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From the Publisher
"As a World Bank employee for 16 years ... I observed some of the same bureaucratic obtuseness [Griffiths] describe[s]...so precisely and with such careful analysis of the Sierra Leone situation, I am amazed...a great book. If only there were many more people...who would write up their experiences with aid projects."—Bill Easterly, Formerly Principal Economist at the World Bank, Now Professor of Economics at NYU, Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development and Institute for International Economics
"...brilliantly elucidates the relationship between incompetence and corruption, both in Sierra Leone and the aid industry..."-The Economist
"Griffiths paints a picture in which World Bank staff are promoted—while whistleblowers questioning government corruption are expelled."—The Observer (UK)
"It is passionately written and backed up by knowledge and experience."—New Agriculturist on-line
"Unputdownable—as thrilling as any thriller... I've never read an account of the life of an economic consultant which came anywhere near it in the vividness of the observation or the pace of the action."—Clive Dewey, University of Leicester
"As a diarized account of the work of an economist—sensitively written and enjoyable—it is compulsory reading for anybody studying economics, management, marketing, business and other social sciences."—David Needham, Nottingham Trent University
Overview
What really happens when the World Bank imposes its policies on a country? This is an insider's view of one aid-made crisis. Peter Griffiths was at the interface between government and the Bank. In this day-by-day account of a mission he undertook in Sierra Leone in 1986, he tells the story of how the World Bank, obsessed with the free market, imposed a secret agreement on the government, banning all government food imports or subsidies. This is a rare and important portrait of the aid world which insiders will ...