ABSTRACT
As described in Chapter 3, the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) has embraced the International Development Targets, and subsequently the Millennium Development Goals, as central to its mission. However, if targets are to mean much in practical terms, they need to be pursued in a concrete fashion at the country level. Chapter 3 described DFID’s overall strategic approach, in which strategy papers play a key part. This chapter focuses on DFID’s Country Strategy Papers (CSPs) as an example of country-level priority setting. It reviews the first CSPs completed under the ‘new regime’ following the 1997 White Paper on International Development and the extent to which they promote a new approach to poverty reduction. Our main argument is that there appears to be a ‘missing middle’ in the CSPs. Whilst the poverty reduction objectives, linked to international targets, are clearly stated, and planned spending for the coming years is laid out, there is little to connect the two.
