Beyond Apologies: Defining and Achieving an Economics of Wellbeing

Debra Efroymson's book, Beyond Apologies, is a must read for development practitioners and social justice advocates working to question mainstream development policies and programs. Efroymson deftly combines a historical review of the unintended consequences of diverse poverty alleviation initiatives from around the world with a sharp analysis of current policy debates and a logically-drawn road map for fundamentally changing how practitioners should think about development. The book is engagingly written and holds a treasure trove of illustrative cases and data points that oblige the international development community to rethink economic assumptions and assess how policy incoherence is driving counterproductive impact and harming the poor.

This new edition of Beyond Apologies is shorter than the original. It also introduces We Squared clubs, which were started to promote the ideas in this book and to help people find ways to take action. The full version, which contains more examples, in-depth discussion, and numerous illustrative quotes, is available online and in printed form.