The classification of donor countries into the two opposed communities of ‘hard-liner’ and ‘like-minded’ countries with regard to the contents of their development cooperation policy is still customary. Germany is clearly seen as part of the former and Sweden as part of the latter. However, recent comparative studies have indicated an approximation of development policy approaches of donor countries regardless whether they belong to the one or other community. In this article the point of attachment to analyse the processes of approximation are the planning and control systems within the respective development administrations of Germany and Sweden. The planning and control systems are seen as filter and key elements between the input (political decisions) and the output (factual impact) of development cooperation policy.
