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Foreign aid and
development in Africa: What the literature says and what the
reality is
Nathan Andrews
Department of Political Science, Brock University, 500
Glenridge Avenue, St Catharines ON, L2S 3A1 Canada or 2
Leeson Street, St Catharines, ON L2T 2R1 Canada. E-mail:
nayak20028@hotmail.com. Tel: 289-686-8450.
Accepted 26 October, 2009 |
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Evidence of ineffective foreign assistance is widespread in
Africa. The debate on how aid can be effective and
contribute to Africa’s development is, however, still
ongoing without any clear way forward. This paper adopts a
deductive approach to explaining aid and development in
Africa. There is a high volume of literature on the impact
of foreign aid on development in Africa, yet not many of
them recognize all the factors that contribute to aid (in)
effectiveness. The focus is often on macro-economic
indicators which do not fairly represent the realities of
poverty and suffering in many African countries. We offer an
analysis of the theories that have been propounded to
explain the relationship between aid and (under) development
in Africa. In this paper, we critically examine such
findings and test their validity against the backdrop that
socio-cultural factors have not been given adequate
consideration.
Key words: Aid, development,
culture, dependence, poverty, economic growth. |
