Multilateral development banks (MDBs) are under growing pressure to prove their relevance in a world where development finance is becoming increasingly fragmented, financing needs are rising, and fiscal space is tightening across many countries.

Governments are asking these institutions to deliver more finance, more quickly, and with greater efficiency and impact. MDBs are also in the middle of a far-reaching reform agenda – driven through successive G20 presidencies and shareholder processes – aimed at strengthening their financial capacity, improving coordination, and making operations faster and more effective.

However, despite this momentum for reform, a central question remains: what is actually changing for the countries these institutions exist to serve?

This episode of Think Change explores that question through the findings of ODI Global’s latest MDB client survey, drawing on the views of nearly 650 government officials across 125 countries.

Guests examine how client countries assess MDB performance across financing, policy advice, delivery speed, coordination and project quality, and whether reforms agreed in recent years are translating into meaningful operational change.

Guests

• Sara Pantuliano (host), Chief Executive, ODI Global
• Anna Bjerde, Managing Director for Operations at the World Bank
• Annalisa Prizzon, Principal Research Fellow at ODI Global
• José Antonio Ocampo, Professor at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, and former Minister of Finance of the Government of Colombia

Related resources

• Reforming multilateral development banks: perspectives from client countries
• Maximising operational effectiveness and impact: key priorities for multilateral development banks
• Are MDBs becoming ‘better’ institutions for their clients? Early insights from the 2025 survey of clients of multilateral development banks

At a moment of fiscal constraint and growing geopolitical fragmentation, international development is being reshaped in real time. This episode of Think Change explores the shift from aid to investment and the growing emphasis on partnerships across governments, development finance institutions, philanthropy, and the private sector.

Recorded alongside the Global Partnerships Conference, we bring together four of the conference chairs to answer the following question: are we seeing a meaningful transformation in how global development cooperation works, or a repackaging of existing approaches under tighter constraints?

With the UK increasingly positioning itself as “thinking like an investor, not a donor,” the conversation also explores what this shift signals politically – about the future direction of development policy, the role of the state, and who ultimately shapes development priorities.

From mobilising private capital at scale to aligning climate and development goals in frontier markets, the conversation unpacks what it will take to deliver impact in an era defined as much by constraint as by ambition.

Guests

• Sara Pantuliano (host), Chief Executive, ODI Global
• Kate Hampton, CEO, The Children's Investment Fund Foundation
• Leslie Maasdorp, CEO, British International Investment (BII)
• Melinda Bohannon, Director General – Global Issues, UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
• Maropene Ramokgopa, Minister in the Presidency responsible for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation of the Republic of South Africa

Related resources

• Centre for Private Finance in Development (ODI Global)
  
  
• What’s really “in it” for private investors in emerging markets? (Think Change podcast, ODI Global)
  
  
• Five ways European governments can support greater private capital mobilisation to low- and middle-income countries (Expert comment, ODI Global)

Recorded at the Women Deliver conference, this episode of Think Change – produced in partnership with GWL Voices – sets out the stakes for gender equality and multilateralism at a moment of deep geopolitical strain, and asks what the race for the next UN Secretary-General reveals about both.

Recent rollbacks on gender rights and climate action are not isolated. They are part of a broader political project that mobilises “traditional values” and divisive narratives to hold onto power, weaken accountability and challenge universal rights.

These dynamics are playing out not only within states, but inside multilateral institutions themselves – and they are already shaping the race for the next UN Secretary-General.

As the selection process begins, the question is not only who leads the UN, but what kind of leadership is politically possible. Campaigns like 1 for 8 Billion, supported by ODI Global, are calling for a more transparent, inclusive and merit-based process, and for Member States to nominate women candidates.

But this is not a neutral contest. It is a deeply political one.

We are already seeing how gender is being weaponised within it, with opposition to candidates framed through ideological lines, including attacks on candidates who support rights-based positions on abortion and women’s autonomy.

In this episode, we explore how these dynamics are playing out and whether feminist leadership offers not just a normative vision, but a practical strategy for rebuilding legitimacy, resisting backlash and making multilateralism work in a more contested world.

The video recording of this episode is now available on our website and on YouTube.

Guests

• Sara Pantuliano (host), Chief Executive, ODI Global
• Helen Clark, Former Prime Minister of New Zealand and Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
• Cristina Gallach, former UN Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information
• Kate Gilmore, Former UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights

Related resources

• Inside the global backlash (Resources hub, ODI Global)
• Advancing gender rights at the Human Rights Council in times of backlash (Report, ODI Global)
• How women's movements lead demands for democracy in the face of backlash and politicised religion (Report, ODI Global)