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Why is aid given?

In: Handbook of Aid and Development

Author

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  • Steven Radelet

Abstract

Governments provide foreign aid for many reasons - to support their own national security interests, fight global threats, maintain influence with former colonies, and for humanitarian purposes. This chapter explores the various motivations for aid, how they have changed over time, and how the inherent tensions between these different motivations make it more difficult to administer and evaluate aid programs. These tensions between motivations are at the heart of the aid effectiveness debate. Most researchers assume that they should measure aid effectiveness by examining economic and social progress, whereas significant amounts of aid are given for very different objectives such as enhancing national security. Aid may not seem to be effective when measured against one set of objectives when it was intended to achieve very different ones. The chapter explores how these tensions between multiple objectives can be reduced, although never fully eliminated.

Suggested Citation

  • Steven Radelet, 2024. "Why is aid given?," Chapters, in: Raj M. Desai & Shantayanan Devarajan & Jennifer L. Tobin (ed.), Handbook of Aid and Development, chapter 3, pages 38-53, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    • Handle: RePEc:elg:eechap:20736_3
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    File URL: https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781800886810.00009
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