Devpolicy Talks

We are all touched by slavery, according to Ambassador Luis CdeBaca, one of the most decorated federal prosecutors in the United States. Former Ambassador-at-large and senior advisor to the Secretary of State on trafficking in persons, Ambassador CdeBaca built his legislation in to policy, transforming US anti-trafficking efforts and including the voices of victims, workers, and communities in dec...

In 2017, Rashmii Bell edited the first-ever anthology of writing by Papua New Guinean women: My Walk to Equality. It captures the daily challenges faced and positive contributions being made by the women of PNG to improve the livelihoods of self, community and nation. In this vein, Tess Newton Cain caught up with Rashmii to talk about her background and experiences as an author, including what has...

This session at the 2018 Australasian Aid Conference, presented the recent report by CGD's High-Level Panel on the Future of Multilateral Development Banking, offering a frank assessment of current MDB policies and practices and situating them in the context of new development challenges. It also discussed how MDBs should respond to the new banks and new challenges that call for global collective...

In a time where the humanitarian funding gap is greater than ever before, humanitarian agencies are required to think innovatively and creatively about how to meet this need to meet current and future mandates. Humanitarian Advisory Group’s recent desk research and subsequent think piece present an exploration and critical examination of evidence of the effectiveness of joint funding mechanisms, i...

The 2018 Australasian Conference, held on 13-14 February at the Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU, was opened by Senator Penny Wong, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs. She discussed Labor's vision for Australian aid and development policy if they are elected to government in the next Federal election. The conference was organised by the Development Policy Centre in partnership with The Asia...

This panel explored the rationale and methodology for LGBTIQ+ inclusion within humanitarian and development programs. In the decade since the Yogyakarta Principles were developed in 2007, global human rights mechanisms have addressed sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and sex characteristics (SOGIESC) with increased sophistication. However, rights-based development organisations a...

The 'strugglers', those who are not poor by conventional international poverty measures, but are nevertheless far from the middle class, are a large but neglected group in development discourse. In her keynote address at the 2018 Australasian Aid Conference, Nancy Birdsall discussed the challenges they face and their prospects. The Conference was held at Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU, on 1...

This public lecture by Nick Danziger was a pre-conference event at the 2018 Australasian Aid Conference, held at Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU, on 13-14 February, and was organised by the Development Policy Centre in partnership with The Asia Foundation. In this lecture, Nick Danziger provides a human face to development issues and share his experiences documenting the lives of people in s...

Populations in the Asia Pacific region, and globally, face increasingly complex health threats, which call for stronger, locally relevant and high-quality health systems capable of addressing prevailing public health issues including emerging infectious diseases. The global response has included the G7-endorsed Global Health Security Agenda, while the Australian response is continuing to evolve, m...

This panel provided a launch for 'Inside the black box of political will', which presents key findings from the past ten years of the Developmental Leadership Program’s (DLP) work. The panel also presents highlights from DLP’s recent research on the role of politics and power in developmental change, with case studies from Myanmar and Fiji, as well as a practitioner’s perspective. Panellists: Mich...

Ebola, MDR-TB, malaria. Infectious diseases will continue to threaten the health and well-being of people across our region and the world. The Australian government has announced a major regional health security fund. How can Australia best support countries to prevent and respond to infectious disease? What is a health security approach in any case? What should the balance be between research and...

What does Australian aid and international development policy need more or less of? This panel presents the best, the most original, the most transformational, the most innovative ideas to get more bang from the $4 billion buck that is the Australian aid program. And to get some new ideas on how to do international development policy differently and better. Following the 3-Minute-Thesis format, ri...

Too often there has been a gap between academic analysis seeking to explain the how and why of corruption and the reality of activists trying to address it on the ground. We need to recognise not only that corruption is complex and multi-faceted, but also that to have any real impact requires sensitivity to the specific contexts in which it takes place, and especially what is politically possible....

Unprecedented levels of need, biggest aid cuts ever, humanitarian catastrophe — all too familiar to hear about in the news, but does the average person care? There are more media outlets and information available than ever before, yet investment in quality international reportage has dropped off as traditional media has been destabilised. Citizen journalism, blogging and social media have stepped...

This panel at the 2018 Australasian Aid Conference discussed the theory and practice of adaptive programming and how we can find ways to implement flexible programming within the context of an increasingly results-driven development agenda. Panellists drew on their experiences to speak to the importance of an adaptive approach to programming, and the implications and challenges of this, from the p...

The role of non-state actors in Asian-led development cooperation has been little discussed. Many assume South-South cooperation is government-to-government and focused on infrastructure. However, Asian providers have vibrant civil societies that are expanding their sphere of influence and practice into development cooperation. This session at the 2018 Australasian Aid Conference discussed the rol...

Taxation is central to the social contract between citizens and the state. Yet little research has explored the relationship in developing countries between individual attitudes towards the social contract and perceptions of tax fairness and efficacy. This recording of a seminar draws on experimental research with informal sector workers in Mexico and a unique survey on taxation and social protect...

Dr Jeni Klugman, Managing Director, Georgetown Institute for Women Peace and Security, Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government’s Women in Public Policy Program, Harvard University; Hon Dr Sharman Stone, Australian Global Ambassador for Women and Girls; Dr Anu Mundkur, ACFID Secondee to the Australian Civil-Military Centre. Countries are more peaceful and prosperous when women are accorded full...

The Social Observatory (SO) is a unit in the World Bank’s Development Research Group. It has worked for seven years with a $5 billion portfolio of community-based livelihoods projects in India. This work combines rigorous impact evaluations with ethnography, process evaluations, and the development of new citizen-led data systems to transform how such projects learn and adapt. This talk reports on...

Are our current approaches to development cooperation fit for purpose to address contemporary challenges? How should development practice evolve to reflect 21st century priorities and knowledge? And how can it bridge the traditional donor-recipient divide? Can aid donors and recipients meaningfully engage with the private sector, private philanthropy, and other new sources of financing? In the 201...

The United States and China have followed nearly parallel paths as providers of foreign aid over the past seven decades. Although both countries’ aid programs were ostensibly aimed at development, both also leveraged their aid programs to further their own national interests, using very different strategies. The United States has largely provided foreign aid with the aim of stabilising the world o...

In this podcast of a seminar, Dr Eric Kwa discusses the agenda and approach being taken by PNG’s new government in relation to strengthening government systems and processes. Among other topics, Dr Kwa discusses the design of the proposed PNG Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC). Dr Kwa is the Secretary/CEO for the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Constitutional and Law Reform Commission and one...

The Governance for Growth (GfG) program in Vanuatu has been running for ten years, and is about to move into its third phase. Considered to be quite innovative when it was first implemented, the program has supported some significant economic policy and public finance reforms. It has also survived changes to the institutional arrangements for the delivery of Australian aid, and significant shifts...

Robin Davies interviews Gillian Mellsop on her career with UNICEF for the Aid Profiles series. Read the full profile at devpolicy.org/aidprofiles. Devpolicy Talks is the podcast of the Australian National University's Development Policy Centre.  Read and subscribe to our daily blogs at devpolicy.org. Learn more about our research and join our public events at devpolicy.anu.edu.au. Follow us o...

Sachini Muller interviews Muhannad Hadi, WFP Regional Director for the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia and Eastern Europe, discussing humanitarian crises in the region and what we can do about them. Devpolicy Talks is the podcast of the Australian National University's Development Policy Centre.  Read and subscribe to our daily blogs at devpolicy.org. Learn more about our research and...