What I'm Reading

Although I'm not done it, I'm really enjoying reading White Man's Burden, by William Easterly. He's an author I was introduced to in second year in my development economics class as a really educated, really cynical economist, who started off trying to save the world and then realized how much everyone trying to do the same thing screws up.

Now he writes about how people in the development field have no idea what they're doing and keep screwing up, and writes about things we should be doing instead (but probably never will).

For example, in White Man's Burden he writes about how Development Plans will never work because they lack accountability and feedback, two things that he says are vital for improvement. Since these things are missing, a scary amount of money is being wasted on things that people don't need, can't use, or don't want.

I'd recommend this book to anyone in the international development field (i.e. people in my class).