thrh.bsky.social - Profile | ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

Cutting UK #aid for military spending is a false economy—it weakens the UK’s global standing. True leadership balances defence, diplomacy, climate, and development. I've joined leading colleagues urging the government to find fairer alternatives. Read our letter to PM Keir Starmer below 👇

submitted 1 hour ago • 0 comments

The stakes in the coming Spending Reivew www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/693...

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

Some punchy story placement on the FT homepage here. (We can and should spend more on both aid and defence, and everyone should read Anneliese Dodd's principled resignation letter which makes this case forthrightly bsky.app/profile/step...)

submitted 3 hours ago • 0 comments

Terrific resignation letter by Anneliese Dodds, this.

submitted 4 hours ago • 32 comments

Centre for the Study of African Economies at University of Oxford will automatically consider all applicants from Africa for full funding for the MPhil in Economics - we have new scholarships for eligible students. How? Just apply asap: deadline 4th March (extended deadline): see below

submitted 19 hours ago • 1 comment

Speaking of which, here I am on the FT Economics Show podcast interviewing Minouche Shafik about the future of international development. Spoiler: neither of us is super-optimistic about aid coming back in a big way any time soon. on.ft.com/3CYqBKB

submitted 7 hours ago • 0 comments

Asylum seeker hotels set to take almost half UK’s reduced aid budget - on.ft.com/3CYjMbT

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

So - I've actually led Ebola outbreak response at USAID. This is bunk from Elon. They have laid off most of the experts, they're bankrupting most of the partner orgs, have withdrawn from WHO, and muzzled CDC. What's left is a fig-leaf effort to cover their asses politically.

submitted 1 day ago • 475 comments

South Africa has made debt sustainability and improvements in the Common Framework for debt treatments priorities for it's G20 presidency. As G20 finance ministers meet in Africa for the first time, what is the record of the Common Framework 5 years after its introduction? odi.org/en/insights/...

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

South Africa has made debt sustainability and improvements in the Common Framework for debt treatments priorities for it's G20 presidency. As G20 finance ministers meet in Africa for the first time, what is the record of the Common Framework 5 years after its introduction? odi.org/en/insights/...

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

20% of decline global inequality attributed to overstatement of GDP growth in less democratic countries academic.oup.com/sf/advance-a...

submitted 2 days ago • 3 comments

South Africa’s G20 presidency puts sovereign debt in focus. Ghana, Zambia & Sri Lanka’s restructurings show delays & tough trade-offs. How must the G20 Common Framework evolve for faster, fairer outcomes? Read more:

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Everyone should be reading Martin Wolf: "Europe will either rise to the occasion or disintegrate...They must start by saving Ukraine from Putin’s malevolence". on.ft.com/3ENRUHN

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

The UK's '2.5% of GDP by 2027' announcement is welcome. But let's be clear. That trajectory essentially allows the MoD to maintain programmes & plug growing holes in existing force structure, rather than any dramatic change, such as backfilling for American assets in Europe.

submitted 3 days ago • 21 comments

The aid cut is so depressing. I know it's politically popular but it's going to cause an enormous amount of harm. It's deeply frustrating that we've never found a way of explaining why it matters to UK voters even though it really does.

submitted 2 days ago • 50 comments

It’s inevitable imo that the competing pressures of underfunded public services, defence spending, local government and other issues will shatter the government’s fiscal position. They’d be better off using the Ukraine situation proactively to change policy, rather than being dragged into it.

submitted 3 days ago • 3 comments

Very interesting paper with evidence to support the anecdotal impression that technologies developed in China are often especially well-suited to the needs of developing countries voxdev.org/topic/techno...

submitted 12 days ago • 0 comments

James Ferguson, a guiding light in the anthropology of southern Africa, has died. His prose and analysis offered a model of clarity and insight. He was only 65. Very very sad.

submitted 13 days ago • 15 comments

🚨 New #StarterPack alert! Stay up to date with our work by following the people behind the Humanitarian Policy Group's critical research: go.bsky.app/DLpdtkC

submitted 17 days ago • 0 comments

@davidallengreen.bsky.social has often made the point that constitutional law should be boring, and when it is not that is a bad sign. The same can be said of government payment systems www.economist.com/united-state... (by @dlknowles.bsky.social)

submitted 17 days ago • 0 comments

NYU economist Bill Easterly, the leading free-market critic of foreign aid, was asked about Musk’s and Trump’s assault on USAID: “It’s illegal and it’s undemocratic,” he said. “Even if I like the idea of moving away from aid, I cannot condone this horrific way to go about it.”

submitted 17 days ago • 0 comments

submitted 18 days ago • 0 comments

China has lent over $75 billion of infrastructure loans across Africa this century, increasingly through bodies with commercial risk and financing approaches. Our doctoral student Tianyi Wu has examined the implications for African economies: tinyurl.com/56pa45hm

submitted 18 days ago • 0 comments

Over 200,000 records from USAID’s Development Experience Clearinghouse, a publicly available online repository documenting nearly 50 years of USAID’s projects, is gone. Taxpayer property stolen by Musk and his cronies. It’s a crime.

submitted 20 days ago • 17 comments

Here is United States law regarding the President's attempts to close our development assistance agency in secret over the weekend. It is illegal. No ambiguity. Americans decide with their actions, today, if the US is a country of laws or—something else. —> crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/...

submitted 24 days ago • 1 comment

I hope one thing digital government practitioners are taking away from attempting to divine what is happening in the US: it should be a mater of public record how digital public services and infrastructure work, when they change and what data they use. No more excuses.

submitted 20 days ago • 4 comments

Request for knowledge: USAID is putting ~everyone on administrative leave. Apparently that can only happen for ten days. Then what? uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?r...

submitted 21 days ago • 1 comment

Rubio claims that @USAID lifesaving assistance for health and humanitarian needs will continue. But his team just communicated that the entire agency will be imminently reduced from 14,000 to 294 people. Just 12 in Africa.

submitted 21 days ago • 146 comments

You may have heard that Secretary Rubio issued a waiver so that life-saving HIV treatment could continue during the break-up of USAID. It has not.

submitted 22 days ago • 11 comments

Government needs to get a grip of its climate hypocrisy as it simultaneously weighs up approving an oilfield in the UK (because growth) www.theguardian.com/politics/202... and withdrawing financing for a natural gas project in Mozambique. on.ft.com/40KwXop UK's GDPpc is more than 30x Mozambique's.

submitted 24 days ago • 0 comments

Why do China's sovereign debt restructurings take so long and deliver such weak relief? A dream team of experts connects the dots between domestic political economy constraints & international outcomes. www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/defaul... #EconSky #FinSky #China

submitted 31 days ago • 1 comment

I passionately disagree with Will. There are at least 7 great ironies of Brexit. His is a corker - but here are six more... 1/7

submitted 28 days ago • 3 comments

Sean Hagan (ex IMF general counsel) calls for hard upper limits on lending to big ‘grey zone‘ bailouts after the IEO report on the fund's exceptional access policy. Very relevant to Argentina. The counter might be that a hard limit turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy... www.ft.com/content/221c...

submitted 30 days ago • 1 comment

Our sovereign debt transparency moonshot! Keeping the faith. #publicdebtispublic @upanizza.bsky.social @theomaret.bsky.social @laynamosley.bsky.social www.law.georgetown.edu/iiel/initiat...

submitted 30 days ago • 1 comment

gilts yields close to their low for the year, so i hope people have got their Takes ready about the surge in investor confidence around Rachel Reeves and the Labour government #watchtheyields

submitted 32 days ago • 10 comments

Chris Humphrey on whether southern-owned developments bank should share the preferred creditor status of the MDBs. The issue is holding up restructuring in Ghana, Malawi, and Zambia. odi.org/en/publicati...

submitted 32 days ago • 0 comments

I ran @USAID health programs for the last 3 years. Trump’s 90 day Stop Work Order on foreign assistance does serious damage to the world and the US. Examples:🧵

submitted 33 days ago • 105 comments

PEPFAR is currently providing lifesaving HIV treatment for 20.6 million people, including 566,000 children, as of Sept. 30, 2024. That treatment is now in serious jeopardy. I'm sure people in the administration don't want half a million kids on their conscience. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/24/u...

submitted 34 days ago • 12 comments

I feel Playbook, and every other outlet, should be mentioning the US numbers when reporting Trump’s 5% NATO defence spending demand.

submitted 35 days ago • 2 comments