Jacqueline Best argues that the 1990s changes in IMF, World Bank and donor policies, towards what some have called the 'Post-Washington Consensus, ' were driven by an erosion of expert authority and an increasing preoccupation with policy failure. Failures such as the Asian financial crisis and the decades of despair in sub-Saharan Africa led these institutions to develop governance strategies designed to avoid failure: fostering country ownership, developing global standards, managing risk and vulnerability and measuring results. In contrast to the structural adjustment era when policymakers...