Novel Approach to Development Economics
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This book is breath-taking in scope, pulsating with captivating optimism and inspiring in its bold proposals. For Jeffrey Sachs, no mountain is too steep or too high to climb. Time and again, when this David locks horns with the Goliaths of the World Bank and the White House, he invariably emerges triumphant.
He makes it sound so amazingly easy when he recounts the systematic diagnosis, prescription and treatment that lead to the dramatic arrest of hyperinflation in Bolivia and Poland. The extended medical metaphor is neither haphazard nor purely stylistic. It reflects Sachs' recommendation of a novel approach to development economics which he sees as analogous to the challenges of a paediatrician trained to grope for answers through "differential diagnosis". Couldn't this be of interest to a country like Zimbabwe today running a four digit inflation? He then goes on to make a fascinating and onstructive overview of the reversal of economic fortunes in China and India in the 80's and 90's.
As the economic advisor to the Jubilee 2000 Campaign for the cancellation of the poorest countries' foreign debt, he provided the very powerful theoretical underpinning for the initiative. What was particularly remarkable about the movement was the way it succeeded in roping in support from across all imaginable divides: religious, ideological, political, racial, cultural and class, gaining enthusiastic ownership and invaluable sponsorship by conservative and liberal congressmen in the US, by the left and the right in Europe, including the Pope. The World Bank and the IMF were also brought on board, initially kicking and screaming sceptically, but in the end going along with fervent gusto.
Starting from a close observation of the impact of disease burden on economic development in Africa, Sachs led the very successful advocacy for US policy changes on the fight against HIV/ Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis, enlisting in the process the support of other donor countries, foundations and UN institutions and securing the support of African leaders such as President Obasanjo of Nigeria. This culminated in the setting up of the now famous and highly effective Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB and Malaria in 2001. He can also claim vicarious paternity for President Bush's remarkably successful Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (PEPFAR).
Sachs deserves the credit for pointing out to the US government that it wasn't enough to open up its market to the products from developing countries. They would be easily kept out by the much more efficient East Asian producers unless an element of preferential access was introduced. This is what led to the drawing up of the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA), an initiative which underscores the cynicism of EU's Everything But Arms (EBA) scheme purporting to open up duty free access to the European market for the poorest countries knowing all the while that they face such severe supply side constraints that the advantage is doomed to remain largely theoretical. Indeed their lot is likely to be made worse by the fact that in reciprocation for the EBA favour, they are required to grant tariff free access to EU products, thereby providing the last nail for the coffin of their nascent industries which can never hope to compete with EU imports.
Jeffrey Sachs very usefully attempts to connect his suggestions on initiatives for sustainable development to the UN's Millennium Development Goals and compellingly repeats: "This time can be different!" He has the strength of conviction and the courage to propose and launch pilot village-level actions in different parts of the world to show that what he advocates is not mere rhetoric but can actually be put to practice.
A significant weakness in his model is over-reliance on external aid. He expends considerable effort to show that many developed countries, chief among them the US, have only given lip-service to the goal of meeting the UN's Official Development Assistance target set at 0.7% of GDP. Yet he somehow hopes they can soon be made to see the light and agree to shoulder their part of the burden, without showing how to arrive at that.
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Bono could save more lives if he gave all his money instead of just his opinion
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To honest, I am being a bit naughty.
I havn't read the book.
I think I will buy one soon.
When I have enough money.
Anyway.
I am sure the guy who wrote this book is really good, and is really sincere.
and I do believe that celeb's like Bone-o and Bob the n.. do loads of good work putting their face about, and giving their words. They probably even make quite good donations, which I am sure would be size-able in comparison to what most of us could give.
However, as most things, how much you give is relative to how much you have.
If all the celeb's like Bone-o and Bob the N.. (or sponge Bob) gave all of what they had, only keeping enough to live on, and used the money to set up self sufficient economies, or a global self sufficient economy, then, most of the problems in the world would be sorted.
I think i am not the only one that gets p*ssed off listening to multi millionairs telling us poor people to give away all we have (which, some of us do.)
I wonder how much of the money made from writing this book, as well as other books on the market written by other authors, is actually used to help set up self sufficient economies, and writing the many wrongs that have been done in the history of our crap greed based world.
It's about time capitalists, used their amazing talents to create revenue (through capitalizing their assets which are skills) to save peoples lives.
Anyway, good luck to all.
I hope you all enjoy reading, and giving what you can to change the world in a positive way.
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A great book
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This book is spiritually satisfactory indeed but it over-hypes the need for "infinite aid". The ideology of "bigger is better" hardly functions in the African geographical and cultural context.
The millenium development goals (currently being implemented by the UN) backed by the author are superb. I hope that the millenium development villages (the real beneficiaries) being pioneered by the author will be the springboard for the rest of the continent because it tackles the local needs rather than the donors'.
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If wishes were horses
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There is probably one indisputable truth from the story of Western aid to Africa over the last fifty years: it has had little positive effect, but it has resulted in corruption and expenditure on numberless failed projects of greater or lesser magnitude.
Given this lesson, what should our response be in the future? A prudent person might feel that a major increase in aid was a very risky strategy. It would at least require an enormous effort to persuade us that the results would not be as paltry as has resulted from the many billions of dollars already spent.
Or instead, you can take in on trust from Jeffrey Sachs that it's all gonna be just fine.
This is a near-worthless book. If you want to understand something about how really to help Africa without boosting the egos of grandstanders like Sachs, read anything by William Easterly.
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A leading economist explains how society can end poverty
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This is an excellent book by one of today's most prominent development economists. Jeffrey D. Sachs has been at the forefront of the most significant economic turnarounds - for better or worse - of the past quarter century. He helped end hyperinflation in Bolivia, advised Poland on its emergence from communism, and counseled Russia, China and Africa. On the basis of his extensive research and experience, he concludes that conventional economic solutions ignore some of the key factors responsible for poverty. Borrowing a page from physicians' diagnostic procedures, he shows how noneconomic factors can have economic implications. Along the way, he exposes the lamentable hypocrisy of the developed world and the institutions allegedly working for the development of the poor world. As an adviser to the leadership of the United Nations, Sachs believes that organization should be strengthened. He is not a dispassionate economist and doesn't pretend to be. He has a plausible case to make and he presses it hard, maybe now and then too hard, in this effort to convince the prosperous that effective help for the impoverished is practical, at least under some circumstances. We believe his well informed, heartfelt book belongs on the reading list of anyone who hopes the world can become a better place.
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