Since the Paris Declaration of 2005, there has been a genuine reappraisal of the modality of aid giving. “Good policy environments” and “national ownership” have become key elements within the new framework. Nevertheless, although the lexicon of the donor community has moved on, “aid conditionality” is still very much part and parcel of aid-giving. Where do the controversies persist on aid conditionality? How successful have donors been in stemming the rising tide of conditionality of the 1980s and 1990s? Does the donor community practise what it preaches in terms of aid allocation according to governance and developmental criteria? And what implications does the financial crisis have for the sustainability of existing conditionality frameworks? These are some of the questions that this study attempts to address.