"The international aid system has a dirty secret. Despite much rhetoric to the contrary, the nations and organizations that donate and distribute aid do not care much about democracy and they still actively support dictators. The conventional narrative is that donors supported dictators only during the cold war and ever since have promoted democracy. This is wrong.
[. . .]
In any case, dictators have received a remarkably constant share—around a third—of international aid expenditures since 1972. The proportion of aid received by democracies has remained stuck at about one fifth (the rest are in a purgatory called “Partly Free” by Freedom House). As for US foreign aid, despite all the brave pronouncements such as the ones I’ve quoted, more than half the aid budget still went to dictators during the most recent five years for which figures are available (2004–2008)."
This, from William Easterly, "Foreign Aid for Scoundrels,"
NYRB (
25 November 2010). So, why the discrepancy between this pattern and what economists like
Amartya Sen and Dani
Rodrik and
Pranab Bardhan would tell us about the ways democracy contributes to development? And, worse, why the discrepancy between this pattern, and the
neo-conservative blather about spreading democracy by waging illegal wars?
