Tony Killick

The Macroeconomics of Doubling Aid to Africa and the Centrality of the Supply Side

The proposed doubling of aid to Africa by 2010 is a less simple proposition, from a recipient point of view, than is commonly supposed. This article argues that it is difficult to manage large and rapidly increasing aid inflows in ways which do not disadvantage producers of tradeable goods, and the private sector generally. This difficulty can be averted if conscious efforts are made to offset it and to stimulate positive responses from the supply side. Whether such responses prevail over the shorter-term management difficulties depends on the efficacy of state actions - and of aid - to bolster the supply side. The outcome is likely to be mixed, depending on country circumstances. Copyright 2007 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

State divestiture as a policy instrument in developing countries

Abstract Reducing the size and role of the public sector in developing countries and emphasizing prices and markets as allocative mechanisms has led to increased privatization measures, of which divestiture has been the most common variant. The paper examines this experience and indicates that ownership transfer is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for achieving more efficient use of resources. In the design of divestiture, the weighting given to enhancing freedom of entry and intensity of competition remains critical. At the same time, the paper notes the existence of multiple constraints — including profitability and capital market limitations — that continue to impede the implementation of divestiture measures. The conditions for divestiture to be both appropriate and successful are shown to be restrictive.

Globalisation and the Rural Poor

This article surveys how globalisation is affecting rural poverty. The forces of change may affect the welfare of the rural poor through their influence on productivity, growth, income distribution, technologies, the security of livelihoods, and policies. There are both credit and debit entries: large potential benefits, for example from accelerated growth, but also real dangers that the rural poor will be left behind, for example that they will not have access to the knowledge and other assets necessary for success in a commercialised world. The article also discusses some of the influences on the ways the forces of change work themselves out, stressing the importance of market access, positive government policy stances and the assets of the rural poor. For all their weak integration into economic life, the rural poor everywhere cannot escape the tides of change lapping the shores of their national economies and their agricultures. The forces of globalisation, commercialisation and liberalisation are particularly strong and intrusive. This article sets out to examine the little that is known about how these forces are affecting rural poverty. The first section summarises the chief forces of change impinging upon the rural poor; the next section considers the various avenues through which these forces impact on welfare; the third section examines the factors which determine these welfare consequences; and the final section sums up the findings.

Policy Autonomy and the History of British Aid to Africa

This article utilises historical information to throw light on the forces shaping British aid policies towards Africa. It outlines key long-term policy developments, summarises the influences shaping these policies and comments on the present juncture of UK policies. It shows that, while there have been many influences, governments have enjoyed considerable policy autonomy, being largely unconstrained in pursuing their preferences in a top-down manner. This autonomy has mainly been used for the pursuit of long-term development, as against the promotion of the UKs national interest. The present thrust of UK policies to achieve massive increases in aid to Africa is a prime example of this policy autonomy.

Flexibility and economic progress

Abstract Reporting the results of a larger study (Killick, 1995) we argue for the usefulness of the concept of the flexibility of an economy, defined as one in which individuals, organizations and institutions efficiently adjust their goals and resources to changing constraints and opportunities. There are strong prima facie reasons for expecting an economys flexibility to be associated with its long-term economic progress; the experiences of East Asia, Africa and centrally planned East Europe appear to substantiate this. The dimensions of flexibility are explored and hypotheses offered concerning its determinants. It is suggested that there is a ∩-shaped relationship between flexibility and the economic development, with causality running in both directions.

The 1975 and 1997 White Papers compared: enriched vision, depleted policies?

The 1997 White Paper on international development is the first such policy statement since 1975. Comparison of the two thus gives us an opportunity for assessing how official thinking and politics in the UK have responded to the many changes that have occurred in the meantime. This article first compares the views of the two papers on the nature of development and of the poverty problem; and then compares the treatment of EC|EU issues. Neither Paper was just about aid. We conclude that WP75 appears comparatively narrow in focus and unsophisticated in its appreciation of the problems addressed, but is better at taking a strategic view and more forthcoming about specifics. What WP97 gains in the breadth and sophistication of its appreciation of problems it loses in detachment from reality and retreat from specifics. Its treatment of EU issues is surprisingly laconic. But overall WP97-in its various forms-is more accessible and decidedly more populist. It has already been disseminated to a far wider audience than WP75 ever reached. Its success is in simplifying a world which development officials know has grown more complex; its failing is that they seem unsure about specifically how their influence and modest resources can best be applied to improving it.

Economic environment and agricultural development: The importance of macroeconomic policy

Abstract This article explores the ways in which the macroeconomic balance of the economy, and related policies, impinge on agriculture in developing countries, and considers implications for the design of policies. It argues that the extent of macroeconomic balance, and the quality of the policies influencing that balance, to a large extent define the scope for effective agricultural policies. The avoidance of severe balance-of-payments deficits and rapid inflation are seen as a necessary condition for the promotion of agricultural growth. They also have an important influence on the nature and range of agricultural policy options available to governments.

Donor Conditionality and Policy Reform

My focus is on the use by aid donor agencies of conditionality to induce changes in economic policies and institutions. At the most general level, this throws light on whether it is feasible to use donor leverage to overcome weak institutions and anti-reformist governments — whether it is possible to use this as a device for prevailing over domestic political constraints on the adoption of better policies. If this appears to be asking too much, is it at least possible that donor leverage and money will tip the balance within governments between reformers and conservatives? Even failing that kind of decisive influence, conditionality may operate through a different channel: steering governments towards the acceptance of policy change in order to secure the ‘seal of approval’ of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and others, and by that means to add to the credibility of their own policies. Can donors act as ‘agencies of external restraint’, adopting the role that Robert Bates argues in Chapter 1 of this volume is being played in some developing countries by private international investors? Can donors’ policy stipulations impinge decisively on domestic policy-making by offering a ‘technology of pre-commitment’? Although donors behave as if their conditionality is highly efficacious, it appears that they have not been able to achieve such results.