Abridged from the WSJ:

You might think the biggest objections to a World Bank anticorruption push would come from, say, corrupt poor countries in danger of losing international aid. In fact, it’s such donor nations as Britain, France and Germany—and bureaucrats at international aid agencies—that complain the loudest.

Welcome to the upside-down world of development aid, where a country’s actual use (or misuse) of money is less important than how much it receives. Paul Wolfowitz, who took over as head of the World Bank last year, wants to change this paradigm. At an annual meeting of bank officials in Singapore last week, European elites let it be known that they much prefer a lending system that gives lip service to ending graft but in fact turns a blind eye to corrupt government officials on the receiving end of billions of dollars in foreign aid.

British Development Secretary Hilary Benn threatened to withhold $94 million in funding next year to protest the transparency and accountability conditions that Mr. Wolfowitz is implementing. Mr. Benn, along with his French and German counterparts finally relented after assurances from Mr. Wolfowitz that the board would play an oversight role. So the same countries that say Americans need to throw more taxpayer money at the developing world don’t seem to care how much of it is siphoned off by corrupt governments. The only word for this is bizarre.

Too true. So much aid money ends up going not to hospitals and schools and economic development but straight into the pockets of the third world’s rich and powerful. That donor nations are loathe to modify the rules on corruption in foreign aid just goes to show that a lot of the money isn’t about helping the needy, it’s about buying friends and favors.

(Thanks to reader for sending along the article.)

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