This course explores the role of microfinance in economic development. It will discuss how poor people in poor countries use financial services such as credit and savings; the history and practice of delivering such services; what is known about their contribution to development; and how stories and...

This course will review the determinants of rural poverty and examine the historical pathways that have led the rural poor out of poverty. A policy perspective will be taken on all three levels of analytical interest: the macro level, the sectoral level, and the household level.

Since 2004, the Center for Global Development has been collecting success stories in global health – remarkable cases in which large-scale efforts to improve health in developing countries have succeeded – and releasing them in the book Millions Saved: Case Studies in Global Health&...

This syllabus, prepared by CGD President Nancy Birdsall for a course she taught in Bologna, Italy, for students of Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), brings together key readings on inequality and development in a globalizing world. The syllabus a...

This is the course syllabus for Economic Development (IAFF 238), taught by Nora Lustig, Shapiro Visiting Professor of International Affairs at George Washington University and CGD Board member. The course analyzes the economic challenges faced by low and middle-income countries in their quest for ...

The goal of this course is to familiarize the student with the different approaches to the study of war and terror: economic, historical, analytical, formal theoretical, and statistical. Most of all, the course is designed to get students to think critically about traditional explanations and approa...

This course examines economic growth and other development indicators around the world since 1965, with some reference to broad patterns since 1820, while also exploring the relationship between growth, poverty, and equity. Other topics will include the developing-country debt crisis and the financi...