Alex de Waal (Program Director, Social Science Research Council): “This is a really fantastic book and one of the most accessible and well argued books on aid available.”
Madelaine Bunting (Guardian journalist): “Dambisa gets lots of coverage... but [The Trouble with Aid] is much better....”
Owen Barder (Center for Global Development): “There are lots of rather dull, very worthy books about the aid business, and in my view this is not one of them. This is a short readable book full of anecdotes and examples about the way that aid works and missing out all the lofty rhetoric that you often read... So the ideas that might otherwise be quite boring, such as aid conditionality, are brought to life with examples that illustrate and support the arguments... It doesn’t slip into jargon, which is one of its great strengths.”
Emma Mawdsley (Cambridge University, for the Journal of International Development): “Glennie has produced an intelligent, judicious and accessible dissection of foreign aid to Africa. It ought to rocket to the top of any reading list on the subject, and in an ideal world it would displace the recent populist publications on foreign aid from the bestseller lists... He is unsparing in his insistence on evidence, and on not conforming to scripts... With a discernment and clarity that seems to elude many in the field, Glennie asks deceptively simple questions, but ones which I suspect will disconcert both aid pessimists and aid optimists. He concludes with a full chapter on prescriptions for change, and in keeping with the rest of the book, these are potentially achievable, radical and realistic at the same time. What they require is willingness to embrace a more holistic, evidence-led and situated understanding of aid effectiveness in reducing poverty... The Trouble with Aid is a tremendously good book. It is written with great clarity, and students will have no problem following the arguments; but at the same time it sets out discerning arguments that academics and policy-makers will find refreshing and challenging.”
Richard Dowden (Director, Royal African Society): “Brilliant... incisive, clearly written and with radical conclusions.”
Robert Molteno (Political scientist and publisher): “[The Trouble with Aid’s] lines of argument ought to command attention for many years to come... The arguments, always nuanced rather than simplistic and sweeping, [provide] the bones of a constructive, alternative development and aid policy.”
New Agriculturalist: “The Trouble with Aid certainly hits the spot. A concise and forthright critique and summary of the aid dilemma, its lack of prohibitive jargon and lofty rhetoric afford it wide and deserved appeal… Glennie offers some suggestions on how to get the aid revolution started.”
Richard Aidoo (Africa Today): “Well-thought-out, [The Trouble with Aid] responds to both the optimists and the pessimists in the aid debate… Glennie’s arguments have contributed to other scholarly discussions which build on the idea of not just increasing aid, but providing support that will really help Africa’s development.”
Lucy Corkin (SOAS, for Pambazuka News): “What makes this book unique is the attempt to collect and synthesize the entire range of arguments for and against aid, in a way that lays bare the complexities of the issue. This is no easy task and Glennie is painstaking in his effort to capture the nuances of arguments... Glennie has done an admirable job in keeping the tone of the book balanced, recognising the importance of conveying a message in a way that, albeit hard to swallow, has a hope of being digested.
D.J. Shaw (Development Policy Review): “[Glennie] suggests not a sudden break but a deliberate change of direction...”
Some Amazon reviews:
“[The Trouble with Aid’s] conclusions are surprising and troubling now, but I suspect will be the orthodoxy by 2020… Glennie's book has shifted my understanding of this subject completely, and I'm still slightly stunned by it.”
“I like this book. It crams a great deal of good sense into a short space... The book is different – maybe paradigm-changing...”
“Glennie's work is a must read for Africanists... Albeit controversial, Glennie's argument... provides a concrete foundation for a paradigmatic shift in development discourse and practice.”
Madelaine Bunting (Guardian journalist): “Dambisa gets lots of coverage... but [The Trouble with Aid] is much better....”
Owen Barder (Center for Global Development): “There are lots of rather dull, very worthy books about the aid business, and in my view this is not one of them. This is a short readable book full of anecdotes and examples about the way that aid works and missing out all the lofty rhetoric that you often read... So the ideas that might otherwise be quite boring, such as aid conditionality, are brought to life with examples that illustrate and support the arguments... It doesn’t slip into jargon, which is one of its great strengths.”
Emma Mawdsley (Cambridge University, for the Journal of International Development): “Glennie has produced an intelligent, judicious and accessible dissection of foreign aid to Africa. It ought to rocket to the top of any reading list on the subject, and in an ideal world it would displace the recent populist publications on foreign aid from the bestseller lists... He is unsparing in his insistence on evidence, and on not conforming to scripts... With a discernment and clarity that seems to elude many in the field, Glennie asks deceptively simple questions, but ones which I suspect will disconcert both aid pessimists and aid optimists. He concludes with a full chapter on prescriptions for change, and in keeping with the rest of the book, these are potentially achievable, radical and realistic at the same time. What they require is willingness to embrace a more holistic, evidence-led and situated understanding of aid effectiveness in reducing poverty... The Trouble with Aid is a tremendously good book. It is written with great clarity, and students will have no problem following the arguments; but at the same time it sets out discerning arguments that academics and policy-makers will find refreshing and challenging.”
Richard Dowden (Director, Royal African Society): “Brilliant... incisive, clearly written and with radical conclusions.”
Robert Molteno (Political scientist and publisher): “[The Trouble with Aid’s] lines of argument ought to command attention for many years to come... The arguments, always nuanced rather than simplistic and sweeping, [provide] the bones of a constructive, alternative development and aid policy.”
New Agriculturalist: “The Trouble with Aid certainly hits the spot. A concise and forthright critique and summary of the aid dilemma, its lack of prohibitive jargon and lofty rhetoric afford it wide and deserved appeal… Glennie offers some suggestions on how to get the aid revolution started.”
Richard Aidoo (Africa Today): “Well-thought-out, [The Trouble with Aid] responds to both the optimists and the pessimists in the aid debate… Glennie’s arguments have contributed to other scholarly discussions which build on the idea of not just increasing aid, but providing support that will really help Africa’s development.”
Lucy Corkin (SOAS, for Pambazuka News): “What makes this book unique is the attempt to collect and synthesize the entire range of arguments for and against aid, in a way that lays bare the complexities of the issue. This is no easy task and Glennie is painstaking in his effort to capture the nuances of arguments... Glennie has done an admirable job in keeping the tone of the book balanced, recognising the importance of conveying a message in a way that, albeit hard to swallow, has a hope of being digested.
D.J. Shaw (Development Policy Review): “[Glennie] suggests not a sudden break but a deliberate change of direction...”
Some Amazon reviews:
“[The Trouble with Aid’s] conclusions are surprising and troubling now, but I suspect will be the orthodoxy by 2020… Glennie's book has shifted my understanding of this subject completely, and I'm still slightly stunned by it.”
“I like this book. It crams a great deal of good sense into a short space... The book is different – maybe paradigm-changing...”
“Glennie's work is a must read for Africanists... Albeit controversial, Glennie's argument... provides a concrete foundation for a paradigmatic shift in development discourse and practice.”
posted by Anonymous @ 06:01
