Each day decisions are made about global political priorities. We choose to support some worthy causes while others are disregarded. Unfortunately, political decisions seldom take into account a comprehensive view of the effects and costs of solving one problem in relation to another. Priorities are often set in an obfuscated environment involving the conflicting demands of the media, the people, and politicians. Despite all good intentions, the decision-making process is marred by arbitrary and haphazard methods. The idea behind the Copenhagen Consensus is to render, in the future, this process less arbitrary, because political decisions should not be made arbitrarily, but should be based on facts and knowledge. The result stemming from the Copenhagen Consensus 2004 is very concrete: a ranked list of real challenges, for real people, in the real world.

If we had an extra $50 billion to put to good use, which problems would we solve first? That was the question put to the participants of the Copenhagen Consensus. Using more than 600 pages of scholarly papers as their point of departure, the participants engaged in an intense scholarly discussion that resulted in a set list of priorities regarding the world's most challenging problems.

This book constitutes a concrete contribution to the debate regarding global priorities – the question of how do we tackle the world's problems, such as where should we start, and what should be done.