CGD's weekly Global Prosperity Wonkcast, event videos, whiteboard talks, slides, and more.
President Barack Obama's re-election gives him four more years to carry out his US global development vision. Rethink director Sarah Jane Staats shares a few ideas that could help the administration get a running start on their second term.
What does the new makeup of Congress mean for global development looking forward? My guest this week is Sarah Jane Staats, director of policy outreach here at the Center for Global Development. Sarah Jane is responsible for engaging the development policy community—especially senior staff in the U.S. Congress, the administration and policy experts in leading development advocacy NGOs—in the Center’s research and other programs.
In this Wonkcast, Sarah Jane starts by explaining that, “the first big takeaway with the elections is that they were really not about foreign policy.” Because domestic issues drove the rhetoric of the candidates this election cycle, even the foreign policy positions of some freshman Congressmen are still unknown. Thirty nine of the sixty new House Republicans align themselves with the Tea Party, a group with no clear foreign policy agenda, much less a unified view about whether and how to engage developing countries.
In this video, the the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network presents their “New Day, New Way: U.S. Foreign Assistance for the 21st Century” report to a standing-room-only audience of policy makers, NGOs and nonprofits.
The U.S. Foreign Assistance Act -- a cornerstone of America’s support for global development -- is so badly out of date that it would be funny if it weren’t so pathetic, writes Lawrence MacDonald, CGD director of communications and policy. Although the mainstream media has shown little interest in the issue, the candidates themselves and a growing number of Americans recognize the urgency of modernizing the FAA. A new YouTube video from CGD’s Global Development Matters initiative helps make the case.