Debate has raged over whether and when debt reduction is appropriate, particularly in advanced economies. Arguments for lowering public debt are based on the costs and risks generated by high public debt; debt reduction is generally deemed appropriate when the risks associated with it are greater than those associated with debt-reducing policies (Best et al 2018: 2). The ...» more
Aid Instruments
Technical Assistance and Capacity Building in International Development
This rapid literature review has been commissioned as an update to a previous report on technical assistance produced by the K4D programme in 2018 by Hannah Timmis. This report concentrates on technical assistance or capacity building in North Africa. This review found only one comprehensive study on technical assistance published after Timmis (2018) and a few recent examples ...» more
Public Sector Reform and Capacity Building in Small Island Developing States
Small Island Developing States (SIDS) experience capacity constraints relating to their small size, remoteness and dispersion (in the case of island archipelagos), which impinge on the quality of the public sector (Horscroft, 2014; Mycoo & Donovan, 2017). This rapid literature review summarises the evidence on public sector reform and capacity building initiatives in SIDS. ...» more
Advantages and Value of Funding NGOs in the Global South
This rapid literature review examines the advantages or added value of providing donor funding directly to Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) or Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) based in the global south, rather than channelling such funding through International NonGovernmental Organisations (INGOs). The literature reveals that United Nations (UN) agencies and INGOs ...» more
What is Civil Society, its Role and Value in 2018?
Civil society is widely understood as the space outside the family, market and state (WEF, 2013). What constitutes civil society has developed and grown since the term first became popular in the 1980s and it now signifies a wide range of organised and organic groups including nongovernmental organisations (NGOs), trade unions, social movements, grassroots ...» more
Donors Influencing Others Donors and Development
There is a growing interest in the ways in which donors can be influenced. While there is some nascent literature on how behavioural insights can be used to influence policymakers (see Helpdesk report, no. 1426), there is very limited research and evidence on the ways in which donors influence other donors. Based on the available literature, this report focuses in large part on ...» more
Strengthening the Financial Independence of Independent Media Organisations
This report is a review of the literature on interventions and business models which can help independent media organisations to become financially sustainable. The overall finding is that independent media in developing countries are primarily reliant on grant funding. Some independent media organisations in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East are generating revenue from ...» more
Privatisation of State Owned Enterprises in Ethiopia since 1991
After decades of socialist rule under the Derg regime, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) adopted market reforms including privatisation of state owned enterprises (SoEs) in 1991. This is a historic literature review, which traces the causes, scale, modalities and impact of the privatisation programme. The literature on the early privatisation ...» more
Models of Gender-Sensitive Procurement Used by International Aid Entities
Few international entities working in international development, humanitarian aid, or similar sectors, are systematically implementing gender-sensitive procurement (GSP) in their own operations, a rapid survey of 40 such multilateral, bilateral, and non-profit organisations conducted for this report shows. Of the 15 organisations that responded with information by email, the ...» more
Institutional partnerships and twinning between civil service organisations
‘Twinning’ typically entails a form of formalised partnership between similar institutions in the North and South for an indefinite period (Jensen, 2007; Baud et al., 2010), with the aim of strengthening the capacity of partners in developing countries (Jones and Blunt, 1999; Ouchi, 2004). Institutional twinning inherently implies that the primary focus of the capacity ...» more
Using Zakat for international development
This review focuses on Zakat, a particular form of almsgiving within Islam. The value of Zakat is estimated to range from US$ 200 billion to US$ 1 trillion per annum across the world (Stirk, 2015) or around US$ 187 million among countries in the Organisation of Islamic Co-operation (Shaikh, 2016). Therefore, interest in mobilising Zakat for poverty alleviation in Muslim ...» more
Donor funded alliances promoting regional cooperation
There are a significant number of donor funded regional cooperation arrangements across a broad range of thematic areas. However, the level of their success varies considerably, and the literature search carried out for this report did not identify any unqualified successes. Areas of cooperation include defence, environmental issues and economic integration. There is a ...» more
Sharia-Compliant Investments in Infrastructure and Development Capital Financing in DFID/CDC/PIDG Geographies
Investments in infrastructure and development capital financing being made in DFID / CDC /PIDG geographies by institutions operating on Islamic finance principles are still limited in scope. The Islamic Development Bank Group is the main donor and agent encouraging other institutions to get involved in the process, through various initiatives. The major undertakings initiated ...» more
Linkages between private sector development, conflict and peace
The private sector can both exacerbate drivers of conflict and contribute to peacebuilding in post-conflict states. Examples of the role that the private sector can play in conflict and peace at the macro, meso and micro levels include the following: Macro level There is a general consensus in the literature that illicit trade in natural resources can increase in the ...» more
China’s aid to developing countries
Definitions and types of aid China’s measurement of “foreign aid” differs from “official development assistance”, for example by including military assistance and excluding donor administrative costs. The main forms of Chinese foreign aid are: complete projects; goods and materials; technical cooperation and human resources development cooperation; medical teams and ...» more
Sustainable Development Goals and current trends
This report focuses on Agenda 2030 and the challenges of delivering the Global Goals and the implications of trends for the UK’s international development work. Section 2 focuses on the Global Goals for Sustainable Development (SDGs/Global Goals) and the challenges of delivering them. These Global Goals will shape the world’s approach to growth and sustainable development ...» more
International development, UK aid and Official Development Assistance spending
This report aims to introduce someone unfamiliar with the field of international development to some of its complexities. It includes hyperlinks to sources rather than a traditional referencing system, to make follow-up learning as easy as possible for the reader. The report introduces international development, its the global context, and the UK parliament’s guiding ...» more
Flexibility in funding mechanisms to respond to shocks
In order to better and more rapidly respond to shocks such as sudden onset disasters, there have been increasing efforts to build flexibility into humanitarian or development funding arrangements, as current emergency responses are often slow to arrive and/or unresponsive to forecasts of disasters (Start Network, 2017; Rüth et al, 2017, p. 2). This rapid reviews looks at ...» more
Impact of economic sanctions on poverty and economic growth
Key findings are as follows: Economic sanctions lead to an increase in the poverty gap and deprived sections of the population feel the most impact. For the most part sanctions fail to achieve their aims and elites manage to negotiate the adverse effects to a far greater level than poorer citizens. Sanctions have a damaging effect on income inequality and impact ...» more
CSOs supporting accountability in cash transfer programmes
Cash transfer programmes, like most social protection programmes, are vulnerable to fraud, errors, corruption and misuse of funds, which undermine their achievements. Civil society organisations (CSOs) have supported, or provided, accountability mechanisms in countries around the world: working to improve transparency to help citizens hold authorities accountable; checking ...» more
