Foreign Aid and Its Unintended Consequences

Foreign aid and international development frequently bring with it a range of unintended consequences. Providing a clear overview of what side effects to anticipate when planning, executing, and evaluating aid, this book will be an important resource for students, development practitioners, and policymakers alike.

Dirk-Jan Koch is Chief Science Officer of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and is Special Professor of International Trade & Development Cooperation at Radboud University, the Netherlands. Views expressed in this book do not represent the official views of these institutions.

1. Introduction: understanding the unintended consequences of international development 2. For those who love theory: explaining unintended effects with complexity theory and bounded policy learning 3. Backlash effects: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction 4. Conflict effects: fighting over and with aid 5. Migration and resettlement effects: aid-induced displacement 6. Price effects: when aid drives prices up (or down) 7. Marginalization effects: can aid unintentionally increase inequality? 8. Behavioural effects: expect the unexpected! 9. Negative spillover effects: look beyond your own targets 10. Governance effects: international development and the social contract, uneasy bedfellows 11. Environmental effects: uneasy trade-offs between ecology and development 12. Ripple effects: the underestimation of positive effects of international development efforts 13. Conclusion: 'It's the complexity, stupid'