Disruption in Development Finance: What

The international development landscape is being reshaped by skeptical policymakers at home and partner countries – both of whom increasingly see the need to adopt new approaches. This course examines several cases of successful innovation in development finance — not to recycle those models, but to identify patterns of what makes innovation work, so the next generation of policymakers can reshape the field as conditions demand.

Through looking at several case studies, notably the International Finance Facility for Immunization (IFFIm), the Advanced Market Commitment (AMC) and disaster risk insurance pools, we will identify some of the factors for success and failure. Students will experiment with developing new ideas through practical application.

The instructor will draw on personal experience in global health and education financing. Guest speakers will provide practitioner perspectives on what works, what doesn’t, and why.

By the end of the course, students will develop their own innovative proposal to address a current development challenge and present it as a pitch to a hypothetical CEO, applying lessons learned from historical cases to contemporary problems.