Welcome to our summer blog! Our goal with this blog is to keep everyone engaged with GDO over the summer, and offer some of our personal experiences with development. If you would like to contribute a blog post, email us to sign up.
My name is Sarah Turkaly, and I will be GDO's President this year. I will be a fourth year in the fall majoring in Foreign Affairs with a minor in Global Sustainability. This summer I am nannying and working while studying for the GRE and preparing for the next steps after graduation. I am looking into various fellowships and internships as well as applying to graduate programs in International Development both domestically and internationally.
One of the best parts of the summer for me is that I can finally find time to read for pleasure. Throughout the school year I wrote down books to read, and I have been moving down the list quickly. Below you can find the ones I've read so far and highly recommend. Feel free to comment with additional suggestions!
My name is Sarah Turkaly, and I will be GDO's President this year. I will be a fourth year in the fall majoring in Foreign Affairs with a minor in Global Sustainability. This summer I am nannying and working while studying for the GRE and preparing for the next steps after graduation. I am looking into various fellowships and internships as well as applying to graduate programs in International Development both domestically and internationally.
One of the best parts of the summer for me is that I can finally find time to read for pleasure. Throughout the school year I wrote down books to read, and I have been moving down the list quickly. Below you can find the ones I've read so far and highly recommend. Feel free to comment with additional suggestions!
Recommended Reads
ON DEVELOPMENT PERSPECTIVES:
The Idealist by Nina Munk
The Tyranny of Experts by Bill Easterly
The Life You Can Save by Peter Singer
MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS:
The Big Truck That Went By by Jonathan Katz
The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux
ON DEVELOPMENT PERSPECTIVES:
The Idealist by Nina Munk
- This was the first book I read this summer, and it was a great choice. Nina Munk follows Jeffery Sachs (of Millennium Development Goals fame) and researches his Millennium Villages in Africa, exposing their benefits and how they may have fallen short of expectations.
- This is a great read because it depicts one side of a huge debate in the development world - that people can be lifted out of poverty - supported by Jeff Sachs. The book has even recently stirred up some controversy amongst Bill Gates and Jeff Sachs, which you can read about in this article.
The Tyranny of Experts by Bill Easterly
- I've just started this one, but it grabbed my attention in the first few pages. Basically, Easterly believes that people cannot be lifted out of poverty - rather, institutions need to be developed so people can progress on their own with the help of a growing economy. It's a great counterpoint to Sachs' ideals as well.
The Life You Can Save by Peter Singer
- I read this book for a politics class and Singer is a political theorist, but it is certainly relevant to those interested in development.
- The book is based on a striking metaphor: Not donating money to a cause helping those across the globe is the same as walking past a pond where a child is drowning and doing nothing in response. It definitely gives you a lot to think about when it comes to ethics of "helping others", even if you disagree with Singer's claim.
MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS:
The Big Truck That Went By by Jonathan Katz
- This book depicts the experiences of Jonathan Katz, an AP reporter, who was in Haiti at the time of the earthquake. The experience obviously was life changing for Katz, and this novel demonstrates his research and reporting on the reaction of the international community and institutions such as the UN and World Bank since the earthquake.
- I am specifically interested in Haiti as a country, but even if you are not, parallels can certainly be drawn between Haiti's experiences and other emergency relief responses and development efforts around the world.
The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux
- I stumbled across this book while looking for a story about travel, but then learned that its author has actually lived an amazing life that has resulted in him traveling to most continents and writing about his adventures and the people he has encountered in detail. This was his first book, but he has many so I highly recommend looking him up.
- Theroux has a lot of experience in Africa in particular, where he started as a Peace Corps volunteer in Malawi.