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Annual Report 2022 Cover

UNU-WIDER 2022 Annual Report is released

2022 was a key year in the UNU-WIDER 2019–2023 work programme, with great achievements made possible through our partnerships and collaborations Read more in the 2022 Annual Report.
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The Job Ladder: Transforming informal work and livelihoods in developing countries

NEW BOOK - Available now on Open Access. Providing a nuanced view of informality across a range of developing economies using a common conceptual framework.
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42 UNU-WIDER articles, publications, projects, experts...

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  • (-) Aid effectiveness
Working Paper
Aid targeting to fragile and conflict-affected states and implications for aid effectiveness

While significant amounts of foreign aid have been allocated to the group of so-called fragile and conflict-affected states in recent years, it is not clear whether that aid is targeted to where it is most needed. This paper extends recent work by...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Foreign aid
  • Fragile states
Working Paper
What does the evidence tell us about ‘thinking and working politically’ in development assistance?

This paper critically reviews evidence on ‘thinking and working politically’ in development. Scholars and practitioners have increasingly recognised that development is fundamentally political, and efforts are underway to develop more politically...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Donors
  • Evidence
Working Paper
Institutional bypass and aid effectiveness in Africa

Many practical and action-oriented international roadmaps to improve the quality of aid and its delivery and impact on development—including the Paris Declaration, Accra Agenda for Action, and Busan Partnership—emphasize a more active involvement of...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Institutions
  • Aid policy
Blog
The vital role of aid in development
by Rachel Gisselquist, Sam Jones June 2019

The UNU-WIDER research programme on foreign aid (ReCom) began in 2010, in a period of strong aid scepticism. Dambisa Moyo’s well-known book, Dead Aid...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Aid policy
  • Conflict management
Journal Special Issue
Aid Impact and Effectiveness
  • Aid effectiveness
  • Aid and growth
  • Development aid
Journal Article
Aid Targeting to Fragile and Conflict-Affected States and Implications for Aid Effectiveness

Part of Journal Special Issue Aid Impact and Effectiveness

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Foreign aid
  • Fragile states
Journal Article
Bypassing Government

Part of Journal Special Issue Aid Impact and Effectiveness

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Institutions
  • Aid policy
Journal Article
Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen?

Part of Journal Special Issue Aid Impact and Effectiveness

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Foreign aid
  • Funding
Journal Article
Do Countries Use Foreign Aid to Buy Geopolitical Influence?

Part of Journal Special Issue Aid Impact and Effectiveness

  • Funding
  • Foreign aid
  • Aid effectiveness
Journal Article
What Does the Evidence Tell Us about ‘Thinking and Working Politically’ in Development Assistance?

Part of Journal Special Issue Aid Impact and Effectiveness

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Donors
  • Evidence
Working Paper
Do countries use foreign aid to buy geopolitical influence?

In recent years, donor countries have increasingly used different aid allocation channels to boost aid effectiveness. One delivery channel that has grown tremendously is ‘multi-bi aid’—contributions to multilateral organizations earmarked for...

  • Funding
  • Foreign aid
  • Aid effectiveness
Working Paper
Too many cooks in the kitchen?

The total funding envelope for World Bank projects is often divided among various state and non-state actors, each of which can have competing ideas about or interests in the project. How does the division of financing relate to overall project...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Foreign aid
  • Funding
Policy Brief
Aid is not dead
  • Foreign aid
  • Macroeconomics
  • Tax revenue
In the media
EBA/UNU-WIDER study on democracy aid featured in Kehityslehti
  • Democracy aid
  • Democracy
  • Aid effectiveness
Panel discussion
Rachel Gisselquist at Finland's Development Policy Days 2021

Rachel M. Gisselquist joins a panel discussion at the annual Development Policy Days event hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Finland. The event is held 9-10 November 2021 both online and at Finlandia Hall, Helsinki from 8:30 – 16:30. Rachel...

9 November 2021 – 10 November 2021
Helsinki, Finland
Past event
Presentation
Does development aid work?

Presentation to the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Finnish Parliament on Aid Effectiveness. See slides here.

5 May 2014
Parliament house, Mannerheimintie 30, Helsinki, Finland
Past event
Report
Effects of Swedish and international democracy aid

Democracy aid is a significant component of development cooperation. As a share of total aid, it has increased steadily since the mid-1990s. In 2018, countries in the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) devoted roughly 10 per cent of overseas...

  • Democracy aid
  • Aid effectiveness
  • Democracy
Working Paper
Does project-level aid for water and sanitation improve child health outcomes?

Empirical studies on the effectiveness of aid to the water, sanitation, and hygiene sector (WASH aid) have focused primarily on access to these services as the benchmark for evaluating the effectiveness of aid in this sector. Given the importance of...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Public health
  • Water
Working Paper
Good for now but not forever: officials’ perspectives on the relevance of the effectiveness agenda and the need for change

This paper investigates whether the current effectiveness agenda—agreed during the 2011 Busan High Level Forum on Development Effectiveness—continues to define best practice in development amidst a rapidly changing development landscape. To do so, we...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Development aid
  • Development agencies
Working Paper
Development narratives in a post-aid era

This paper argues that the crisis facing the development effectiveness agenda is fundamentally derived from limited collective commitment to a singular model of development, one where a developed North serves as model and funder for a developing...

  • Development effectiveness
  • Foreign aid
  • International cooperation
Working Paper
Evidence on aid (in)effectiveness in highly fragile states

This working paper provides a summary of three systematic reviews on the effectiveness of aid in Afghanistan, Mali, and South Sudan between 2008 and 2021. These three countries, like all other highly fragile countries, suffer from bad governance...

  • Foreign aid
  • Aid effectiveness
  • Systematic review
Working Paper
Aid effectiveness in fragile and conflict-affected contexts

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 conflict-affected contexts. We draw on our own research findings as well as...

  • Fragile states
  • Fragility
  • COVID-19
Policy Brief
Building evidence around the effectiveness principles

This policy brief draws on the studies presented at the International Research Conference on the Effectiveness of Development Cooperation on 17–18 November 2022, in Brussels, Belgium and jointly organized by UNU-WIDER and the European Commission (DG...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Aid policy
Working Paper
Putting Paris into practice

This paper examines the application of the first two principles of the 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness, namely ownership and alignment, to the cases of Mali and Ghana. It argues that Western donors and recipient governments have adopted...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Paris decleration
  • Ownership
Blog
Foreign aid can help stem the decline of democracy, if used in the right way
by Rachel Gisselquist, Miguel Niño-Zarazúa April 2021

Democracy is having a hard time. In India, once the world’s largest democracy, the pandemic has hastened the country’s slide toward authoritarianism...

  • Foreign aid
  • Development aid
  • Aid effectiveness
Working Paper
The institutions and policies of aid-recipient countries and aid effectiveness

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...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • State fragility
  • Regime type
Working Paper
Politics, policies, and the effectiveness of foreign aid in fragile states

International development cooperation has evolved since the 1960s. The effectiveness of aid is still topical, but studies have not paid adequate attention to the relationship between sectoral aid, politics, institutions, and aid effectiveness in...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Education
  • Health
Working Paper
Do the effectiveness principles matter for development?

The Principles of Effective Development Co-operation provide an important reference point for foreign aid and international development assistance. Although the principles—country ownership, focus on results, inclusive partnerships, and transparency...

  • Development effectiveness
  • Aid effectiveness
  • development cooperation
Working Paper
Donor relations and sovereignty

As a sovereign country, Mozambique initially relied on international solidarity and managed its donor relations well. Donor dependency entailed some loss of agency for the government as it allowed donors to challenge its capacity but never its...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Donors
  • Foreign policy
Book Chapter
Foreign aid and peacebuilding

Foreign aid is a core component of peacebuilding and among the largest external financial flows to fragile states and conflict-affected areas. Nevertheless, troubling critiques have been raised about its overall impact and effectiveness. Some of the...

  • Foreign aid
  • Peacebuilding
  • Aid effectiveness
Policy Brief
Aid effectiveness

The questions of whether aid has impact and is effective have been the subject of considerable attention. This thematic issue brings together nine studies that speak to the diverse ways in which aid affects development outcomes including, but not...

  • Aid effectiveness
  • Aid and growth
  • Development aid
Working Paper
Does aid fragmentation affect tax revenue dynamics in developing countries?

There exists a burgeoning empirical literature on the impact of aid fragmentation on development outcomes in aid-receiving countries, with it being widely recognized that aid fragmentation is deleterious. This paper adds to the existing literature by...

  • Aid fragmentation
  • Tax revenue
  • Institutional quality
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