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Foreign aid is an integral aspect of international cooperation. The complexity and controversy of foreign aid has sparked a debate about the capacity of aid to foster development. This paper analyses the underlying discourses of UK and Sweden’s foreign aid strategies. Dryzek’s discourse analysis model was used in this paper to assess the respective aid strategies of the UK and Sweden and describe how foreign aid actors view and understand developmental issues. Foreign aid strategies have been applied to various development contexts such as economic growth, basic needs, human capabilities, and the goal achievement like the Millennium Development Goals and the current Sustainable Development Goals. Additionally, geostrategic, economical, and political factors orientate aid strategies. The comparison between aid strategies of the UK and Sweden shows that the UK and Swedish discourses emphasise on democratic states and individuals as key factors for a sustain development in recipient countries. Their discourses, however, differ in their approach to effectiveness of aid and the conditions they use around aid.

Improvement in information sharing and communication about the foreign aid resources between the donors and the aid-recipient countries have always been considered very important. In recent years, the integration of advanced technology in the area of aid coordination has received a tremendous amount of attention. The following thesis studies the influence of technology in the area aid coordination within the context of Afghanistan. Guided by the Actor-Network Theory, the thesis examines how the social and technological aspects of the Development Assistance Database (DAD), as an advanced aid information management technology, influences aid coordination and information sharing between the donors and the government of Afghanistan. Using a case study methodology, the research also investigates whether or not the DAD adheres to the principles of aid effectiveness. The findings reveal that although technology had a profound impact in the area of aid management in Afghanistan, there are several areas that still face challenges. The present study highlights these challenges and recommends the appropriate solutions.

This work is dedicated to the "Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness", a document which was signed in 2005. This declaration was designed to eliminate serious issues occurring during the distribution of development aid and also to contribute to the successful completion of the Millennium Development Goals through the increase of aid effectiveness. In the first part of this thesis several shortages that the development community has had to face are outlined. A detailed analysis of the document follows in the second chapter, also including an evaluation of the progress achieved from 2005 to 2008 when the last report on the status of implementing the Paris Declaration was issued. Special attention is given to the influence of the document over the policies of the World Bank, European Union and the Czech Republic. The illustration of implementing the Paris Declaration into policies of developing countries has been made using Ethiopia and Cambodia as examples. Finally, this work is concluded by evaluating the effects of the Paris Declaration on the system of development aid.

As democracy promotion has become an increasingly important aspect on the agenda of foreign aid donors, and since such prioritization of funding comes at the expense of other development areas, it is arguably of interest for donors as well as researchers to investigate its actual impact on democratization. This study endeavors to examine the influence of two types of foreign assistance that could potentially contribute to a democratic development, directlythrough democracy support and indirectly through aid focused on education. Four models of regression analysis are applied on a data set of 65 developing countries receiving Official Development Assistance (ODA), during the period of 2006–2018. The findings of this study are inconclusive in determining the influence of these aid types, as the main results show no significant effects on the Freedom House grading of the recipient countries. Yet, when using an alternative measurement, the Democracy Index, directly focused democracy support appears to have a slight positive and significant impact on democratization. These results should however be interpreted with caution due to the risk of reversed causality.

The literature has shown that aggregate aid is mostly ineffective (Doucouliagos and Paldam, 2011). However, new studies on foreign aid also show that the effect of aid depends on both aid type and the donor type (Clemens et al., 2012; Isaksson and Kotsadam, 2018). Thus, the first essay investigates the impact of education aid on educational outcomes. The study uses panel data for 83 developing countries from 2000-2014 to examine World Bank education aid. The results suggest that there is no robust evidence that education aid is effective in improving educational outcomes. The paper finds some evidence that aid improves enrollment rates in primary and secondary but not tertiary education. The results show that aid's effectiveness is determined, to a large extent, by the type of aid and the economic outcomes aid targeted. Likewise, the second essay examines whether specific types of aid are more effective across different donors. The study uses factor analysis to separate aid flows into interpretable categories, economic purposes, social purposes, and infrastructure. In addition, the study compares three donors, the World Bank, the U.S., and China. Examining the growth effect of each aid type for each donor shows that the impacts depend on aid type. All the aid types are positive irrespective of the donor, though only the U.S. aid types show some improvements economic growth. The Chinese economic aid is a complement of the World Bank economic aid. However, the Chinese social aid and the World Bank social aid are both substitutes. Both studies show that most foreign aid to developing countries is not effective, but disaggregating aid by type can lead to moderate improvements in developing countries.

Responding to and preventing violent conflict continue to be a major concern on the international agenda. However, the results of peacebuilding projects are often mixed and some interventions have even proven harmful in the past. In the debates on aid effectiveness, evaluations have been advocated as being an effective instrument to better understand the results of development and peacebuilding projects and thereby ultimately to improve the practice. However, despite a long tradition of evaluation utilisation research dating back to the 1970s, the effects of peacebuilding evaluations are far from being understood. The concept of evaluation use is too narrow and does not take the diversity of potential positive and negative evaluation effects into account. There is little evidence concerning the organisational factors that influence the use and effects of evaluations. Using a comparative case study analysis in three organisations implementing peacebuilding activities (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit, Saferworld and the World Bank), this study examines the roles and effects of peacebuilding evaluations within international organisations. The results show a wide range of positive and negative evaluation effects that are promoted or hindered by different attitudes and the process of the evaluation, in addition to organisational and other contextual factors. To improve our understanding of the interlinkages in this context, evaluation pathways causally linking different effects and factors are proposed.

The worrying global trend of shrinking space for democracy and civil society necessitates a critical reevaluation, even within established democracies. While the urgency of the issue may at first appear less pronounced in a Western context, recent trends suggest a worrying similarity within the EU, particularly when it comes to the future of civil society organizations. This research delves into the potential effects and perceptions of recent changes in Swedish aid policy on civil society organizations. It examines how these changes may affect civil society autonomy, ownership, and overall effectiveness of development cooperation. The study considers the perspectives of civil society organizations using discourse analysis to understand their reasoning and concerns. Kingdon’s policy streams approach is used to provide valuable insights into the policy processes and by examining how CSOs experience access to civic space, how coping responses and autonomy evolve within our own political climate, we can discover potential parallels to experiences where the civil society is impeded. Should such parallels exist, especially with regard to a potential, albeit unlikely, similar experience in Sweden, proactive measures could be identified. Despite the complexities surrounding studying an ongoing phenomenon, this study finds (1) that there is a sense of negativity, especially among civil society groups, about the recent changes in development practices, (2) these changes might break established international agreements and make it harder for these groups to function effectively, (3) the uncertainty surrounding these changes is causing a lot of disruption and makes it difficult for civil society to know how to adapt, and (4) this uncertainty could potentially be a sign that civil society will have less freedom to operate in the future, and we need to be watchful to prevent that from happening.

The end of the Cold War changed radically the international environment as well as the scope of development aid and cooperation within it. The development agenda in the new millenium has started to significantly focus on the develpment aid effectiveness. In this context the use of the instrument of budget support is rising. The thesis aims to assess the concept of the partnership general budget support and the way it responds to the requirements imposed on development aid mainly by the Paris Declaration On Aid Effectiveness in 2005.

The thesis analyses development cooperation in Kenya, including an example of personally realized development project. The goal of the thesis is to find out what is the current state and direction of development cooperation in Kenya, demonstrate some of the problems of Kenya and their possible solutions using an example of personally visited region and realized development project and to determine whether this project corresponds to the current trend of development cooperation in the world and in Kenya. The first chapter characterizes the current political, economic and social situation on Kenya. Following parts analyze the Kenyan development strategies and current trends in the area of development cooperation at the global level and in Kenya. The last chapter describes personally realized development project which is then evaluated from the point of view of new paradigm of development cooperation and concerning the overall impact.