide autonomously on aid allocation. Indeed, we show empirically that...

The paper examines how flows of foreign aid have reacted to events of democratization in developing countries. Using a panel dataset of 136 aid receiving countries between 1980 and 2009, aid allocation regressions reveal that donors in general have tended to react to visible, major democratic...

This paper presents a neoclassical growth model comprising education and child labor with a focus on developing and aid-receiving countries to demonstrate cyclical growth and bifurcation in economic development. The appearance of multiple equilibria has often been attributed to the internal...

General budget support (GBS) is funding which is not earmarked for a specific sector or project, but is provided as direct financial support to the public sector in the recipient country. This type of aid is argued to have a positive effect on aid efficiency if it is targeted at countries with...

This paper looks into aid allocation in the response to multiple crises, focusing more specifically on the cases of concomitance between so-called `natural' hazard/disaster and conflict situations. Over 150 natural disasters have occurred alongside complex political crises in the past seven...

This paper assesses the validity of the perception-based governance indicators used by the US Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) for aid allocation decisions. By conducting Explanatory and Confirmatory Factor Analysis of data from 1996 to 2009, we find that although the MCA purports to measure...

This paper introduces a framework for studying the optimal dynamic allocation of foreign aid among multiple recipients. We pose the problem as one of weighted global welfare maximization. A donor in the North chooses an optimal path for international transfers, anticipating that consumption and...

This paper introduces a framework for studying the optimal dynamic allocation of foreign aid among multiple recipients. We pose the problem as one of weighted global welfare maximization. A donor in the North chooses an optimal path for international transfers, anticipating that consumption and...