Dambisa Moyo’s new book, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa, has received a great deal of attention in the last few months. Moyo’s book is a must-read for any person interested in the question of why some countries are rich while others remain stagnant or poor.

Under modern ideological conditions, a national emergency produces a virtual free-for-all of policies, programs, and plans that expand the government’s power. This expansion leaves the public with altered political and ideological sensibilities. Efforts to rein in the government’s crisis-driven overreaching must concentrate, first, on affecting the public’s thinking about how the government ought to act during an emergency and, second, on changing the machinery of government so that ill-considered or poorly justified measures cannot be adopted so easily.

Achieving land tenure reform is by no means an easy or quick process. However, the benefits over the long term can lead to substantial gains for smallholder farmers’ competitiveness.

This paper argues that there are two tiers of entrepreneurship important for economic development. One is concerned with investments in productive technologies that improve productivity and better service consumer needs. The other is concerned with the creation of protective technologies that secure citizens’ private property rights vis-à-vis one another.

Government intervention and interference in agricultural markets prevents the growth of commercial agricultural sectors and decreases the ability of African farmers to improve their standards of living through agriculture.  To combat hunger and to encourage economic development, African governments need to embark on reforms that allow farmers to use agriculture to improve their lives.

Despite having their plans frustrated through the regulations and uncertainty created by government action, humankind has still demonstrated a remarkable resilience following a natural or manmade disaster.  We argue that this is due to the civilizing and coordinating roles played by civil society.  For-profit companies, charities and churches play a vital role in the recovery process.  These organizations have proven to be the first, and most well equipped responders to disasters, jump starting the recovery process.

Kazakhstan is a major success story in Central Asia, having experienced double-digit growth rates between 2000 and 2007. The country has made significant market-oriented reforms and large amounts of foreign investment. However, following the maxim adopted by many successful countries in Southeast Asia, “First the economy and then politics,” political reform in Kazakhstan has lagged. Much of Kazakhstan’s future success will depend upon whether it implements liberal or illiberal economic policies going forward.  If the political decision makers in Kazakhstan recognize entrepreneurship as the market’s driving force and focus on the institutional prerequisites to growth, Kazakhstan could unleash great economic potential.

Could anarchy be a constrained optimum for weak and failing states? Although a limited government that protects citizens’ property rights and provides public goods may be the first-best governance arrangement for economic development, among the poorest nations such “ideal political governance” is not an option. LDCs face a more sobering choice: “predatory political governance” or no government at all. Under these conditions, anarchy is the second best option.