LU-MRRL Lecture Series: Helping People in Rural Bolivia, Mozambique, and Columbia: Results of a 27-Year Study on How People in Some of the Poorest and War-ravaged Places on the Globe Improve Their Livess

Recent news cycles have focused on the dismantling of USAID and the negative and potentially existential threat this might present to some of the most vulnerable populations on the globe. This is no doubt true in important cases such as the US's PEPFAR program's delivering AIDS therapy in Zambia, or USAID'S building water systems and latrines in rural El Salvador. However, evidence from more than a quarter-century of work in rural areas of developing countries suggests that local factors--including local forms of government, local leaders' decisions, and rural areas' relations with nearby cities--are more important than international aid, important as that is, in influencing human well-being in the globe's poorest areas. Dr. Brian Norris, associate professor of political science, will discuss his research based on work he did as a   Peace Corps volunteer in rural Bolivia in the late 1990s, on interviews in rural areas affected by civil war in Columbia and Mozambique funded by a Fulbright global scholar award between 2022 and 2024, and other observations from 39 professional trips to developing countries over the years.