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:question: Discuss the advantage and disadvantage of giving international aid to poor countries. :idea: Giving international aid to poor countries is an internationally common practice. Its main motive is based on moral obligation which stipulates that all fellow humankind should help each other, according to their respective abilities. This practice also has its own advantages and disadvantages. Some of them are as follows. On the side of its advantages, international aid can serve as many useful tools. First, it can serve as additional resources to help poor countries develop themselves. Many poor countries are often found in great need of resources and international aid can give them some relief. Second, international aid can serve as a tool to strengthen international relations. The donors and the recipients will benefit from each other by engaging in mutual coordination. The former usually will require the latter to guarantee that the latter will make the best use of the aid and won’t misuse it, and the latter is bound to pledge commitment to use the aid the way it is intended for. Third, international aid can facilitate technology transfer, especially when the aid is in the form of technical aid by which the donors not only give the technology (in the form of machinery or the like) but also assign their technicians to train or educate local workers to operate it. On the side of its disadvantages, international aid is found to be often misused. By giving the aid, the donors sometimes require the recipients to do something the benefit of which is disproportionately more favorable to the former than to the latter. Many recipient countries have often complained that donor countries are often found to take advantage of them by means of international aid. Sometimes, the aid is given in such a way that makes the recipients ever dependent on their donors. Finding themselves in a “weaker” bargaining position, recipient countries often has no choice whatsoever but to do what their donors tell them. On the other hand, donor countries, well aware of their “stronger” bargaining position, have the chance to make use of their aid as a pressure on their recipients. In my opinion, international aid should continue because it is a part of our moral obligation - one of the main pillars on which our humanity depends. However, to maximize its advantages and eliminate (or at least, to minimize) its disadvantages, ii should continue in good faith and in such a way that promotes mutual coordination and puts both the donors and the recipients in the same level of bargaining position. Giving aid with the real intention of subjecting its recipients is by no means a good deed and can constitute a violation of commonly accepted moral obligation.