aid has frequently been provided for with noneconomic objectives such as emergency assistance following disaster relief or for political or geostrategic reasons during the cold war billions of dollars of aid supported corrupt and tyrannical dictators such as joseph mobutu of zaire now the democratic republic of the congo and jeanbedel bokassa of the central african republic in other cases aid may have had a negative effect on growth through dutch disease effects where inflows of capital reduce the competitiveness of the export sector through the appreciation of exchange rates more generally the crosssection aid and growth literature is bedevilled by all the econometric problems associated with the trade and growth literature to which we referred earlier