January 11, 2021
Allocating Global Aid to Maximize Utility
In a paper and blog, Charles Kenny discusses the idea of the declining marginal utility of income and its potential use in allocation decisions.
Views from the Center
December 21, 2020
Better Ways to Use Aid in Middle-Income Countries
In a paper and blog, the authors examine the distribution of aid among countries at different income levels and focus on the aid going to middle-income countries (MICs).
December 15, 2020
Playing Snakes and Ladders with International Development Aid: When Fragile Accounting Rules and Political Pressures Mix
In new analysis, we explore the impact of political pressures and fragile accounting rules on aid budgets, and ask: What can be done to ensure ODA remains robust and relevant?
December 3, 2020
Development Leaders Conference 2020: Shaping Collaboration at a Crucial Time
As development agencies transition from their immediate COVID-19 response towards a medium-term strategy, their leaders see a clear need to rethink some key aspects of their underlying business models. The Development Leaders Conference brought together heads of bilateral development agencies and senior management from selected multilateral institutions.
November 20, 2020
The Kindest Cuts of All
If further cuts are to come from the ODA budget, how should they be selected and managed? And is there a way to rescue those things of greatest value in the portfolio? In a new note, I argue that there is—and that such a process can improve the quality of ODA spending in perpetuity.
November 13, 2020
Coming Out in the Greenwash: How Much Does the Climate Mitigation Marker Tell Us?
The world is facing a climate emergency, and additional financing is sorely needed to ensure that global temperatures do not rise by more than 1.5 degrees. But how much of the new finance pledged by donors is actually new?
October 27, 2020
On Aid and Climate, Don’t Make the Poor Pay Twice
A few months ago, the experts at the OECD who decide what’s in and what’s out when it comes to what counts as official development assistance (ODA) said spending on research towards a Covid vaccine was out. “It contributes to addressing a global challenge and not a disease disproportionately affecting people in developing countries,” they argued.
July 20, 2020
Why is the World So Stingy?
Over the last sixty years, we have seen many changes in what constitutes a "rich" country, but little difference in what counts as a poor country requiring significant development assistance. While donor status appears more closely tied to relative income, significant recipient status appears to have been effectively tied to a low absolute income. Charles Kenny asks why the world has become stingy.
July 2, 2020
Building Capacity in the Right Places: How to Make the Newton Fund Effective
Euan Ritchie and Charles Kenny take a closer look at the Newton Fund and ask if it is focused on the right places.
June 30, 2020
Redesigning UK Aid for Research and Development
Directing innovation to overcome barriers to development in the world’s poorest countries is surely a good use of aid, then. But who should decide the barriers to overcome, and how should the research and development be supported?
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