See James Ferguson's "The Anti-Politics Machine" - he contends that both the donor and the done profit from the failures of 'development,' and not because 'development' improves. Great book.

Sorry - that should be 'donor and donee'

Thanks, that's a classic work. Wondering if there is any new thinking on the subject?

Sarika Bansal 's report  is a valuable one. We must learn from failure and be open to speak out about our failure. The FAILFaire is also an interesting idea. This kind of media is necessary to be open to failure. In this regards, I have to thank Ritu Verma for making me aware of Sarika Bansal 's report.

Each project has its own failure and we should detect it. However, as Ritu Verma suggests, there are so many failures and we must question if there are some structural problems. In this regards, we must question the current state of three fields:

• development economics
• development studies
• international economics (trade theory in particular)

Development economics started 1940's and 50's. At that time, structuralists were prevalent. Although they were too much inclined to central or government planning, they were right in stressing the lack of social and economic conditions that a market economy works well and normally. With the arrival of neoclassical revolution in development economics, the economists who work on development started to think with macro data and reasoned that the market failure is a result of regulations. They recommended market-friendly policies. I agree that there are many unnecessary regulations but we must also see that some of them are crucial to the well-being of the people and the latter is the very basis of economic development.  We should question the state of the art of development economics.

Development studies seems to have started with some discontent vis-à-vis development economics dominated by neoclassical  economists. Development studies include varied fields. I am interested Discourse Analysis but this is not our subject now. Although they are not uniquely responsible, development studies remained rather separated from development economics. This indifference towards economics implied (with no intention) the indifference towards examining conditions for economic development.

International trade theory is important, because no country or area can be separated from the world economy, if you like it or not. Many of successful Asian economies used foreign trade strategically. There are wide spread understanding that these economies adopted free trade policy. Except the case of Singapore and  Hong Kong, this is a kind of urban legend and false. We must learn more closely the secrets of successful countries such as Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia and others. Why could they get a (relative) success in their economic building. With this regards, a thorough re-examination of  trade theory is necessary. Export oriented policy was successful, but we should know the conditions that it  would be successful.

In general, I feel there is a lack of interests in theory. I am now discussing the reason

Why did Eaton and Kortum model perform so badly? 

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Why_did_Eaton_and_Kortum_model_perform_so_badly?_tpcectx=profile_questions

but there are very few reaction to this kind of questions. This facts may indicates a kind of apathy in theory. It is a shame.