the expense of the citizens. Most African leaders and officials are able to amass huge sums of personal wealth for themselves from the foreign aid received—they enrich themselves and do not use the aid provided for its intended purpose. It has been argued that much government-to-government aid was ineffective because it was merely a way to support strategically important leaders (Alesino and Dollar, 2000). A good example of this is the former dictator of Zaire, Mobuto Sese Seko, who lost support from the West after the Cold War had ended. Mobuto, at the time of his death, had a sufficient personal fortune (particularly in Swiss banks) to pay off the entire external debt of Zaire. Promoting neopatrimonialism and poor governance American political scientist and professor Nicolas van de Walle has also argued that despite more than two decades of donor-supported reform in Africa, the continent continues to be plagued by economic crises due to the combination of state generated factors and to the counter productivity of international development aid to Africa. Van de Walle first attributes the failure to implement economic policy reform to factors within the African state: Neopatrimonial tendencies of state elites that serve to preserve and centralize power, maintain limited access orders, and create political obstacles to reform. Ideological obstacles that have been biased by two decades of failed economic policy reform and in turn, create a hostile environment for reform. Low state capacity that reinforces and that in turn, is reinforced by the neopatrimonial tendencies of the state. Van de Walle later argues that these state generated factors that have obstructed the effective implementation of economic policy reform are further exacerbated by foreign aid. Aid, therefore, makes policy reform less likely, rather than more likely. Van de Walle posits that international aid has sustained economic stagnation in Africa by: Pacifying Africa's neopatrimonial tendencies, thereby lessening the incentives for state elites to undertake reform and preserving the status quo. Sustaining poorly managed bureaucratic structures and policies that would be otherwise rectified by market forces. Allowing state capacities to deteriorate through externalizing many state functions and responsibilities. In order for aid to be productive and for economic policy reform to be successfully implemented in Africa, the relationship between donors and governments must change. Van de Walle argues that aid must be made more conditional and selective to incentivize states to take on reform and to generate the much