Fighting Global Poverty: The Inside Story

Townsend Swayze and Tom Blinkhorn

Thursdays, 9:30 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.
September 29 - November 10, 2005
D.O.C. House

What, in fact, is economic development all about? And how can we more effectively tackle poverty in the developing world? What about the environment? Is it compromised by the rush of countries to get richer? And how can we engage communities, those who most need to be listened to?

We will present a series of case studies to illustrate the very difficult problems of tackling poverty in developing countries. The discussions will examine environmental priorities and look at the strength and influence of grass root campaigns and the importance of listening to communities. In one case study, for example, we will look at the complexities of the transition from a state owned economy to a market system, and in another at an early and very successful initiative in the health sector. The case studies range from Indonesia to India to the Ukraine and to Africa. From each story we will work together to sort out the lessons learned as we struggled to help.

Class readings will include excerpts from World Bank reports and some background information. Class discussion, questions, comments, and ongoing participation will be very much encouraged.

Class is limited to 20 members.

Townsend Swayze has thirty-five years of experience in the field of international development, working principally as an environmentalist, economist, and country program officer on countries in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. He worked for 25 years at the World Bank and before that for ten years for the US Agency for International Development, which included three years in India. Recently, he has taught January term courses at Middlebury College as well as ILEAD courses. He has degrees in English from Harvard College and Oxford University. He has a Masters in Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton and a Masters in Environmental Studies from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies.

Thomas A. Blinkhorn, a retired World Bank manager who recently moved to Hanover, NH, with his family, has worked since 1993 on a variety of development projects throughout Eastern Europe and Central Asia. He continues to work as a consultant for the Bank. Before joining the Bank thirty years ago, he worked as a journalist in the United States and Canada (he was born and grew up in Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia).