Maximizing Finance for Development Comes to the Middle East and North Africa analyzes the development paradigm currently being pushed in the Middle East and North Africa. In the World Bank’s terms, maximizing finance for development (MfD) constitutes a bold strategy for “systematically leverag(ing) all sources of finance, expertise, and solutions to support developing countries’ sustainable growth.” In actuality, the report demonstrates that MfD threatens to increase financial volatility, compromise public finances, intensify inequality, and obstruct the infrastructure upgrades needed to power equitable development and survive ecological change.