Conceived in 1950, the Colombo Plan for Co-operative Development in South and Southeast Asia was a unique experiment in foreign relations. Meeting annually across what we now know as the 'Indo-Pacific', talented administrators facilitated foreign aid provision, and promoted development fuelled state-making, internationalism and experimental regionalism across postwar Asia. David Lowe argues that this new setting and dynamic international cast created an unusually productive diplomatic environment of development internationalism. The Colombo Plan did not escape power politics or Cold War divisions. However, it did run according to its own rhythm, and, unlike other experiments, it endured, continuing today in much reduced form.

‘Lowe's study demonstrates an alternative channel of the voices of the post-independent countries of Asia to the A-A movement of the Bandung Conference (1955). It identifies the Columbo Plan's Consultative Committee as a fora-based international organization grown beyond the original Commonwealth base, where these countries, especially India and Sri Lanka, shaped external and intra-regional aid projects. A great contribution to the growing literature on the history of international development.'

Tomoko Akami - ANU College of Asia and the Pacific

‘This is a stimulating story of a newly formed Commonwealth-based development organization, the Colombo Plan, and its enduring impacts on the emerging ‘Indo-Pacific' region in the long 1950s. We can identify the dynamic interactions between decolonization, the Cold War and economic development in Asia in the context of global history.'

Shigeru Akita - Osaka University, Japan

‘Lowe expertly reveals the operations and machinations of 'development internationalism,' through the overlooked yet enduring Colombo Plan, exposing how various countries harnessed the program as more than a simple vehicle for aid but a means to reshape international relationships in the Indo-Pacific and beyond in the critical years after 1945.'

David Ekbladh - Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy

‘… a superb scholarly history of this regional development plan … The book makes a persuasive case for remembering an unusually productive diplomatic environment for developmental internationalism in postwar Asia. Given recent international developments involving the unashamed use of military force by powers such as Russia and the United States, determined on expansionism, it is timely indeed. The Colombo Plan is also a reminder that the history of 'Australia in the world' is much more complex and interesting than a survey of our changing relations with Britain and America. The Colombo Plan deserves a wide readership, not only in DFAT and academic circles, but among journalists and others who like to frequent writers’ festivals.’

Marilyn Lake Source: Australian Book Review