Healing Broken Societies: Can Aid Buy Love and Peace?(Global INSIGHTS‪)‬

We live in a world where concern for the human condition is big business and, in the epoch of terror, a matter for global strategic interest. This is encapsulated in the Millennium Development Goals and is also central to the notion of human security as a whole. Increasingly, providing humanitarian assistance for the survival and well being of war-torn populations is seen as a litmus test of the adequacy of political effort, as well as a mark of civilized global governance. Considerations of sustainable development raise complex concerns. On one hand, there are intense--and often sharply polarized--debates in all societies and political systems around the world on the best ways of organizing and paying for economic and social progress. These generate considerable controversies on who benefits and who is left out. On the other hand, the achievement of good human development status, for example, in health and education, is seen as a basic universal human right, inspired by the values of a common humanity.