The debt problem of the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs) led to the re-evaluation of international approach to foreign aid at the turn of the century. Although there have been much criticism to the western development approach, based on the so-called “Washington Consensus” , there has been rare criticism to the philosophical base of Japan's ODA approach, which helped Japan to achieve the status of the largest creditor to the HIPCs.

There is a persistent argument that the philosophy of Japan's ODA reflects its experience of economic development after World War II. However, having considered the fact that Japan had already achieved national integration and entered into international society at the beginning of the twentieth century, whereas African countries, so called “quasi states” , were struggling to achieve national integration after de-colonisation, it is questionable whether Japan's remarkable economic growth in the post-war period can be a model for the development of the Third World countries. The problem of dual sovereignty was neglected here, and the fact is that Japan's ODA approach, which relied on yen loan, is not the product of carefully reflected policies, but a result of its financial constraint and a response to the international calls for Japan's aid expansion, although it is undeniable that there are some similarities between Japan's post-war economic growth and its aid approach.

It is erroneous to consider that Japan's post-war experience can be applied to developing countries without any reservations. Japan's experiences range from social (education, health, etc.) to political and economic spheres, and it is necessary to re-examine the various experiences in many sectors of Japan since its modernization. By doing so, Japan can contribute to the intellectual evolution of international development ideas.

I attempted to analyze scientific research activities of developing countries quantitatively, which used to attract little attention before, using the data from Thomson Reuter Scientific. First of all, according to the result analyzed based on data of 161 countries between 1985 and 2005, the number of academic articles has been increased in all income levels and regions. In the meantime, the share of the articles developed by low-income countries or Sub-Saharan Africa has been slightly dropped. Based on the analysis of the data from Web of Science, the percentage of international co-authorship has been increased for ten years between 1998 and 2007. The trend of international co-authorship varies from regions, where the peak of co-authorship rate of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa records the highest among seven regions.

Secondly, as a case study, I analyzed six developing countries (two each from South East Asia (Indonesia and the Philippines); South Asia (Bangladesh and Pakistan) and Sub-Saharan Africa (Kenya and Nigeria)) and found that countries with a small number of papers show a high international co-authorship rate and low ownership rate of the articles. For researchers in these six countries, researchers in the U.S., Japan, U.K., and Germany are the major co-authors and especially the researchers in the U.S. seem to play a leading role of research activities in all six countries, while researchers in Japan is likely to fulfill the role in two South East Asian countries.

Using data from 100 countries, this paper examines the effect of ethnic or religious conflict on redistribution under different political systems.

First, I empirically analyze how democracy and social conflict influence redistribution measured by government expenditure on education, medicine and social security. The results are following: (1) democracy promotes redistribution by increasing medical expenditure, (2) social conflict has negative impact on redistribution under democracy, (3) democracy has no significant effect on education and social security expenditure.

Second, I investigate how social conflict influences redistribution under different political systems. I classify democracy into a majoritarian democracy and consensual democracy by election rule and presidential system. The result is that religious conflict has more negative impact on medical expenditure in consensual democracy than in majoritarian democracy. On the other hand, the ethnic conflict has more negative impact on education and social security expenditure in majoritarian democracy than in consensual democracy. These findings imply that different political systems have a distinct conflict management.

The purpose of this study is to examine the social development of poor women in rural Bangladesh. Our research is based on previous studies and interviews conducted during 1997-2010. The primary focus of this study is BRAC's social development programme for poor rural women in Daudkandi Thana, Kumilla District.

BRAC is one of the largest NGOs in Bangladesh. It launched a social development programme in Daudkandi Thana in 2000. The programme officers, who are staff members of BRAC, initiated talks with poor rural women who have been excluded from the foreign-aid-funded rural development projects in the area. They recognize that poor women at the bottom of the social scale are poor women who are illiterate, and as a result, their children are victims of the widening gap between the rich and poor. The programme officers believed that poor women will be able to become independent if they are provided with adequate support. Therefore, they have worked with poor women, to organize a samity (village organization) which is at the core of the social development programme. Once samity has been established, samity members are made aware of the extent of social problems around them by BRAC's consciousness raising programme. They have also been participating in the social development programme that helped reduce their vulnerability.

BRAC organizes poor women at the grass-roots level and raises their social awareness. BRAC's unique, holistic approach towards poverty reduction and empowerment of poor women is different from those adopted by other institutions providing foreign aids, which are emblematic of the modernization theory in context to their assumptions and effectiveness of the trickledown effect. Therefore, in this paper, we also explore case studies that prove the endogenous development theory to be valid.

This study gives a thorough report and critical analysis on one of the most successful resident (or citizen) participation programs of India. The Bhagidari Programme was initiated by the government of Delhi State (formally “National Capital Territory of Delhi”) in 2000, with the slogan, “Citizen, Government Partnership”. This Programme has been recognized widely as a successful case, and it has indeed appealed to many Delhi state residents and tackled a lot of urban problems with its participative approach.

First, this paper gives a brief but thorough report of the program and points out the mechanism of its success. Second, this paper deals with the negative side of this program as well. The program has not been successful at including the poor section of the population. Moreover, since this program has successfully empowered the middle class population, it unintentionally ends up with exclusion of the poor. This distinguished program, with its big impact and social effects, gives a clue to the success of participation programs as well as warns of the difficulties with them.