What We're Reading, Part Two
David Jacobstein
It’s been a year since the dismantling of USAID and the full scope of the damage is starting to emerge, along with some of the new forces and ideas that are shaping the space. While nothing will come into full focus for a while, and it’s unlikely that a single paradigm will predominate, it’s interesting to consider what has changed and what endures. Some powerful and data-driven reviews highlight this quarter’s readings:
This Aid report provides a comprehensive review of the cuts, and should be a starting point for anyone wanting to unpack what it has caused.
For those specifically interested in the democracy space, this review of DRG funding one year after also provides a wealth of data, not only on consequences but on how different democratic actors are coping, and what strategies they are trying, to continue their work now.
I always love reading Ken Opalo, and I thought his article on the emerging aid paradigm and the need for adaptation was great. It doesn’t make me optimistic, exactly, but it is very realistic, quotes my favorite scholar Yuen Yuen Ang, and highlights the importance of aid aligning itself with a project of state-led development, realistic about the political economy within and between states, and aware of the costs as well as opportunities in the more transactional and multipolar world that exists today.
Nic Cheeseman writes powerfully on middle powers driving decay of democratic norms in Africa, something that should require a pretty urgent rethink around how and why democracy will be valued in states with imperfect democracies subject to significant foreign influence. It reminded me of this article on the new paradigm as having significant costs, and generating a need to blend governance and security in order to continue to support public goods at a time when everything is seen as transactional. Would love to know what my DRG colleagues and peers think of these ideas!
Here’s a great review of great open PEA paper on cash vs. corn in Malawi - part of a larger project on open political economy knowledge that Peter Evans has been spearheading, and which I’m tremendously excited about.
One of the best toolkits I saw in my time at USAID was this brilliant guide on practically building a TWP lens into biodiversity work: Technically Strong and Politically Savvy when Practicing Conservation Standards. I’m delighted that it has resurfaced and comment it to anyone working in environment or natural resource management.
Some other political economy papers that look great, but I haven’t gotten to yet:
CGD on world bank and political economy of knowledge
TWP in Malawi anti-corruption work
h/t Chistian Arandel this article around the political economy of health work, with the excellent term “rented outcomes” that I will apply going forward to explain progress that is both real and transitory absent funding
h/t Alan Hudson this rich qualitative study of political economy of absenteeism in Nigeria, a great type of study and reminds me of the open PEA paper on Malawi