杰弗里•萨克斯非洲扶贫试验破产之谜

    虽然用意良善，但萨克斯给人的印象是易怒、傲慢以及超级自负。最令人沮丧的是，萨克斯似乎脱离了千禧村项目实地的现实，脱离了他手下工作人员的努力，尤其脱离了他试图改善其生活的那些人们。在芒克的叙述中，萨克斯几乎不会花时间待在村子里，而是乘坐那种装甲SUV到处穿梭，只会停留在高档酒店和非洲国家领导人的办公室之间。萨克斯在村庄的时间只够他接受村民们给予的英雄式欢迎，这些村民都热衷于得到资金援助——芒克明确表示，这是一种表演。与此同时，“伟大的教授”——这是最初被萨克斯迷住的一位工作人员对他的叫法——拒绝外界对千禧村项目进行评估。而且芒克还发现证据，证明这个组织自身的报告存在报喜不报忧的行为。

    尽管萨克斯和他暴躁的脾气为这本书提供了最有料的内容，但芒克也带领读者认识了那些认真负责、身为千禧村项目工作人员的非洲人，他们（跟芒克一样）对这个项目越来越失望。他们被授以不可能完成的工作，既要负责处理实地的状况，又要遵从朝令夕改、不切实际的指令，而这些指令都来自千禧村项目位于纽约的总部。一位村庄协调员被要求为一份建立小规模奶制品工厂的商业计划书撰写多份草案，而他所在的村庄正面临非常严重的饥荒和干旱，以至于愤怒的人们袭击了一位水车的司机。

    这样的时刻可能会让读者感到，对外援助的状态以及战胜贫困的前景非常黯淡。芒克完成了一项出色的工作，她向读者传达了开发工作以及对外援助中所涉及的复杂的制衡体系。

    尽管萨克斯存在过错，尽管千禧村项目遭遇了种种失败，但芒克对他还是有些苛刻了。芒克在书中不止一次地提到了千禧村项目村庄取得进展的实例——死亡率和疟疾患病率下降了；就学率提高了——然而这些显著的成就让人感觉被那些小失败的声音所掩盖了。萨克斯仍然是解决全球贫困问题极少数激烈的公共倡导者之一，芒克描绘的形象很是刺痛人心，以至于让人很容易忘记这个事实。当然，作为一个博得大量关注和资源的精神领袖，萨克斯理应接受这种审视。但他也理应得到比这书中描写更多的认可——但只是稍微更多一些。在这本书的末尾，甚至连萨克斯本人也显露出谦卑的姿态。他承认，虽然这少数几个村庄的情况有所改善，但找到战胜贫困的全球性解决方案仍然有一段很长的路要走。（财富中文网）

    译者：王灿均  

    Though well-intentioned, Sachs comes across as prickly, dismissive, and supremely arrogant. Most damningly, he appears disconnected from the on-the-ground realities of MVP, the efforts of his staff, and particularly the lives he's trying to improve. By Munk's telling, Sachs barely spends any time in the villages, but rather blows through the region, being shuttled in those armored SUVS, between high-end hotels and the offices of African leaders. He drops into villages, only long enough to receive a hero's welcome—a performance, Munk makes clear—from villagers who are keen to keep the money coming. Meanwhile "the great professor"—as one initially smitten staff member calls him—resists external evaluation efforts of MVP, and Munk finds evidence the organization's reports are leaving out bad news.

    While Sachs and his short temper provide the book's juiciest bits, Munk effectively draws readers into the stories of the earnest, committed, and (like Munk) increasingly disillusioned group of Africans who work as MVP field staff. They have impossible jobs; tasked with managing the on-the-ground situation while keeping up with the constantly changing and increasingly pie-in-the-sky orders that come down from the New York-based MVP headquarters. While one village coordinator is being asked to write multiple drafts of a business plan for small-scale milk production, his village is facing famine and a drought so severe that an angry mob beats the driver of a water truck.

    Moments like this can leave readers feeling awfully bleak about the state of foreign aid and the prospects of ever overcoming poverty. Munk does a good job conveying the complexities of development work and the system of trade-offs involved in foreign aid.

    Yet for all of his faults and MVP's failures, Munk is a bit hard on Sachs. More than once, she offers examples of progress in the MVP villages —drops in mortality and malaria rates; improved school attendance—yet these notable feats feel overshadowed by the steady drumbeat of small failures. Sachs remains one of a very few fierce, public advocates for addressing global poverty. Munk's portrait is so stinging, it's easy to forget that fact. Certainly, as a figurehead who commands considerable attention and resources, Sachs deserves the scrutiny. He also deserves more credit than he gets here—but only slightly more. By the end of her book, even Sachs seems humbled, and admits that while things are better in these few villages, a global solution for poverty still a long way off.