Helping
People Help Themselves:
From
the World Bank to an Alternative
Philosophy of Development Assistance
By David Ellerman
Foreword by Albert O. Hirschman
Click
here to read the Table of Contents.
This
volume is part of the series
Evolving
Values for a Capitalist World
Click
here to read a Note from the Series Editor, Neva Goodwin
Helping People Help Themselves grew
out of David Ellerman's ten years at the World Bank—and
particularly out of his three years as advisor and
speechwriter for Joseph Stiglitz during Stiglitz's
tumultuous term as the Bank's Chief Economist. The
book provides a structural critique of the World
Bank's approach to development assistance—but
the main purpose is to lay the intellectual foundations
for an alternative approach. The book takes a broad
interdisciplinary approach drawing from educational
theory, management theory, community organizing,
psychology, and philosophy. While many thinkers
are discussed, there is a focus on eight individuals
who have wrestled in different fields with the fundamental
conundrum of trying to give external help that promotes
(rather than thwarts) self-help. Those individuals
are: Albert Hirschman, John Dewey, Paulo Freire,
E. F. Schumacher, Douglas McGregor, Carl Rogers,
Saul Alinsky, and Søren Kierkegaard.
“The book uses the interdisciplinary
methodology of pointing to similar ideas expressed
by a variety of other authors in different fields:
management theory by Douglas McGregor, psychotherapy
by Carl Rogers, community organizing by Saul Alinksy,
community education by Paulo Freire, spiritual counseling
by Soren Kierkegaard, and economic development by
E. F.
Schumacher and myself. In the end, the book speaks
of a series of ways in which development
agencies can experience blocks to learning and singles
out the “long confrontation between man and
a situation,” which, according to Camus, can
be so fruitful for the achievement of
genuine progress in problem.”
—Albert O. Hirschman, Institute for
Advance Study, from the Foreword
Click
here to read the rest of the Forward by Albert O.
Hirschman.
"A towering achievement... a coherent alternative
"way of seeing" the relationship between
aid organizations based in rich countries and aid
recipients based in poorer ones, and some practical
suggestions on how to reengage the aid agencies
more as "helpers" than as "doers".
Along the way it fairly sizzles with insider insights
into the workings of the World Bank."
—Robert Hunter Wade, Development Studies
Institute, London School of Economics
"Ellerman provides a compelling
humanist understanding of how economic development
aid can succeed, if only people and nations are
enabled to help themselves."
—William Greider author, The Soul
of Capitalism: Opening Paths to a Moral Economy
