What’s Next in International Development? Perspectives from the 20% Club and the 0.2% Club
The ‘20% Club’ and the ‘0.2% Club’ offer different perspectives on the development agenda, with
different though overlapping priorities. The ‘20% Club’ consists of countries which derive around 20%
of GDP from aid. These countries will be major beneficiaries of the commitment in 2005 to double aid.
Their agenda will cover such topics as absorptive capacity, political development and the use of aid to
achieve both growth and human development. They will want to hold donors to account for delivery
against commitments and will have a strong interest in streamlining the aid architecture. The ‘0.2%
Club’ consists of countries in which aid plays a much smaller role. Here, the issues are more to do with
managing the changing challenges of globalization, with regional and inter-regional collaboration, and
with linkages to non-aid development issues like security and the management of the global commons.
Countries in this Club are becoming aid donors themselves, and are looking for new kinds of
partnership with developed countries. These different agendas are closely related, of course. In both
areas, they challenge aid agencies to rethink their roles and their competencies. They also challenge
development researchers to work on new issues and in new ways.