“The past year has underlined how the dramatic growth of some of the world’s most populous developing economies is propelling a remarkable shift in the global geopolitics of aid and development,” the Guardian reports in an article examining how “non-traditional donors” contributed large amounts to several humanitarian crises this year.

“[A] deluge of donors to relief work in Japan [after the earthquake] and the Horn of Africa [in response to famine] illustrates how global shifts are upending the simple oppositions of developed and developing, donor and recipient countries. There are similar shifts in traditional development aid, where flows are no longer structured on clear north-south lines and Europeans and Americans are no longer the only players,” the newspaper states. The article looks at how some developing countries are establishing their own aid agencies; how new donors are classifying their aid; and how “destabilizing inequalities” among populations in emerging economies may threaten progress (Provost, 12/13).