Although Easterly does believe in homegrown (from the native country, not from external outsiders), piecemeal solutions (which is a bit frustrating because they do not have the coherency of a central plan), that was not the main thrust of the talk. He was more focused on breaking down barriers in our attitudes towards the developing world which often paints them as helpless and incapable, dependent on the Western world to save the day. He, of course, provided evidence of homegrown solutions to support his claim, but given the hour he had, he focused on tackling the conceptual problem that under-girds every policy – which can be frustrating if you’re looking for concrete, practical answers. But you can always look those up online or read about them. To piece together from the data an overarching trend is a much harder task, and I think Easterly tried to do that.

Easterly is a minority voice dissenting from ‘accepted’ thought on international aid, and while this is the first time I’ve heard any of his viewpoints (after taking Prof. Sachs’s class) I have to admit that they’re pretty logical. He was perfectly civil and his ideas deserve more engagement, but of course decentralized schemes that threaten highly trained macroeconomists’ jobs will always face opposition from the crowd that could prove them right or wrong.

I agree with the correspondent that Easterly’s sub-par delivery didn’t actually convince anyone from the Sachs camp of these ideas. He stomped down the libertarian path of freedom and individual rights, leaving the audience searching for any sign of novelty and nuance in his arguments. He was un-empathetic, nerdy and academic. Questions at the end were either specific to his book or so bald it was evident audience members hadn’t grasped a word he said.