Date of Award
Fall 2023
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Political Science
First Advisor
Bush, Sarah
Abstract
This dissertation asks and answers two questions: first, does foreign aid have distributional effects in recipient countries? And, if so, how do these distributional effects undermine donors’ attempts to influence policy? In three essays, I find that international aid targeting changes the balance of power within recipient states. In the first, I theorize the concept of “aid withdrawal” and study its application in climate aid. Using novel observational and experimental evidence, I show that beneficiaries of fossil fuel projects reject international influence after the withdrawal of international support for dirty projects. In contrast, sites of future renewables increase their support for international actors. The second and third papers examine the effects of aid targeted at political out-groups. One, examining the perspectives of in-group members, shows that aid for out-groups causes political backlash against politicians, out-groups, and internationals. The other finds that out-groups who receive aid do not reward politicians and instead credit international actors for the aid. Together these papers provide evidence of the asymmetrical, and often negative, political effects of targeted aid.
Recommended Citation
O'Brien-Udry, Cleo, "Essays on the political economy of foreign aid" (2023). Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations. 1174.
https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/gsas_dissertations/1174
