William Easterly

Argues that western foreign aid efforts have done little to stem global poverty, citing how such organizations as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are not held accountable for ineffective practices that the author believes intrude into the inner workings of other countries. By the author of The Elusive Quest for Growth. Reprint. 50,000 first printing.

Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good

The White Man's Burden

An economist describes how tactics to fight global poverty have actually resulted in suppressing the rights of the poor and argues for a new model of development in third world countries that will address unchecked state power and retain individual freedoms. 40,000 first printing.

Economists, Dictators, and the Forgotten Rights of the Poor

The Tyranny of Experts

"In this book Easterly shows how these solutions all violate the basic principle of economics, that people - private individuals and businesses, government officials, even aid donors - respond to incentives. Easterly first discusses the importance of growth. He then analyzes the development solutions that have failed. Finally, he suggests alternative approaches to the problem.

Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics

The Elusive Quest for Growth

Over the last century, global poverty has largely been viewed as a technical problem that merely requires the right "expert” solutions. Yet all too often, experts recommend solutions that fix immediate problems without addressing the systemic political factors that created them in the first place. Further, they produce an accidental collusion with "benevolent autocrats,” leaving dictators with yet more power to violate the rights of the poor. In The Tyranny of Experts, economist William Easterly, bestselling author of The White Man’s Burden, traces the history of the fight against global poverty, showing not only how these tactics have trampled the individual freedom of the world’s poor, but how in doing so have suppressed a vital debate about an alternative approach to solving poverty: freedom. Presenting a wealth of cutting-edge economic research, Easterly argues that only a new model of development--one predicated on respect for the individual rights of people in developing countries, that understands that unchecked state power is the problem and not the solution --will be capable of ending global poverty once and for all.

J. M. M. Ritzen

Michael J. V. Woolcock

One of the primary reasons that otherwise good politicians enact bad policies in countries all over the world, but especially in low-income countries, is that they face significant constraints in their efforts to bring about reform. These constraints, the "room for maneuver", are shaped by the degree of social cohesion in a country and the quality of its institution.

Social Cohesion, Institutions, and Growth

On "good" Politicians and "bad" Policies

William Russell Easterly

Nancy Birdsall

The urgency of reducing poverty in the developing world has been the subject of a public campaign by such unlikely policy experts as George Clooney, Alicia Keyes, Elton John, Angelina Jolie, and Bono. And yet accompanying the call for more foreign aid is an almost universal discontent with the effectiveness of the existing aid system. In Reinventing Foreign Aid, development expert William Easterly has gathered top scholars in the field to discuss how to improve foreign aid. These authors, Easterly points out, are not claiming that their ideas will (to invoke a current slogan) Make Poverty History. Rather, they take on specific problems and propose some hard-headed solutions. Easterly himself, in an expansive and impassioned introductory chapter, makes a case for the "searchers"—who explore solutions by trial and error and learn from feedback—over the "planners"—who throw an endless supply of resources at a big goal—as the most likely to reduce poverty. Other writers look at scientific evaluation of aid projects (including randomized trials) and describe projects found to be cost-effective, including vaccine delivery and HIV education; consider how to deal with the government of the recipient state (work through it or bypass a possibly dysfunctional government?); examine the roles of the International Monetary Fund (a de facto aid provider) and the World Bank; and analyze some new and innovative proposals for distributing aid. Contributors: Abhijit Banerjee, Nancy Birdsall, Craig Burnside, Esther Duflo, Domenico Fanizza, William Easterly, Ruimin He, Kurt Hoffman, Stephen Knack, Michael Kremer, Mari Kuraishi, Ruth Levine, Bertin Martens, John McMillan, Edward Miguel, Jonathan Morduch, Todd Moss, Gunilla Pettersson, Lant Pritchett, Steven Radelet, Aminur Rahman, Ritva Reinikka, Jakob Svensson, Nicolas van de Walle, James Vreeland, Dennis Whittle, Michael Woolcock.

Reinventing Foreign Aid

World Bank. International economics Department

The Macroeconomics of the Public Sector Deficit

A higher share of income for the middle class and lower ethnic polarization are empirically associated with higher income, higher growth, more education, better health, better infrastructure, better economic policies, less political instability, less civil war (putting ethnic minorities at risk), more social "modernization," and more democracy.

The Middle Class Consensus and Economic Development

Desde el final de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, los economistas se han esforzado por averiguar por qué los países pobres no consiguen alcanzar los niveles de renta de los países industrializados del Norte, a la vez que han aplicado toda clase de remedios a la situación, con resultados descorazonadores. Según el autor, estos fracasos no lo son del conocimiento económico sino de no emplear en la práctica los principios de la economía. En un estilo accesible, y a menudo irreverente, este libro presenta la teoría moderna del crecimiento económico desde la óptica de un economista comprometido con su aplicación práctica. "William Easterly no sólo conoce bien la teoría económica sino también los países en desarrollo. Ha escrito un libro comprometido sobre el problema más difícil de todos: cómo conseguir que los países pobres mantengan un crecimiento sostenido" –Robert M. Solow, Premio Nobel de Economía. "Este libro, de una enorme fuerza, puede ayudar a curar la ignorancia de la gente que soluciona los problemas del desarrollo a base de consignas" –Rudi Dornbusch, MIT. "Es éste un libro brillante, original. Es, francamente, el mejor libro que conozco sobre desarrollo económico" –Sergio Rebelo, Northwestern University. Traducción de Bernardo Kugler, profesor de economía en la Universitat Pompeu Fabra.

andanzas y tribulaciones de los economistas del desarrollo

En busca del crecimiento

Jessica Cohen

What Works in Development? brings together leading experts to address one of the most basic yet vexing issues in development: what do we really know about what works— and what doesn't—in fighting global poverty? The contributors, including many of the world's most respected economic development analysts, focus on the ongoing debate over which paths to development truly maximize results. Should we emphasize a big-picture approach—focusing on the role of institutions, macroeconomic policies, growth strategies, and other country-level factors? Or is a more grassroots approach the way to go, with the focus on particular microeconomic interventions such as conditional cash transfers, bed nets, and other microlevel improvements in service delivery on the ground? The book attempts to find a consensus on which approach is likely to be more effective. Contributors include Nana Ashraf (Harvard Business School), Abhijit Banerjee (MIT), Nancy Birdsall (Center for Global Development), Anne Case (Princeton University), Jessica Cohen (Brookings),William Easterly (NYU and Brookings),Alaka Halla (Innovations for Poverty Action), Ricardo Hausman (Harvard University), Simon Johnson (MIT), Peter Klenow (Stanford University), Michael Kremer (Harvard), Ross Levine (Brown University), Sendhil Mullainathan (Harvard), Ben Olken (MIT), Lant Pritchett (Harvard), Martin Ravallion (World Bank), Dani Rodrik (Harvard), Paul Romer (Stanford University), and DavidWeil (Brown).

William Easterly

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