The Return to Foreign Aid

WIDER Working Paper 2014/089 What is the aggregate economic rate of return to foreign aid?

Introduction to the Geopolitics of Foreign Aid

Introduction: Geopolitics and aid Foreign aid is an essential element of foreign policy for many countries. Since World War I, the richest states in the world have used transfers of goods, services, and funds as a means of interacting with other countries. Over time, increasing numbers of states have given increasing amounts of resources to other states. Aid has come in the form both of loans, ...

The determinants of foreign aid

Foreign Aid, Incentives and Efficiency: Can Foreign Aid Lead to Efficient Level of Investment?

This paper develops a two-period-two-country model in which an altruistic donor faces Samaritan’s Dilemma to address two important policy questions: (i) whether foreign aid can lead to efficient level of capital investment in the recipient country and (ii) how do the form (e.g. budgetary transfers, capital transfer) and the timing of aid affect the incentives of the recipient? It finds that the...

The Role of Foreign Aid