Achieving the MDGs – A Note

Kishtany, Naill and Taffesse, Alemayehu Seyoum (2004): Achieving the MDGs – A Note. Published in: Ethiopian Journal of Economics , Vol. 18, No. 1 (April 2009): pp. 101-116.

Abstract

The material and symbolic importance of these targets make it vital to assess the analytical coherence of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) “project”. In this spirit, this paper highlights complexities and difficulties of the MDG approach. Specifically, it outlines a framework for analysing the MDGs and subsequently discusses measuring progress; achieving and valuing multi-dimensional outcomes; sustainability; devising policies during structural transformation; and implementing policies in a decentralised policy system. These discussions draw attention to limitations of current methods of analysing the MDGs. Indeed, the history of today’s rich countries shows that development is a drawn out, uneven and contradictory process full of reversals and discontinuity. The MDGs, with their ambitious, linear, broad, and essentially ahistorical set of socio-economic goals belie this complexity; contemporary developed countries measured yesterday with today’s MDG yardstick might well have been branded “failures”.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Millennium Development Goals(MDGs), development policy, Tinbergen’s rule, structural transformation
• Subjects: O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O1 - Economic Development; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O2 - Development Planning and Policy; E - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics > E6 - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook > E61 - Policy Objectives ; Policy Designs and Consistency ; Policy Coordination; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O2 - Development Planning and Policy > O21 - Planning Models ; Planning Policy

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