Institute of Development Studies

Do the MDGs still reflect what is important about how development happens and how policy influences that process? The MDGs were an approach born of a benign era of relative stability, stronger economic growth and fairly buoyant aid budgets. We now face a very different world. Changes sparked by uncertainty, and a sense of multiple insecurities, could impact adversely on poverty levels. The economic crisis has led to significant changes in the context for international development and the crisis/post-crisis context is central to many MDG questions in terms of impacts on poverty and on development commitments over the next ten years.

Articles in this IDS Bulletin inform the debate in 2010, leading up to and beyond the UN MDG review summit, and reflect on the MDG experience so far. They ask what that experience means for the next five years and beyond. What have the MDGs actually achieved, and for whom? What can we learn from the MDGs about how the international community can best play a role in national processes of development and poverty reduction? Will the MDGs prove to reflect an international commitment to poverty reduction that goes beyond 2015, or are they the product of a specific moment, unlikely to be repeated? The debate around what should succeed the MDGs after 2015 is still in its early stages and many fear talking about this will derail the momentum around them. As the articles here, and the conversations over this year and next will demonstrate, it is sure to go to the heart of what international development is all about.

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Contents

Preface
Lord Mark Malloch-Brown

Introduction - The MDGs and Beyond: Pro-poor Policy in a Changing World
Andy Sumner and Claire Melamed

The Impact and Design of the MDGs: Some Reflections
Richard Manning

Lessons from the Making of the MDGs: Human Development Meets Results-based Management in an Unfair World
David Hulme

Reducing Inequality - The Missing MDG: A Content Review of PRSPs and Bilateral Donor Policy Statements
Sakiko Fukuda-Parr

Towards Genuine Universalism within Contemporary Development Policy
Andrew M. Fischer

A ‘2015' Agenda for Africa: Development from a Human Perspective
Yehualashet Mekonen

The MDGs in Historical Perspective
Richard Jolly

The MDGs Beyond 2015
Selim Jahan

Taking the MDGs Beyond 2015: Hasten Slowly
Jan Vandemoortele and Enrique Delamonica

The MDG Paradigm, Productive Capacities and the Future of Poverty Reduction
Charles Gore

The MDG-Human Rights Nexus to 2015 and Beyond
Mary Robinson

A Poverty of Rights: Six Ways to Fix the MDGs
Malcolm Langford

The MDGs and Beyond: Can Low Carbon Development be Pro-poor?
Frauke Urban

Climate, Conflict and Capital: Critical Issues for the MDGs and Beyond 2015
Erik Solheim

Beyond Business as Usual: What Might 3-D Wellbeing Contribute to MDG Momentum?
Allister McGregor and Andy Sumner

Progressing Gender Equality Post-2015: Harnessing the Multiplier Effects of Existing Achievements
Nicola Jones, Rebecca Holmes and Jessica Espey

Holding on to the MDGs (For Now)
Myles A. Wickstead

An MDG-plus Agenda for Africa
Alfred G. Nhema

Proceedings of the DFID-DSA-EADIActionAid Policy Forum
Michael Tribe and Aurélien Lafon