Revisiting Foreign Aid

by Rehman Sobhan

The three chapters in Part A of IRBD2003 examine the efficacy of macroeconomic management in Bangladesh by studying such important performance indicators as GDP growth rate, savings and investment performance, revenue mobilisation and public expenditure, credit and monetary growth, and wages and inflation. Part A also looks at Bangladesh's external sector performance by concentrating on export and import, terms of trade and balance of payments, with a discussion on some selected key emerging issues. This section of IRBD2003 also presents a review of the various initiatives and activities which went into the preparation of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) for Bangladesh. Selection of the theme of aid as the overarching focus for Part B of IRBD2003 gives the current volume a distinct flavour. Titled Revisiting Foreign Aid in Bangladesh this section of the IRBD2003 presents a rich discourse on aid by looking at it from a number of important perspectives in the context of Bangladesh. Thus, the nine chapters in Part B of the IRBD2003 presents a critical examination of the political economy of foreign aid to Bangladesh, macroeconomic dimensions of aid and the underlying dynamics in the distribution of its gains, changing role and structure of aid, and shifts in approach and perspectives of Bangladesh's major development partners in relation to aid to Bangladesh. This section of IRBD2003 also examines the efficacy of aid in terms of poverty alleviation, and in this context looks at the role of NGOs and the private sector. Rehman Sobhan, M. Syeduzzaman, Debapriya Bhattacharya, Mustafizur Rahman, Salehuddin Ahmed, M. M. Akash, Mirza Azizul Islam, Ananya Raihan, Uttam Kumar Deb, A. K. Abdul Mubin, Mashiur Rahman, M Fouzul Kabir Khan, Mirza Azizul Islam, Syeed Ahamed, Mabroor Mahmood, Wasel Bin Shadat, Asif Anwar, Touhidul Hoque Chowdhury and Shahnur Rahman.

Hardcover

Published January 1, 2004

About the author

Professor Rehman Sobhan was educated at St. Paul’s School, Darjeeling, Aitichison College, Lahore and Cambridge University where he was awarded an MA in Economics. He began his working career at the faculty of Economics, Dhaka University in 1957 and retired as Professor of Economics in 1977. He served as Member, Bangladesh Planning Commission, in charge of the Divisions of Industry, Power and Natural Resources, and of Physical Infrastructure, as Chairman, Research Director, Director General and Emeritus Fellow, BIDS from and as a Visiting Fellow, Queen Elizabeth House, Oxford. He was a Member of the Advisory Council of the President of Bangladesh in 1991, in charge of the Ministry of Planning and the Economic Relations Division. He is the founder and Executive Chairman of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD). He has been the Executive Director, South Asia Centre for Policy Studies (SACEPS), a Visiting Scholar, Initiative for Policy Dialogue, Columbia University and a Senior Research Fellow, at the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance, Harvard University. Currently he is the Chairman of CPD.

Professor Sobhan has held a number of important professional positions. He was a Member of the Panel of Economists to review the Third and Fourth Five Year Plans of Pakistan, Editor, Pakistan Economic Journal and Editor, Forum, a weekly magazine by The Daily Star. He served the independent Government of Bangladesh as Envoy Extraordinary with special responsibility for Economic Affairs, during the Liberation War in 1971. He was President, Bangladesh Economic Association, Member, Bangladesh National Commission on Money, Banking and Finance, Member, U.N. Committee for Development Planning, Member, Governing Council of the U.N. University, Tokyo, Member of the Commission for a New Asia, Kuala Lumpur, Member of the Board of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, Geneva, Member of the Executive Committee of the International Economic Association, Member of the Group of Emminent Persons appointed by the SAARC Heads of State to review the future of SAARC, Chairman, South Asia Centre for Policy Studies, Chairman of the Board of Grameen Bank, Member of the BIDS Board of Trustees and Member of the International Advisory Committee of the Ash Institute, Harvard University. He is currently a member of the Board of Trustees of the Freedom Foundation, Bangladesh, Chairman of the Pratichi Trust (Bangladesh) set up by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and Board Member of SACEPS, Kathmandu.

He has published 27 books, 15 research monographs and 140 articles in professional journals. His principal publications include: Basic Democracies, Works Programme and Rural Development in East Pakistan, Public Enterprise in an Intermediate Regime, The Crisis of External Dependence: The Political Economy of Foreign Aid to Bangladesh, Debt Default and the Crisis of State Sponsored entrepreneurship in Bangladesh, Planning and Public Action for Asian Women, Rethinking the Role of the State in Development: Asian Perspectives, Bangladesh: Problems of Governance, Agrarian Reform and Social Transformation, Aid Dependence and Donor Policy: The Case of Tanzania, Transforming Eastern South Asia, Rediscovering the Southern Silk Route, Challenging Injustice: The Odyssey of a Bangladeshi Economist, Milestones to Bangladesh and The Political Economy of Malgovernance in Bangladesh.