Why has the West disbursed vertiginous sums of money to the Palestinians after Oslo? What have been donors’ motivations and above all the political consequences of the funds spent?
Based on original ...academic research and first hand evidence, this book examines the interface between diplomacy and international assistance during the Oslo years and the intifada. By exploring the politics of international aid to the Palestinians between the creation of the Palestinian Authority and the death of President Arafat (1994-2004), Anne Le More reveals the reasons why foreign aid was not more beneficial, uncovering a context where funds from the international community was poured into the occupied Palestinian territory as a substitute for its lack of real diplomatic engagement. This book also highlights the perverse effects such huge amounts of money has had on the Palestinian population and territory, on Israeli policies in the occupied Palestinian territory, and not least on the conflict itself, particularly the prospect of its resolution along a two-state paradigm.
International Assistance to the Palestinians after Oslo gives a unique narrative chronology that makes this complex story easy to understand. These features make this book a classic read for both scholars and practitioners, with lessons to be learned beyond the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
'In meticulous detail, she traces the international aid effort, and identifies why it has so dramatically failed to deliver the ‘tangible results’ it once promised. Her answer is clear: heavy Palestinian dependence on the Israeli economy, coupled with Israeli policies of territorial control—illegal settlement activity, roadblocks and other mobility restrictions, and construction of the separation barrier—have made it all but impossible for the West Bank and Gaza to flourish, even with large amounts of external assistance......this is an excellent volume. It certainly should be required reading for anyone studying the conflict—and most especially for diplomats, aid officials and others directly involved with the issues that Le More so ably explores'- Rex Brynen, McGill University, Canada; International Affairs
"...the strength of this book lies in the breadth of analysis, its well-articulated and evidenced arguments, and its focus on the role of the four main third-party actors: the United States, the EU, the UN and the World Bank..." -- Mandy Turner, University of Brandford; International Peacekeeping Journal
'International Assistance to the Palestinians After Oslo, the first in Routledge's Studies on the Arab-Israeli Conflict Series, provides an important critique of the belief that reconstruction, development, and humanitarian aid form essential counterparts to political processes aimed at resolving longstanding violent conflicts....Le More does a masterful job placing ostensibly technocratic donor mechanisms in political context.' - Ali Abunimab - Journal of Palestine Studies, Spring 2009
'This monograph tackling the thorny question of the politics of aid in Palestine is essential reading for anyone interested in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and, more broadly, the politics of aid in a conflict environment....The message in Le More's book is as meticulous and clear as it is sobering.' - Nathalie Tocci, The International Spectator, Vol.44, No. 3, September 2009
Introduction 1. Aid Because of Politics: The Analytical, Legal and Institutional Frameworks 1.1 Analytical background: aid, politics, conflict and peacebuilding 1.2 International law, discourse, and perceptions 1.3 The aid coordination architecture: a political framework for assistance 2. Israeli Policies: The Territorial, Demographic, and Socio-Economic Fragmentation of the Occupied Palestinian Territory Territorial separation, cantonment, dispossession, and segregation 2.1 De-development and macroeconomic decline under Oslo and the intifada 2.2 The emergence of a humanitarian crisis 3. Palestinian Adjustment: The Rise and Fall of Arafat’s Regime 3.1 Authoritarianism and the personalization of power 3.2 Corruption 3.3 Security, human rights abuses, and the failure to rein in domestic opposition 4. Aid Instead of Politics: Multiple Actors, Fragmented Interests, Limited Influence 4.1 The bilateral protagonists: the US plays; the EU pays 4.2 American-European rivalry 4.3 The multilateral sponsors: the UN ‘processes’; the World Bank leads 5. Espousing Israeli Policies: Supporting the ‘Peace Process’ 5.1 Short-term fixes, political relief, and variation on a similar theme 5.2 Mitigating the socio-economic and humanitarian crises 5.3 Underwriting the process of Palestinian territorial fragmentation 6. Funding Palestinian Adjustment: Regime Creation and the Undermining of Palestinian State Building 6.1 Bailing out the PA: budget support, 1994-1998 & 2000-2005 6.2 Legitimizing the regime; de-democratizing Palestinian politics 6.3 Reforming the regime, 2002-2005 Conclusion
Anne Le More currently works for the United Nations in New York. She holds a PhD in International Relations from Oxford University. Her research interests include the Middle East, and the Arab and Muslim world more broadly. She has published a number of articles and is the co-editor of Aid, Diplomacy and Facts on the Ground: The Case of Palestine (Chatham House, London, 2005).
The OECD's Development Assistance Committee (DAC) conducts periodic reviews of the individual development co-operation efforts of DAC members. The policies and programmes of each member are ...critically examined approximately once every five years. DAC peer reviews assess the performance of a given member, not just that of its development co-operation agency, and examine both policy and implementation. They take an integrated, system-wide perspective on the development co-operation and humanitarian assistance activities of the member under review. Contents Portugal's aid at a glance Context of Portugal's peer review The DAC's main findings and recommendations Chapter 1. Towards a comprehensive Portuguese development effort Chapter 2. Portugal's vision and policies for development co-operation Chapter 3. Allocating Portugal's official development assistance Chapter 4. Managing Portugal's development co-operation Chapter 5. Portugal's development co-operation delivery and partnerships Chapter 6. Results management and accountability of Portugal's development co-operation Chapter 7. Portugal's humanitarian assistance Annex A. Progress since the 2010 DAC peer review recommendations Annex B. OECD/DAC standard suite of tables Annex C. Field visit to Sao Tome and Principe Annex D. Portugal's credit lines 2001-14.
Debates over foreign aid can seem strangely innocent of history. Economists argue about effectiveness and measurement—how to make aid work. Meanwhile, critics in donor countries bemoan what they see ...as money wasted on corrupt tycoons or unworthy recipients. What most ignore is the essentially political character of foreign aid. Looking back to the origins and evolution of foreign aid during the Cold War, David C. Engerman invites us to recognize the strategic thinking at the heart of development assistance—as well as the political costs.In The Price of Aid, Engerman argues that superpowers turned to foreign aid as a tool of the Cold War. India, the largest of the ex- colonies, stood at the center of American and Soviet aid competition. Officials of both superpowers saw development aid as an instrument for pursuing geopolitics through economic means. But Indian officials had different ideas, seeking superpower aid to advance their own economic visions, thus bringing external resources into domestic debates about India's economic future. Drawing on an expansive set of documents, many recently declassified, from seven countries, Engerman reconstructs a story of Indian leaders using Cold War competition to win battles at home, but in the process eroding the Indian state.The Indian case provides an instructive model today. As China spends freely in Africa, the political stakes of foreign aid are rising once again.
Practically all donor countries that give aid claim to do so on the basis on the recipient's good governance, but do these claims have a real impact on the allocation of aid? Are democratic, human ...rights-respecting, countries with low levels of corruption and military expenditures actually likely to receive more aid than other countries? Using econometric analysis, the author examines the factors that really determine the patterns of aid giving. The author analyses such examples as: * aggregate aid flows * aid from multilateral organisations such as the EU and the UN * aid from bilateral donors such as Germany, Japan, the US as well as Arab donors. This concise, well argued and well researched book will be a great read for students, academics and policy-makers involved in development studies, economics and international relations.
Eric Neumayer is Lecturer in Environment and Development at the London School of Economics, UK.
'Eric Neumayer's book is an important contribution to the current debate about development assistance and the motivation of aid donors, and it deserves to be read by academics and policy makers alike.' - Development and Change, January 2004
1. Introduction 2. Good Governance and its Relation to Aid 3. Overview of Existing Studies 4. Research Design 5. Aggregate Aid, Western Bilateral and Multilateral Aid 6. The Arab Donors 7. Analysis and Discussion of Results 8. Testing the Robustness of Results 9. Conclusions
Offering a clear and logical analysis of the panoply of European Union aid policies and a theoretically informed evaluation of their operation, Patrick Holden contends that the major thrust of EU aid ...policy is an effort to augment the EU's structural power through targeted political and economic liberalization. Although historically grounded, this book concentrates on EU aid to key world regions in the 21st century. As such, it provides a comprehensive and thought-provoking account of EU aid policy and will be of interest to a wide range of academics, students and policy makers.
The wave of neoliberal economic reforms in the developing world since the 1980s has been regarded as the result of both severe economic crises and policy pressures from global financial institutions ...such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Using comparative evidence from the initiation and implementation of IMF programs in Latin America and Eastern Europe, From Economic Crisis to Reform shows that economic crises do not necessarily persuade governments to adopt IMF-style economic policies. Instead, ideology, interests, and institutions, at both the international and domestic levels, mediate responses to such crises.
Poverty knowledge Alice O'Connor
2001., 20090110, 2009, 2001-12-31
eBook
Progressive-era "poverty warriors" cast poverty in America as a problem of unemployment, low wages, labor exploitation, and political disfranchisement. In the 1990s, policy specialists made ..."dependency" the issue and crafted incentives to get people off welfare. Poverty Knowledge gives the first comprehensive historical account of the thinking behind these very different views of "the poverty problem," in a century-spanning inquiry into the politics, institutions, ideologies, and social science that shaped poverty research and policy. Alice O’Connor chronicles a transformation in the study of poverty, from a reform-minded inquiry into the political economy of industrial capitalism to a detached, highly technical analysis of the demographic and behavioral characteristics of the poor. Along the way, she uncovers the origins of several controversial concepts, including the "culture of poverty" and the "underclass." She shows how such notions emerged not only from trends within the social sciences, but from the central preoccupations of twentieth-century American liberalism: economic growth, the Cold War against communism, the changing fortunes of the welfare state, and the enduring racial divide.
The great American mission Ekbladh, David
2010., 20110808, 2011, 2009, 2010-01-01, 20100101, Letnik:
6
eBook
The Great American Mission traces how America's global modernization efforts during the twentieth century were a means to remake the world in its own image. David Ekbladh shows that the emerging ...concept of modernization combined existing development ideas from the Depression. He describes how ambitious New Deal programs like the Tennessee Valley Authority became symbols of American liberalism's ability to marshal the social sciences, state planning, civil society, and technology to produce extensive social and economic change. For proponents, it became a valuable weapon to check the influence of menacing ideologies such as Fascism and Communism.
