Bank to explicitly address political and social factors in project appraisal. The Bank was perceived by its staff as relatively free from political pressures and driven by a technocratic approach. An explicit inclusion of political and social considerations in project appraisal, therefore, meant that the Bank would be “vulnerable to every variety of reaction from member countries and would lose its fortunate position.”<sup>61</sup> An important cause for criticism from Bank officers was that Hirschman showed a complete disinterest in quantitative evaluations, focusing instead on a qualitative analysis or, as he wrote, on “comparing ‘personal profiles’ of projects in different sectors.”<sup>62</sup> To a bureaucracy that expected Hirschman’s study to shed some light on issues such as the measurement of indirect economic benefits of projects and the feasibility and the effects of applying shadow prices for products and factors of production, this was most likely disappointing.<sup>63</sup> Furthermore, criticism may have been intensified by Hirschman’s claim that his reflections were “strictly policy-oriented,”<sup>64</sup> and thus had an immediate consequence for the Bank’s loan policies, while many Bank economists considered that they did not have any application. A Bank engineer commented that Hirschman was “not well aware of the choices facing the Bank.”<sup>65</sup> As a matter of fact, when the Bank’s economists had the opportunity to read the final output of Hirschman’s research, published in 1967 by the Brookings Institution as _Development Projects Observed_ , they were not excessively critical of it; rather, they highlighted the fact that “his conclusions have only very limited applicability.”<sup>66</sup> Robert Asher reported that Dick Demuth, the Director of the Bank’s Development Services Department, considered the book’s

> Observations’,” September 8, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1; P.A. Reid to Mr. L.J.C. Evans, November 16, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1; Warren C. Baum to Mr. B. Chadenet, “Comments on Mr. Hirschman’s Paper,” September 17, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1; Mario Piccagli to Mr. H. B. Ripman, “Comments on Mr. Hirschman’s Observations,” September 22, 1965, Albert O. Hirschman Papers, Box 57, Folder 4.

> 61 D.S. Ballantine to Mr. B. Chadenet, “Comment on Interim Observations by A.O. Hirschman,” September 15, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

> 62 Albert O. Hirschman, “A Study of Selected World Bank Projects – Some Interim Observations,” August 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

> 63 Dragoslav Avramovic to Department Heads, IBRD and IFC, “Investment in Developing Countries – Effects, Expectations and Reality,” February 18, 1964, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

> 64 Albert O. Hirschman, “A Study of Selected World Bank Projects – Some Interim Observations,” August 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

> 65 A.D. Spottswood to Mr. Bernard Chadenet’, “Comments on Dr. Hirschman’s ‘Interim Observations’,” September 8, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

66 Hans A. Adler to Mr. Warren C. Baum, “Comments on Professor Hirschman’s ‘Study of Selected World Bank Projects – Some Interim Observations’,” September 22, 1965, World Bank Hirschman Folders Vol. 1.

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