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The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill And So Little Good [Paperback]

William Easterly
4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
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Book Description

27 Sep 2007
We are all aware of the extreme hunger and poverty that afflict the world's poor. We hear the facts, see the images on television, buy the T-shirt and are moved as individuals and governments to dig deep into our pockets. Yet what happens to all this aid? Why after 50 years and $2.3 trillion are there still children dying for lack of twelve cents medicine? Why are there so many people still living on less than $1 a day without clean water, food, sanitation, shelter, education or medicine?

In The White Man's Burden William Easterly, acclaimed author and former economist at the World Bank, addresses these twin tragedies head on. While recognising the energy and compassion behind the campaign to make poverty history he argues urgently and powerfully that grand plans and good intentions are a part of the problem not the solution. Giving aid is not enough, we must ensure that it reaches the people who need it most and the only way to make this happens is through accountability and by learning from past experiences.

Without claiming to have all the answers, William Easterly chastises the complacent and patronising attitude of the West that attempts to impose solutions from above. In this book, which is by turns angry, moving, irreverent but always rigorous, he calls on each and everyone of us to take responsibility, whether donors, aid workers or ordinary citizens, so that more aid reaches the people it is supposed to help, the mother who cannot feed her children, the little girl who has to collect firewood rather than go to school, the father who cannot work because he has been crippled by war.

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The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill And So Little Good + The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It + Dead Aid: Why aid is not working and how there is another way for Africa
Price For All Three: £20.67

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Product details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: OUP Oxford (27 Sep 2007)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0199226113
  • ISBN-13: 978-0199226115
  • Product Dimensions: 15.5 x 2.5 x 23 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 15,175 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • See Complete Table of Contents

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Review

Compelling reading...Easterly's book is an important one, and the arguments he raises cannot and should not be ignored. (London Book Review.com )

About the Author

William Easterly is Professor of Economics at New York University and a senior fellow at the Center for Global Development. He was a senior research economist at the World Bank for more than sixteen years. In addition to his academic work, he has written widely in recent years in The New York Times, The Independent, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Forbes, and Foreign Policy, among others. He is author of the acclaimed book The Elusive Quest for Growth and has worked in many areas of the developing world, most extensively in Africa, Latin America, and Russia.

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Customer Reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
97 of 99 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
How come $2.3 trillion dollars of Western aid has been spent in the last 50 years mostly in Africa, my native continent, and yet millions of children still die of preventible diseases like dysentery, cholera and malaria? Why have 'vast' amounts of aid money and Western good intentions not been able to lift Africa out of back-breaking poverty? William Easterly's argument, in this fascinating book, is that Western aid has failed because of the traditional approach that it has taken to tackling Third World poverty: planning and bureaucracy. According to Mr Easterly, Western aid in the form on the Bretton Woods institutions (the World Bank and the IMF) is the most recent reincarnation of the White Man's Burden, a phrase which was immortalized by Kipling. The basic argument of the White Man's Burden in the 19th century was that Western Europe spread Christianity, commerce and civilization to the coloured, benighted races of the world (of course, for the benefit of the coloured races).

THE BOOK's ARGUMENTS IN BRIEF
Mr Easterly, a former World Bank Economist, writes that the command-and-control bureaucrats of the aid establishment, whom he dubs 'Planners', cannot understand the complexities of getting aid to the desperate poor because:
- There is no accountability for service delivery, as the poor cannot do this by voting.
- Planners' thinking is dominated by grandiose, non-specific plans such as ending poverty and the Millennium Development Goals
- Planners think that they already have the answers. Hence, they tend to be patronizing and have a ready-made answer for every poor country - structural adjustment, free markets and privatization

The author then contrasts the failure of the Planners with Searchers, whom he defines as people who work at the local level seeking incremental economic change for the poor by constantly experimenting with new ideas on the ground. He provides interesting accounts of aid projects, done by Searchers; Westerners and Africans, which were modest in scope but brought significant benefits to the poor. My favourite example was from India. By making a contribution of $5,000, Western donors built a toilet block for teenage girls in a rural school. This dramatically cut the drop-out rate for the girls because, as it turns out, they (the girls) had been dropping out "in droves because of the embarrassment that they felt once they started menstruating and had no private facilities".

He shows that Western-style market societies cannot be planned "top-down" (contrary to the goals of the Planners). Markets in the developed West are the result of complex social and political institutions/norms that have taken thousands of years to evolve. Since free market opportunities in the West and The Rest depend on "bottom-up choices" which the planners don't begin to understand, Planners are doomed to fail in creating markets in the Third World.

Though the subject of the book is a serious one, the tome is spiced with witty accounts of the histories of various Third World countries: Western support for UNITA in Angola, the Contras in Nicaragua and in Haiti. On page after page, Easterly provides grim evidence of the failure of the World Bank, the IMF and Western military intervention to bring about desired social change. More often than not, it has led to much harm as in the above-mentioned countries. The message: Economic success in the tropics cannot be planned from an office in Washington DC. Instead, as has happened in Japan, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, China and India, it must be homegrown. Certainly Western aid still has a role to play but the Planners in the World Bank and IMF would do well to be more humble in their ambitions and seek incrementally to improve the lives of people in poor countries

SIMPLIFICATION, OBFUSCATION AND OUTRAGE
The book has at least three glaring limitations. First, Mr Easterly's analysis is often disingenuous. For instance, he shows that rich) Danes trust their fellow countryfolk more than (poor) Philippinos do theirs. However, he erroneously concludes that wealth is a determinant of trust in a society. Could it be that Danes are more trustful of each other because theirs is a more ethnically homogenous and egalitarian society than The Philippines? Could a breakdown in social institutions in The Philippines - not wealth per se - be the cause of mistrust?

Second, Easterly asks the reader to be indignant because $2.3trillion of Western taxpayer wealth has been wasted on foreign aid in the last 50years. Two questions for Easterly: (1) How much is $2.3trillion? Well, not much. It breaks down to $46billion per year on average - a miniscule percentage of annual Western GDP in the last 50years. (2) How does $2.3trillion compare with the sums of money that the West extracted/siphoned from Africa in the form of interest payments, bribes, shady deals with corrupt governments, private stash of dictators, and even recycled aid money? Mr. Easterly is taciturn on these issues. $2.3 trillion in Western aid over 50years is hardly enough reason for moral outrage; the failure of aid and the hypocrisy of the aid system is.

Third, Easterly's distinction between Planners and Searchers is simplistic. It is hard to believe that every employee of the World Bank and IMF falls neatly into the "Planner" category. Surely, the truth is more complex than the author presents it. However, since the crude distinction works well in contrasting the traditional approach to aid, I'll not fault the author for this.

Despite these limitations, the author presents some ideas for making aid work: (1) Make aid agencies individually accountable for individual, feasible areas that help poor people improve their lives; (2) Give aid agencies the opportunity to experiment and search for what works; and (3) Abandon the utopian blueprint to fix the Third World's complex problems. Instead focus on getting specific, incremental improvement in people's lives in fields such as health, sanitation and food security. Broad-brush plans for delivering market economies, 'Making Poverty History' or establishing the rule of law, laudable as they are, are doomed to fail.

CONCLUSION
Western (good?) intentions, grandiose planning, bureaucratic hubris and bleeding-heart campaigns do not end poverty. In the concluding chapter, the author makes a poignant point: "Aid won't make poverty history...only the self-reliant efforts of poor people and poor societies themselves can end poverty, borrowing ideas and institutions from the West when it suits them to do so." Easterly's is a call for humility as we try to tackle the problem of poverty in The Third World. It is also a message with which I concur and one that I, as a Nigerian, have taken to heart. I recommend White Man's Burden for making such a timely point.
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53 of 55 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Intelligent critique of foreign aid policies 18 May 2007
By Rolf Dobelli TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Hardcover
At the World Economic Forum in 2007, author William Easterly gave the audience some distressing news: The $2.3 trillion in aid sent to Africa since the 1950s had done nothing to increase Africa's GDP. It had been largely a waste of money. Bill Gates, who was sitting next to Easterly that day, admonished the author for focusing on narrowly economic benchmarks: "You don't eat GDP," Gates said petulantly. Easterly's riposte came a few days later in The Wall Street Journal, where he chided the world's richest college dropout for missing "the economics class that listed the components of GDP, such as food." Readers who enjoy such debates will love this acerbic, clearheaded book. Easterly, a former World Bank economist who is fervently committed to global prosperity, demolishes the myths that prop up ineffective efforts to help developing nations. He points his wrecking-ball at photo-op celebrities and utopian economists who feel that big plans and big aid budgets will eventually build big economies (the last 50 years of contrary evidence notwithstanding). Ah, you say, at least they are trying to do something good, while many others simply watch the impoverished world's agony in dismay. Instead, the author argues, only alternative, pinpointed aid tactics can succeed, but only if they use local knowledge and implementation. We recommend this to anyone interested in economic development and emerging markets, and to lovers of intelligent polemic on issues that matter.
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48 of 50 people found the following review helpful
By Joanne
Format:Hardcover
I bought this book fully expecting to disagree with almost everything the author said, but feeling that to have an open mind I should read it.

The title I found hugely embarrasing especially as I spend most of my time reading in public places where large proportions of the people are not white.

Easterly despite having spent a good time of his career earning money from the World Bank actually spends most of the time explaining how foreign aid policy has failed to work over the last 50 years largely due to the desire to have a 'Big Plan' and the arrogance of foreigners (from predominantly white nations) in their interventions in the rest of the world.

I actually found myself agreeing with more of this book than I thought I would and certainly most of it was easy but interesting to read. I think some of the explanations and criticisms were too clear cut but I could see that often trying to comply with a Big Plan does indeed distract from the more important task of finding ways to improve lives.

Two things about the book really annoyed me. One was the constant reference to Planners v Searchers which was much along the lines of here come the 'baddies' in the black clothes called 'Planners' and against them are the good, little people trying to bring light in their white clothes 'Searchers'.

Secondly was the use of statistics. I think if you have a good grasp of statistical analysis then you would be disappointed with the frequent lack of referencing of the data or only referencing secondary sources. If you are not statistically biased then trying to read and re-read the descriptions of the analysis - 'adjusting for reverse causality' is difficult because you are left unconvinced as to whether the conclusions presented have a strong basis.

However even saying this I felt there were many interesting points to consider in this book, generally it was written in an easy style all be it a little too frivolous at times. For anyone interested in development, aid or foreign policy this is a MUST READ book.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Facinating
Found the first section on planners vs searchers fascinating. Completely changed how I view foreign aid. Excellent read. . .
Published 1 month ago by syrphur
5.0 out of 5 stars Aid projects as neo-colonialism?
I've come to this rather late, as in this game the 6 years since publication has changed the story to some extent, but the basic message is still entirely valid. Read more
Published 4 months ago by G. Duigu
5.0 out of 5 stars The truth the media doesn't want to see, wonderful read!
First of all I'd like to point out that I haven't read the whole book yet.

However, as an Economics student in Spain with some cultural background on Africa (because my... Read more
Published 12 months ago by C. A. Gonzalez Villalobos
5.0 out of 5 stars A clarion call for proper delivery of Aid
I thoroughly recommend this book. It's not anti-foreign aid, but it asks sensible and probing questions about how Aid is funded and organised, how it is actually used on the... Read more
Published 22 months ago by Krappyrubsnif
4.0 out of 5 stars Refreshingly critical
Easterly's book is about the efficiency of development aid. In the beginning of his book, he proposes the existence of two tragedies: the tragedy that one billion people are living... Read more
Published 22 months ago by Alexander Sokol
1.0 out of 5 stars frustrating...
This book made me think that after so many years, the white man is still not able to give up his "burden". Very predictable and heavily loaded with a liberal connotations.
Published on 28 Jan 2010 by ays
5.0 out of 5 stars great book
this book gives a brilliant, and different insight into the world of development in an informal and interesting way.
Published on 6 Jan 2010 by Ms. E. Stiles
4.0 out of 5 stars Challenges what you believe
Easterly does a good job challenging contemporary opinion on how to solve poverty around the book. While the book's title is slightly embarrassing, in a way, it explains the two... Read more
Published on 29 May 2009 by Emeka O
5.0 out of 5 stars The White Man's Burden by Wm Easterley
A refreshingly frank easy to read book written from decades of "inside" knowledge and experience which should be a bible for anyone involved or interested in releasing Africa's... Read more
Published on 10 Feb 2009 by Mr. David G. Stables
4.0 out of 5 stars Taking the poor seriously
`The White Man's Burden: Why the West's efforts to aid the rest have done so much ill and so little good' poses two fairly simple questions. Read more
Published on 19 Dec 2008 by Jeremy Williams
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