PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND DEVELOPMENT, Vol. 11,601-608 (1991)

Book reviews

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF BRITISH AID FOR TRAINING, ACTION AID, DEVELOP- MENT REPORT, 1990 Dr David Hulme Action Aid, London, 1990 72 pp.

This short report contains three parts: a summary by Dr David Hulme of the findings of the study of the effectiveness of British training aid, commissioned by Action Aid; the speech made by Mr Bob Ainscow, Deputy Permanent Secretary, ODA, at the symposium arranged by Action Aid to discuss the report; and a paper on ‘The Difficulties of Quantifying the Outcome’ (of training assistance) by Mr John Morris and Mr Mark Lowcock of the ODA Evaluation Department.

The topic is one that has fascinated, and baffled, evaluators for many years: how can one systematically evaluate the benefits of training? Cost-effectiveness analysis presents no prob- lems. But when it comes to cost-benefit analysis the traditional methods are useless because the benefits cannot be quantified . . . or so everyone has tended to assume. So most evaluations, until recently at least, have used qualitative measures: what Mr Ainscow calls ‘reasonably systematic judgement’. Thus most such evaluations have depended heavily on structured inter- views, often conducted a year or so after the trainee has returned, and sometimes including hisher employer as well. This report finds that ODA has a commendable track record in this type of evaluation- better in fact than that of most other donors. However these tech- niques inevitably suffer from ‘biases of politeness’, and in Dr Hulme’s view ‘cannot be treated as surrogates for the measurement of output’.

But is that the end of the story? Dr Hulme clearly thinks it isn’t, and Mr Morris agrees. Indeed Mr Morris describes a number of systematic quantitative approaches that ODA has successfully applied in recent years, such as: the Logical Framework; the Switching Value Technique; scoring and rating systems; and what he calls the ‘clear cut case’. These are all promising approaches, but the problem is that ODA is necessarily limited in the resources it can devote to an exhaustive trial of such techniques. So Dr Hulme puts forward the suggestion that ODA should consider ‘contracting external consultants, or funding a major research initiative, to develop a methodology for assessing the proximate impacts (and, perhaps, ultimate impacts) of its training activities’.

Other interesting suggestions made by Dr Hulme are: an intensification of third-country training; better selection procedures for trainees (getting rid of the ‘Buggins turn’ syndrome); more follow up after the trainees have returned home (something that evaluators have been saying for years); greater willingness on the part of ODA to share some of the risks that institutions have to carry when they set up custom-designed training programmes; more empha- sis on the training of women; and finally, that ODA should stop hiding its light under a bushel and should publicise the quality and innovativeness of the training it finances. These all make good sense, and if the ODA decides to act on them Action Aid’s initiative in commis- sioning this study will have been well worth while.

B. E. CRACKNELL

CITIES IN CRISIS: THE URBAN CHALLENGE IN THE AMERICAS Edited by Matthew Edel and Ronald G. Hellman Bildner Center for Western Hemisphere Studies, Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York, New York, 1989 157 pp.

This volume includes the papers delivered to a series of colloquia held between 1984 and 1985 in New York. They are designed to compare issues arising in the largest cities of the

0 1991 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

602 Book reviews

Americas. There are thus essays on Metropolitan Sao Paulo, on Mexico City (with an extra one on housing policy there), Santo Domingo, New York’s fiscal crisis, Buenos Aires (policy and the urban poor), public health problems in Medellin, and on a squatter settlement in Panama.

It is an odd collection with little to focus the disparate interests represented. The contribution on New York is strong, but many others are simply descriptive, at best linked tenuously by the ubiquitous sense of crisis which seems somehow to infect those who analyse cities. There have been so many cries of ‘Wolf!’, it becomes difficult to stifle the yawns, particularly given that the papers are at least six years old and people seem to be able to manage with crisis. Some of the authors share some of the conventional prejudices of the field-that popula- tion concentration is a bad thing, dispersal a good thing and apparently cost-free, that the provision of public infrastructure determines location, that rural people migrate because they are poor and have no access to infrastructure etc-but few grapple with the contradictory realities that face millions of urban inhabitants. There is not even a half baked theory as to why cities occur.

The good points and argument tend sadly to get lost in the wearying conventional wisdom. The best pieces are highly specific by topic, but then have little to do with each other. The editors-or the Centre-need to think more clearly about what it was trying to do.

NIGEL HARRIS University College, London

GETTING TO THE 21ST CENTURY. VOLUNTARY ACTION AND THE GLOBAL AGENDA David C. Korten Kumanian Press, W. Hartford, USA, 1990,253 pp.

This important book could be the start of a co-ordinated movement among non-governmental organizations, and those they influence, to change policies and attitudes towards reversing the global crisis. As a book with an urgent message about the moral as well as the environmental crisis of mankind it should be read and taken seriously by everyone.

Much of the book’s value stems from the fact that it provides its readers with not only an analysis of the issues, but with the basis for a programme of practical action which can be used by groups in schools, churches, non-government and government organizations which are concerned to see where development practices have gone wrong.

A guide to action is contained mainly in the appendices. The first of these is the Manila Declaration on People’s Participation and Sustainable Development whose principles are reflected throughout Korten’s book. Sponsored by the Asian NGO Coalition (ANGOC) the Declaration arose from the deliberations of 31 NGO leaders from Africa, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the South Pacific, Latin America, the Caribbean, North America and Europe. The basic statement is of a concern, shared by Korten, that current development practice is not just, sustainable, or inclusive (of rich and poor, men and women); that it ‘demeans the human spirit, divests people of their sense of community and control over their own lives, exacerbates social and economic inequity, and contributes to destruction of the ecosystem on which all life depends’. The introductory quotation from an Australian Aborigine woman addressed to developers is again an important theme in Korten’s book.

If you have come to help me you can go horpe again. But if you see my struggle as part of your own survival, then perhaps we can work together.

I t clarifies the meaning of ‘participation’ for constructive development. The focus is not on grass-roots communities participating in projects designed for them; but on developers participating in programmes designed by the communities, with both being aware that ‘the struggle’ has much wider survival implications than the local one.

The Declaration should be read too for what it shares with Korten in its assessment of damage by debt financing, orienting national economies to the needs of foreign consumers at the expense of the poor and the environment; the people-centred development vision, the