Effectiveness Of Development Aid Research Articles

Assessing the Effectiveness of South Korea’s Development Assistance in Vietnam

South Korea’s development assistance has become an important resource in facilitating Vietnam’s socio-economic development and contributed to infrastructure establishment, agricultural and rural development, as well as hunger eradication and poverty reduction in Vietnam over the past 25 years. By adopting indicators proposed in the Busan Partnership Agreement and OECD’s DAC criteria, desk study and in-depth interviews, the paper assessed the effectiveness of South Korea’s development aid in Vietnam at three levels: nation, donor and project level. The results show that at both national and donor levels, South Korea’s ODA in Vietnam is successful and effective in terms of aligning objectives of both sides, facilitating engagement of private sectors, supporting a forward-looking vision, providing public and up-to-date information, and applying effective international methods to monitor and evaluate ODA projects. At project level, the QCGH project of KOICA has proved to be relatively successful especially in terms of relevance and impacts. The paper also pointed out shortcomings of South Korea’s development at national and donor levels with a focus on disbursement of development aid, the use of Vietnam’s financial system, strictly binding conditions and limited inclusive cooperation between South Korea and Vietnam in assessing the effectiveness of South Korea’s development aid. At project level, the shortcomings lied mainly under efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability indicators. Based on evaluation of South Korean’s aid performance and effectiveness in Vietnam, the paper drew out some implications to strengthen South Korea’s development aid effectiveness in Vietnam in the future. 
 Keywords
 Aid effectiveness, Vietnam, South Korea, development aid, development assistance
 References
 
 [1] Department of Planning and Investment of Quang Binh province, Report on ODA attraction, management and utilization and loans in the period 2011-2015 and orientation to attract ODA and loans for the period 2016-2020 of Quang Binh province, 2015. [2] EDCF 2015. EDCF Annual Report. Seoul: Economic Development Cooperation Report [3] JICA, New JICA Guidelines for Project Evaluation: First edition. Tokyo: Japan International Cooperation Agency, 2010.[4] KOICA. Ex-Post Evaluation on the Project for the Establishment of the Central General Hospital in Quang Nam Province, Vietnam. Gyeonggi-do: KOICA, 2014.[5] KOICA, KOICA Annual Report 2016. Gyeonggi-do: KOICA, 2016.[6] Ministry of Strategy and Finance of South Korea and Ministry of Foreign Affairs of South Korea, 2014 Korea’s Official Development Assistance White Paper: Opening a New Era of Happiness for All Humanity, Seoul, Ministry of Strategy and Finance of South Korea, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of South Korea, 2014.[7] OECD, Evaluating Development Co-operation: Summary of key norms and standards, OECD, 2010.[8] OECD & UNDP, Making Development Cooperation More Effective : 2014 Progress Report, OECD Publishing, 2014.

Sources of Economic Growth in Zambia: An Empirical Investigation

In this article, the key macroeconomic determinants of economic growth in Zambia are investigated using the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach. The study has been motivated by the unsustainable growth trends that Zambia has been experiencing in recent years. Our study finds that the key macroeconomic determinants that are significantly associated with economic growth in Zambia include, amongst others, investment, human capital development, government consumption, international trade and foreign aid. The study’s results reveal that in the short run, investment and human capital development are positively associated with economic growth, while government consumption, international trade and foreign aid are negatively associated with economic growth. However, in the long run, the study finds investment and human capital development to be positively associated with economic growth, while only foreign aid is negatively associated with economic growth. These results have significant policy implications. They imply that short–run economic policies should focus on creating incentives that attract investment and increase the quality of education, the effectiveness of government institutions, the promotion of international trade reforms and the effectiveness of development aid. In the long run, development strategies should focus on attracting the accumulation of long-term investment, improving the quality of education and the effectiveness of development aid.

Of terrorism and revenue: Why foreign aid exacerbates terrorism in personalist regimes

States hosting terrorist groups often receive foreign aid from donors who have an interest in reducing the level of terrorism in these countries. However, existing work is inconclusive on the question of whether such aid is effective at bringing about favorable counterterrorism outcomes. Aid scholars argue that the political structure of the recipient regime is an important determinant of development aid effectiveness. I apply this logic to the topic of counterterrorism aid and argue that the effects of foreign aid on terrorism will be conditional on recipient political incentives. In particular, personalist dictatorships are unique in their reliance upon external sources of revenue with which to keep their regimes afloat. Thus, rents from foreign aid encourage these regimes to become counterterrorism “racketeers”, offering their services in exchange for a fee. But rather than fixing the problem, they perpetuate it, as their survival is conditional upon a perpetual security threat. Using a variety of data on regime type, terrorist attacks, and terrorist group duration, I find that in personalist regimes, US aid significantly increases levels of terrorist activity. This paper contributes to the literature linking foreign aid and terrorism by considering domestic politics as an important determinant of counterterrorism aid effectiveness.

The European Union as a Collective Actor: Aid and Trade in African Public Opinion

Perceptions of the impact and effectiveness of development aid are used to assess whether the EU is viewed as a collective actor in foreign aid policy. Using Afrobarometer data, we explore the image of the EU in Africa relative to that of France, Britain, the US and China. We compare these results with the effects of trade and investment relationships between donor countries and their African counterparts. There are significant differences in the visibility of the major bilateral donors’ activities in sub‐Saharan Africa, and foreign aid has a positive impact on public opinion about the EU. The EU has partially overcome its collective action dilemma and has come to be perceived as a foreign aid actor in its own right.

Development aid: Regulatory Impact Assessment and conditionality

The purpose of this paper is to examine how Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) can contribute to decision-making processes of Official Development Assistance (ODA) loans and grants. The point of departure for the discussion is the phenomenon that RIA, within a context of ODA, is applied by International Finance Institutions mainly in the context of Development Policy Loans, to introduce or strengthen country systems for Regulatory Impact Assessment. However, ODA grants, and loans, particularly when specific policy or regulatory conditions are attached to them, significantly impact economic and social conditions within the beneficiary country. This article examines what role RIA can play in facilitating a coherent decision-making process affecting the ODA allocation within a context of conditionalities requiring the introduction of new, or changes to existing, policies and regulations. The discussion considers the nexus between development aid effectiveness, conditionality and ownership, and RIA. The article argues a justification for applying RIA to ODA loans and grants which carry regulatory and policy conditionalities.

Performance‐Based Aid: Why It Will Probably Not Meet Its Promises

Performance‐based aid (PBA) is increasingly advocated as a way to improve the effectiveness of development aid by resolving incentive issues inherent in aid relationships, and some donors use it together with performance‐based financing arrangements within partner countries. Expectations from PBA are high, but, while its rationale may look appealing, it is based on a restrictive model and is flawed when taking account of the real‐world context. A number of problems associated with PBA have already been observed, and its appropriateness to provide incentives all along the chain from recipient governments to those who are supposed to produce results is questionable. Thus believing that PBA can have a mechanistic trickle‐down incentive effect seems illusory.

Can Development Aid Help Promote Foreign Direct Investment? Evidence from Central Asia

AbstractThere is a continuing debate on the effectiveness of development aid. One less obvious angle on this issue is the question of the likely impact of aid on foreign direct investment (FDI). This paper tests whether aid had any impact on incoming FDI in Central Asian economies during the period 1993–2008. A simple panel model suggests that (a) aid had a moderate complementary effect on inward FDI, (b) there was a crowding‐out effect such that domestic investment reduced FDI stocks, (c) natural resources were a key attraction for private capital, and (d) increases in development aid offset the crowding‐out effect of domestic capital on FDI. It is argued that donors should target aid to enhance the climate for inward investment.

Catching up with the West? Europeanisation of rural policies in Hungary and Poland

This paper presents a comparative perspective on Europeanisation of rural policies in Poland and Hungary. We focus on developments in these two countries in the last decade and situate them in a broader European Union (EU) narrative. This exercise shows that Europeanisation in rural development has been mostly a one-way process of transferring the EU-15 policy models into the post-socialist realm. The policy system has lacked contextual sensitivity and recognition of the signifi cant differences in political and institutional cultures both within the Central and Eastern European countries and between the ‘old’ and ‘new’ EU Member States. The results are low effectiveness of development aid, coupled with the lack of policy learning and the possibility for gradual improvements of the system. We look here especially at the delivery of LEADER and how its transformation from being an experimental bottom-up innovation into a mainstream delivery mechanism of rural policy has affected its transfer to Hungary and Poland. We conclude with some recommendations for improvements in rural policy delivery and with some research questions to encourage further research.

ILS Position Statement on Development Aid Effectiveness

ILS Position Statement on Development Aid Effectiveness

Development Aid and Growth in Transition Countries

Empirical studies normally analyze diverse and heterogeneous groups of countries, producing very mixed evidence on the effectiveness of development aid in promoting growth. We focus on whether aid promotes economic growth in transitional economies. We find that aid, on average, has had a positive impact on growth for this specific group of countries. This result is robust to samples, estimators, and the use of alternate instruments to address endogeneity. Aid effectiveness is not conditional on good policy and there is little evidence of non-linear growth effects arising from aid.

Broadening the Scope of Societal Change Research: Psychological, Cultural, and Political Impacts of Development Aid

To date, the study of societal change in social and political psychology has been dominated by an intergroup relations research agenda. But in addition to intergroup dynamics, there are other major pathways to societal change and emancipation, which are almost never systematically considered in psychological research. The distribution of technologies (e.g., “ICT for development”) or money (e.g., microcredits) are among the supposed drivers of societal change. Many development aid projects are anchored in expectations about the effect that such instruments have on anticipated primary goals and the emancipation of particular groups (such as women). In the current paper, we begin by reviewing theories in the field of social change. Social psychological theories mainly address the conditions under which social change stimulated by intergroup dynamics is likely to occur, while other mainly historical and sociological research has focused on the role of different technologies as drivers of social change in history. Next, we review recent research focusing on the anticipated primary goals and (often) unanticipated psychological and cultural changes resulting from development aid interventions, presenting two examples of such interventions in Ethiopia and Sri Lanka in more detail. We suggest that (1) development aid projects can instigate profound psychological and cultural change and (2) that the pathways to such changes are markedly different from those traditionally examined in the literature. At the political level, we reflect on the unanticipated side effects of development aid. We conclude with some recommendations for practice following from the research described.

The Impact of Giving on the Recipient: A Summary

Lopamudra Banerjee The Impact of Giving on the Recipient: A Summary IN THE INTE RN AT IO NA L S P H E R E , ONE A SP E C T OF GIVING IS the conferring of aid. Aid entails a voluntary transfer of resources from the donor to the recipient and, by and large, has two objectives. Aid may be directed toward assisting long-term social and economic transforma­ tions of the recipients; aid may also be intended to fulfill the short-term immediate needs for the recipients during a crisis generated by natural disasters, political violence, social strife, or pandemics. In official termi­ nology, the form er is considered development aid, while the latter is considered humanitarian aid. In either case, while the flow of aid may be motivated by altruism, philanthropy, and humane concerns, aid may also serve a strategic purpose for the donors. For example, aid may be used to garner political and military alliances between nation­ states and to indicate diplomatic sanctions. Aid may also be used to provide incentives to the recipient for actions favored by the donor, and to extend the donor’s cultural influence. The essays by Michael Cohen, Nicolas de Torrente, and Joanne Barkan examine the effects of aid by exploring these issues. Cohen looks at the role of development aid from the macro-perspective of the growth and development of the recipient countries and de Torrente the role of humanitarian aid in fulfilling the urgent and criti­ cal needs of the recipients. Barkan addresses the normative aspects of aid flows from nongovernment agencies and large private founda­ tions, especially in context of provisioning public goods in situations where the democratic welfare state is gradually withdrawing from its commitments. social research Vol. 80 : No. 2 : Summer 2013 587 Cohen’s essay highlights how development aid has played a key role in the economic progress and social transitions of countries both recently and historically. Aid facilitated the postwar reconstruction of Japan and Germany, and played a role in the economic restructur­ ing of postcolonial Asia and Africa. Aid has also brought about historic improvements in various indicators of the quality of life, including health and education, in countries where deficiencies in national resources would otherwise have constrained the nation’s efforts to improving the material living conditions of its citizens. The magni­ tude, composition, and donors of development aid have, however, transformed over time. Cohen traces this transformation over the past seven decades, through the postcolonial period and the cold war, to the present-day emergence of new economic powers such as China and the oil-rich countries. The issue of aid flow is, however, not without contention. First and foremost, controversies arise when there is a mismatch in assis­ tance priorities as experienced by the recipient and as perceived by the donor. The problem may be particularly acute in situations in which the recipients cannot negotiate the volume, delivery mechanism, or targeted spheres of support, and in situations in which conditions are attached to aid flows. The second concern is with regard to the accountability of aid use by the recipients. Cohen notes that two philosophical issues may be especially relevant to the donors: first, should aid be allocated on the basis of need or the performance of the recipients in the use of prior aid; and second, should aid be conditioned on the fulfillment of prior condi­ tions? A third major concern is the possible detrimental effects of aid. It has been argued that if aid flows weaken a nation’s sense of self-determi­ nation and progress, a perpetual dependency on the donors can result. This dependency is neither economically sustainable nor is it politically desirable. Cohen notes that while the positive effects of development aid are undeniable, evaluations of the precise nature these impacts over the long run are missing. In the absence of such serious evaluations, the function of aid in facilitating socioeconomic advancements of recipient countries cannot be fully appreciated. 588 social research De Torrenté’s essay emphasizes that aid is not merely a material resource but also a symbolic one. As a material resource, humanitarian aid can play a crucial role in providing support to...

Does aid improve democracy and governance? A meta-regression analysis

The paper provides a systematic and quantitative review of the empirical evidence on the effects of development aid on democracy and governance. We find that aid has had, on average, a zero or negative effect on democracy, except that it has had a positive effect on democratization in European transitional economies. Aid had a positive effect on governance during the Cold War period but has had no effect on governance in the post-Cold War period.

Conflicting Views of Fairness in Aid Distribution: Evidence from Rural Nicaragua

Development programmes and their potential beneficiaries may differ considerably on how they assess the fairness of aid distribution(s). It is worthwhile to understand and explain this heterogeneity, as a mismatch may jeopardize local acceptance and the effectiveness of development aid. Focusing on rural Nicaragua, we analyse two case studies on the use of fairness concepts in discursive struggles over rural microfinance and the agrarian reform. We complement this analysis with an investigation of individual fairness preferences, elicited with the help of a distribution experiment. Asking people how development aid should be distributed in different scenarios, we find that individual fairness preferences correlate with sex, age, wealth, religion and village solidarity and respect for individual property. For policymakers, these correlations yield useful insights regarding the types or groups of people that have potentially conflicting fairness preferences. Les programmes de developpement et leurs beneficiaires potentiels peuvent differer considerablement dans leurs manieres d’evaluer l’equite de la distribution de l’aide. Il est utile de comprendre et d’expliquer cette heterogeneite, car un manque de coherence peut compromettre l’acceptation locale ainsi que l’efficacite de l’aide au developpement. En examinant le cas du Nicaragua rural, nous analysons deux etudes de cas concernant l’utilisation des concepts d’equite dans les discours autour de la micro-finance rurale et la reforme agraire. Nous completons cette analyse par une enquete sur les preferences individuelles en termes d’equite, revelees grâce a une experience sur la distribution. Nous avons demande aux individus comment l’aide au developpement devrait etre repartie dans differents cas de figure et avons constate que les preferences individuelles en termes d’equite etaient liees au sexe, a la religion, l’âge, la richesse, ainsi qu’a la solidarite villageoise et au respect de la propriete individuelle. Pour les decideurs politiques ces correlations apportent des indications utiles sur les types ou groupes de personnes qui auraient potentiellement des preferences conflictuelles concernant l’equite.

Does UK Development Aid in Afghanistan Contribute to Stability in a Positive Way or Does it Facilitate Corruption?

Since 2001, Afghanistan has received over $50 billion in development aid, 1 yet there is scant evidence to suggest that it has been effective in delivering stabilisation or security objectives, and...

IEG's Role in Evaluating Climate Financing—Response

Heider asserts the importance of avoiding bias or conflict of interest in evaluating the impacts of climate change financing. We could not agree more. Independent and transparent auditing of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and other climate change financing is not only critical to minimizing waste, but also to building the public and political will necessary to provide financial support to the developing world. We recognize that internal auditing bodies such as the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) of the World Bank Group try to maintain independent governance structures and implement institutional mechanisms aimed at minimizing bias in project evaluation. Unfortunately, there is substantial evidence that historical and on going ties between an auditor and the aid institution create the potential for both actual and perceived bias in project evaluation. Maintaining independence and credibility is a challenge for independent evaluation offices because of shared culture and personnel. There is a revolving door between international development institutions and their internal evaluation groups ([ 1 ][1]–[ 3 ][2]). For example, a majority of the current upper management (directors, managers, program leaders, and advisers) at the IEG are former World Bank employees, in some cases for decades. The IEG itself is housed within the World Bank headquarters. It is unlikely that evaluators with long-term ties to the aid institution can conduct investigations free from concern about potential repercussions on a future career in the institution ([ 1 ][1]). Even if the evaluators are independent, the culture of the institution still affects their outlook and their methods. An external review of the Internal Evaluation Office of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) found that evaluators were often unable to think outside the box due to the influence of IMF culture and recommended that outsiders be recruited to bring fresh personalities, perspectives, and questioning attitudes ([ 1 ][1]). It is for these cultural reasons that there have been calls for evaluations of aid institutions to be conducted by people without ties to the institutions ([ 3 ][2]–[ 5 ][3]). In the case of climate change financing, the perception of the trustees and the auditing process could influence whether donor nations meet funding pledges and whether recipient nations trust financing programs. Regardless of recent initiatives to increase aid effectiveness and introduce a culture of learning to aid institutions, the perception of a conflict of interest between the auditor and the aid institution would remain. As Heider notes, this problem would not be solved by delegating evaluation to a single outside entity that could become financially dependent on the institutions it was meant to monitor. These actual and perceived conflicts of interest can be minimized by engaging a loose, third-party network of auditors through an academic-style peer review system. The internal evaluation divisions at the development banks and aid agencies would still be key players in such a system. For example, if the World Bank becomes the GCF trustee, the IEG could play a more editorial role that includes collecting project data, coordinating the external evaluation process, and reporting results of that process to the GCF Board. This approach would take advantage of the strengths of the IEG while providing the type of transparent auditing necessary to build the political and public confidence in the climate change financing system. 1. [↵][4] 1. K. Lissakers, 2. I. Husain, 3. N. Woods , Report of the External Evaluation of the Independent Evaluation Office (International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC, 2006). 2. 1. C. Weaver , Rev. Int. Org. 5, 365 (2010). [OpenUrl][5][CrossRef][6] 3. [↵][7] 1. A. Lerrick , “Is the World Bank's word good enough?,” Testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Hearing on Multilateral Development Banks (U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2006). 4. 1. R. Levine , “Evaluating development aid effectiveness,” Testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Hearing on Multilateral Development Banks (U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2006). 5. [↵][8] 1. W. Easterly , “Accountability for multilateral development banks,” Testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Hearing on Multilateral Development Banks (U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2006). [1]: #ref-1 [2]: #ref-3 [3]: #ref-5 [4]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1 in text [5]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DRev.%2BInt.%2BOrg.%26rft.volume%253D5%26rft.spage%253D365%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1007%252Fs11558-010-9094-1%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [6]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1007/s11558-010-9094-1&link_type=DOI [7]: #xref-ref-3-1 View reference 3 in text [8]: #xref-ref-5-1 View reference 5 in text

Measuring Aid Flows: A New Approach

Conventional measures of aid are not designed to estimate the overall aid content of financial flows. Furthermore, they typically overstate the grant elements of concessional loans, thus understating relative aid flows to recipients getting mostly grants and from donors giving mostly grants (and loans in high-yield currencies). A new approach to measuring aid flows-Effective Development Assistance-focuses on the overall grant equivalent of official financial flows and allows meaningful comparisons of recipients or donors. Debate about the effectiveness of foreign aid has intensified in recent years, as budgetary pressures on aid have increased in donor countries. Whatever the merits of opposing arguments, the question is: do conventional measures of aid (such as OECD's Net ODA), which lump together grants and loans, accurately reflect true aid flows? Chang, Fernandez-Arias, and Serven analyze the methodological shortcomings of conventional measures of aid and propose a new approach, which measures official aid flows as the sum of grants and the grant-equivalents of official loans (in a new aggregate they call Effective Development Assistance, or EDA). They show how results using this conceptually superior measure may differ significantly from conventional aggregates, providing a quite different view on major aid trends. They implement their approach empirically using data on some 40,000 official loans from the World Bank's DRS database-virtually all of the official loans to 133 developing countries from 1975 to 1995. The numerical results underscore several points: - The conventional approach has led to systematic overestimates of the concessionality of official loans. This overestimate has increased significantly since the mid-1980s. Conventional methods show a rising trend; the new method shows the opposite. - Net ODA increasingly overstates the true aid content of official flows, although the divergence between the two approaches is somewhat muted by the rising relative importance of grants over loans in total official flows. This paper - a product of Macroeconomics and Growth, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to understand the effectiveness of development aid. The authors may be contacted at cchang6@worldbank.org or lserven@worldbank.org.

Organizational Learning in Housing Sector Nongovernmental Development Organizations: Recommendations for Enhancing Development Effectiveness

Despite sizable investment over the last forty years to improve housing conditions and quality of life in substandard settlements, success has been elusive. Meeting the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goal of achieving significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020 seems unlikely given recent projections. The 2006 report of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme indicates that nearly one billion people live in slums, with that number predicted to double by 2030. Given the current debate on U.S. foreign assistance reform and serious questions about the effectiveness of development aid, it is more important than ever to candidly examine initiatives to improve slums and the lives of slum dwellers and to grapple with the question of why existing funding levels and good intentions have not resulted in the hoped-for improvements in the lives of the world’s most poor. The U.S. Agency for International Development, the U.S. Department of State and other donors of official U.S. foreign aid channel significant development assistance through nongovernmental development organizations (NGDO). NGDOs that choose to accept government funds are impacted by U.S. development policy, and the effectiveness of U.S. development assistance is deeply impacted by the quality of NGDOs’ work. Given the reality that housing interventions have grossly inadequately addressed the housing crisis in developing countries, the ability of NGDOs to learn from the past and adapt their approach for the future is of pressing importance to meet the need for adequate housing and to meet other global challenges. This paper examines factors that hinder the ability of NGDOs working on slum issues to learn from the past, especially those related to NGDO success at organizational learning. Key lessons learned are examined and recommendations are proposed to enhance the ability of NGDOs to learn and thus better serve the needs of their focus population.

THE AID EFFECTIVENESS LITERATURE: THE SAD RESULTS OF 40 YEARS OF RESEARCH

AbstractThe aid effectiveness literature (AEL) consists of empirical macroeconomic estimates of the effects of development aid. By the end of 2004, it comprised 97 econometric studies of three families of related effects. Each family has been analyzed in a separate meta‐analysis. The AEL is an ideal subject for meta‐analysis as it uses only a few formally similar models to estimate the same underlying effects. It is also an area with strong beliefs, often generated by altruism. When this whole literature is examined, a clear pattern emerges. After 40 years of development aid, the preponderance of the evidence indicates that aid has not been effective. We show that the distribution of results is significantly asymmetric reflecting the reluctance of the research community to publish negative results. The Dutch disease effect on exchange rates provides a plausible explanation for the observed aid ineffectiveness.

The Aid Effectiveness Literature - The Sad Result of 40 Years of Research

The aid effectiveness literature (AEL) consists of empirical macroeconomic estimates of the effects of development aid. By the end of 2004, it comprised 97 econometric studies of three families of related effects. Each family has been analyzed in a separate meta-analysis. The AEL is an ideal subject for meta-analysis as it uses only a few formally similar models to estimate the same underlying effects. It is also an area with strong beliefs, often generated by altruism. When this whole literature is examined, a clear pattern emerges. After 40 years of development aid, the preponderance of the evidence indicates that aid has not been effective. We show that the distribution of results is significantly asymmetric reflecting the reluctance of the research community to publish negative results. The Dutch disease effect on exchange rates provides a plausible explanation for the observed aid ineffectiveness.