First World, Third World

First World, Third World examines the failures of aid to eliminate poverty. The world development effort can claim only limited success, and in some parts of the world, especially Africa, failure must be recognised. William Ryrie, while starting from a position of sympathy with the aims of the aid effort, insists that the record must be analysed with ruthless honesty. Well-intentioned aid has often had perverse and harmful effects. One of these has been to undermine the working of the market economy, which offers the best hope for development and growth. His book proposes a new approach to the development task which would reconcile it with market philosophies.

Reviews:

A brilliant and incisive analysis of the questions surrounding development aid at the end of its first half century. Ryrie, whose long experience of the 'Third World' and of the development programmes of the World Bank and the British government have given him an unusual combination of compassion and clear-headedness, starts from the assumption that action to alleviate poverty is a moral imperative, but argues that much of the aid directed to the Third World in the last fifty years has been misdirected or even counter-productive. Drawing on this experience, he suggests ways in which development and the reduction of poverty can be pursued effectively within the context of the new global economy. Anyone interested in the practical issues of how the world's poor can be genuinely helped should read this book