This report is a self-evaluation of the Operations Evaluation Department's (OED) Country Assistance Evaluations (CAEs). CAEs examine World Bank performance in a particular country, usually over the past four to five years, and report on its conformity with the relevant Bank Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) and on the overall effectiveness of the specific CAS. This Retrospective addresses the question 'What Have We Learned?' by compiling lessons relevant for developing country assistance strategies from the most recent batch of CAEs. Second, it assesses revisions to the CAE process,...

China and India are the two most populous countries in the world and now also two of the fastest growing. By sheer virtue of the fact that China and India are home to 2.4 billion people--two-fifths of the world's population--the rapid growth of their economies has far-reaching implications not just for global living standards and poverty reduction but also for competitiveness and distribution of income in the rest of the world. Commensurate with their economic progress, there has been a surge of interest in the nature and implications of China and India's economic growth.
There are...