Hi all,
I’ve been reading Amartya Sen’s The Idea of Justice recently (and slowly). It’s my wife’s copy, signed by the great man himself. In it, he continually returns to the argument that in choosing arrangements that affect justice and fairness in the world we must take consideration of the views of those outside our own immediate community. He gives many examples of how we may be affected by or have concerns for the justice of others, even those quite distant from us, and how many ideas of fairness and justice do not adequately capture this. His answer—so far, I haven’t finished the book yet—involves a lot of discussion, debate and exchange of ideas. This has been on my mind a lot. On Tuesday the US will choose its President. When I was 18 or so, the choice was between Bush and Gore; I remember a friend of mine proposing that everyone in the world should have a vote because what happens in the US will affect us all, a kind of practical and institutional application of Sen’s ideas. I could never persuade myself he was right, but the underlying idea, of our connectedness and especially everyone’s connectedness to what happens in the States remains as true today as it was 24 years ago (and yes, writing that did make me feel very old indeed).
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In that vein Ken Opalo discusses what the different outcomes of the election may mean for Africa. The piece does compare and contrast the Republican and Democratic approaches to engaging with Africa, but it’s also so much more than that. It’s a deeply critical and questioning discussion of the very basis from which the US determines its Africa policy, and how the different agencies are oriented with respect to Africa. His criticisms are both hard and fair, and I think they could easily apply to many other countries, including the UK. Reading it made me question some of my own beliefs about the optimal structure of UK relations in different places in Africa, and I think its worth reading and critically engaging with for anyone in an official role in or working on Africa. He also points out the two great structural constraints to stronger US-African relations (which also apply in other places), both of which again have much broader relevance. It’s brilliant, read it.
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One of the things Ken discusses in his piece is localization and how USAID’s 25% target is insufficiently ambitious. I’ve written about localization this week, too, and I take a slightly different tack to Ken. I think localization, and specifically doing it well, is going to be really really hard, and it requires a lot more thought about why and how we can best implement it. The practicalities underlying localization are difficult because (in part, and not solely) because of conceptual challenges it poses to development cooperation, and most donors need to do a lot more work on this. Blog version here for the hard-of-time.
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On a related topic: I missed that OWID now has a foreign aid topic page.
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I could spend the rest of the links just on VoxDev pieces today, but I will restrain myself and group them here. First, and again related: how southern researchers can play a bigger, more central role in the knowledge generation that underpins development work and policy. Second, Oliver summarises a huge amount of learning from editing VoxDev to give tips on making research accessible but useful. Third, two good pieces on gender: the first on how bias in the classroom can affect later life outcomes; and the second on representation in journal editorial boards and the impact that has on what gets published.
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Tim Harford on trick questions, and what they teach us. This is a good one. I’m quite bad at abstract logic puzzles, but quite good at solving practical puzzles in real life. I’m also innately sceptical of most big claims. I wonder how that kind of pattern would be represented in the research he cites.
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Jishnu Das has a substack, too! We are truly entering a new golden age of development blogging, perhaps driven by the ongoing destruction of Twitter (which, by the way, I am trying not to post on at all—do follow me on other platforms). The most recent post is about private provision of education in developing countries. He is provocative and very much worth reading.
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Finally, it was Halloween yesterday, and I was in Oxford. The students outdid themselves. I saw a BoJack Horseman, a Michael Myers so realistic I actually jumped when I saw him, Agatha Harkness and more. But no-one went as Manu Ginobli, which is a tragedy, because nothing more Halloweeny has ever happened than when Manu caught a bat with his bare hands in the middle of a basketball match being played on Halloween. Manu’s timing was always impeccable. And finally, in the spirit of the season, here’s a video of some of the greatest scare pranks of all time (note, not for the faint of heart).
Have a great weekend, everyone!
R
Disclaimer
CGD blog posts reflect the views of the authors, drawing on prior research and experience in their areas of expertise. CGD is a nonpartisan, independent organization and does not take institutional positions.
