We present here two papers which argue that the existing models underlying the strategies to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are deficient and flawed on a number of counts. The authors, Sanjay Reddy and Antoine Heuty, propose an alternate approach to achieving the MDGs through a process of periodic peer and partner review. According to the authors, the process of peer and partner review will enable each country to learn from its own experience and that of other countries and thereby increases the likelihood of success.

• Achieving The Millennium Development Goals: What’s Wrong with Existing Analytical Models?
   
  (PDF Document , Size: 271 Kb, App. Download Time: 04 min @ 28kbps)
   
  Sanjay Reddy and Antoine Heuty
   
  Effective strategic choices for achieving the MDGs must be based on sound assessments of the costs and benefits of alternative policies. However, existing approaches to identifying these costs and benefits are unreliable. In particular, estimates of the costs and benefits of alternative strategies derive from implausible and restrictive assumptions, often depend on poor quality data, and are presented without adequate recognition of the presence of uncertainties concerning the future. These weaknesses of existing approaches can be mitigated but not overcome. An alternative to the technocratic approach to strategic planning is needed, in view of the potential damage from the use of erroneous analytical models.
  
  
  
• Peer and Partner Review: A Practical Approach to achieving the MDGs
   
  (PDF Document , Size: 136Kb, App. Download Time: 02 min @ 28kbps)
   
  Sanjay Reddy and Antoine Heuty
   
  A number of strategies to achieve the MDGs have recently been proposed, most influentially by the Millennium Project, the World Bank and the United Nations. The models underlying the recommended strategies are flawed, as a result of their reliance on implausible and restrictive assumptions and poor quality data and their failure adequately to reflect uncertainties about the future. These weaknesses of technocratic predictive models can be mitigated but not overcome. An alternative approach to strategic planning should establish an institutional framework for continuous informed policy choice by representative decision-makers. The alternative approach to achieving the MDGs can be implemented through a process of periodic peer and partner review. The process of peer and partner review will enable each country to learn from its own experience and that of other countries and thereby increases the likelihood of success.
  

Updated July 20, 2005.