In his new book, The Tyranny of Experts, the economics professor argues that the quest for economic growth has led to the neglect of poor people's rights

The neglect of poor people's rights is "the moral tragedy of development today", argues the New York University economist William Easterly. In his new book, The Tyranny of Experts: Economists, Dictators, and the Forgotten Rights of the Poor, the professor of economics and co-director of NYU's Development Research Institute, condemns what he sees as unjustifiable support of authoritarian regimes in the quest for economic growth and prosperity by experts and aid agencies who have cast development as an overly technical exercise. The technocratic approach has served autocrats and those who advise them, while too often overlooking or sanctioning the abuse of poor people's rights.

"What used to be the divine right of kings has in our time become the development right of dictators. The implicit vision in development today is that of well-intentioned autocrats advised by technical experts," says the economist and author of The White Man's Burden, who spent 16 years at the World Bank during the 1980s and 90s. He has perhaps become better known recently for his public spat with Columbia University's Jeffrey Sachs over what foreign aid can achieve. But he is "really ready to move on", from that debate. During a phone interview from New York, Easterley says aid is such a small part of the story.

The Tyranny of Experts traces a long history of what the professor alleges is the neglect of rights in development. Racists, colonialists, cold war strategists, some post-independence African leaders and expert development economists have come to favour a technocratic approach and used it to further their interests, he argues. It has also appealed to philanthropists and humanitarians in rich countries, in their drive to help raise living standards.

Easterly says he was "very blind to the issue of autocracy and rights" for much of his career. He describes an authoritarian mindset at the World Bank and was involved in imposed shock therapy economic reforms in Russia, and structural adjustment programmes in poor countries. In The Tyranny of Experts, he writes: "I can sympathise with economists who, in their zeal to help the world's poor, unwittingly favour autocracy, because for a long time I was one of them myself."

He casts the founding of the World Bank as the moment of original sin and names the US and UK government aid agencies, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as having also embraced the technocratic approach by financing or otherwise supporting what he calls authoritarian development.

He laments that the debate between authoritarian development and one based on respect for individual rights – what he calls free development – has never happened. He questions how it is possible that the idea of the benevolent autocrat could have become so popular despite a lack of convincing evidence that such leaders are able to deliver the development miracles they promise. He asks how much evidence a person would require if told that by giving up some of their freedoms and rights, their material life would improve. The burden of proof should fall squarely on the autocrat, Easterly says. The free development alternative, meanwhile, would spur progress by creating incentives for innovation and responsive governments through respect for individual rights – an ideal in its own.

Easterly argues that those who want to do something about global poverty should advocate for the rights of the poor and protest when those rights are ignored or violated. Aid agencies, he says, should cut off funds to repressive regimes and seriously investigate allegations of abuse related to projects they back. "We must not let caring about the material suffering of the poor change the subject from caring about the rights of the poor … autocrats have offered a false bargain to meet material needs while we overlook their suppression of rights."

Easterly's book, perhaps not surprisingly, has been met with mixed reviews.

Nancy Birdsall, founding president of the Centre for Global Development thinktank in Washington DC, called the book "deeply radical and thought-provoking, and brilliantly entertaining". She writes: "Development insiders will, with some justification, complain about one-sidedness and exaggeration. But no one who starts this book will be able to put it down, or be able to undo its influence on her thinking about the deep determinants of development progress."

Angus Deaton, economics professor at Princeton University, says: "Knowledge and expertise are fountainheads of prosperity and freedom, yet experts, especially foreign experts, have frequently been the instruments of the very oppression that they seek to alleviate. The Tyranny of Experts tells the extraordinary story of authoritarian development."

But, writing in the Wall Street Journal (paywall), Sarah Chayes, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the book was "too often haphazard, self-contradictory or erroneous" and full of generalisations. It failed to acknowledge the increase in international support for grassroots development and democratisation efforts.

"[Easterly's] belabored insistence that freedom and democracy are the only reliable paths to economic prosperity is too general and thus not very helpful for anyone thinking seriously about how to reform development assistance," Chayes writes.

Geoff Lamb, chief economic and policy advisor at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, called the book meandering and replete with parable and diversions. Reading it, he said, was like falling into a late afternoon conversation in a pub with a "pleasant, learned and somewhat impish stranger, who yarns away about one thing after another", but the conversation is confusing and you're relieved when it is over.

He accuses Easterly of "pretty slithery argumentation". Donors do support democratic movements, elections and civil society groups, Lamb argues, taking issue with Easterly's coverage of Ethiopia and Bill Gates's enthusiasm for its progress on reducing child mortality. Lamb mocks Easterly for "huffing and puffing" about interpretations of statistics.

Easterly is keen on debate and is curating links to reviews, praising, measured and scathing alike, on his website. He says he will be in London in May, to present The Tyranny of Experts to officials at the Department for International Development. A similar talk at the World Bank was cancelled and has not yet been rescheduled.

As for Lamb's post, Easterly promptly left a comment, offering a "response … to continue the dialogue" on the blog. They have yet to take him up on the offer, he says.

The Tyranny of Experts: Economists, Dictators, and the Forgotten Rights of the Poor is published in the UK by Basic Books on 20 March 2014