As of March 2026, this website is no longer being updated. I now work mainly on climate issues, especially in Brighton and Hove, and new work can be found on the website of Climate:Change, our independent think-tank on socially inclusive action in the City: www.climatechangebh.org.uk.
Meanwhile, however, this website has over 850 entries, mostly representing my work on international development from 2010-2025. Among much else, there are over 50 book reviews, more than 20 papers and training cases on bridging research and policy and on managing think-tanks, nearly 100 articles on climate change, and many papers on other topics, including aid, food security and nutrition, and the future of international development. See ‘Topics and Themes’ for more details. I can be reached at sm@simonmaxwell.net.
Innovative and important, yes, but also instrumental and incomplete: the treatment of redistribution in the new New Poverty Agenda'
Innovative and important, yes, but also instrumental and incomplete: the treatment of redistribution in the new New Poverty Agenda, Journal of International Development, 2001, Volume 13, Issue 3
The current narrative on poverty reduction, summarized in WDRWorld Development Report 2000/1, rehabilitates distribution as a central topic on the development agenda. WDRWorld Development Report argues (i) that redistribution matters for instrumental reasons, as a route to faster growth and faster poverty reduction; (ii) that changes to income distribution result from complex changes in sectoral, geographical and individual performance; and (iii) that better distribution can be achieved in a win-win fashion, without undermining incentives or forcing a choice between equity and efficiency. The argument can be extended: (i) the case for redistribution is not simply instrumental, but can be rooted in a discourse about social inclusion and rights; (ii) observed changes are strongly associated with liberalization policies, and with changes to social norms; and (iii) governments can do more than the Bank suggests to achieve greater equality. A commitment to redistribution should be enshrined in a new international development target: a ceiling on Gini coefficients of 0.45................. (see link in title for full article)