I created the above map using Palladio and it represents the movement of over $450 million dollars (in 1986 dollars) in state grants to Nicaragua from 1979 to 1986. The data comes from the Nicaraguan Ministry of External Cooperation, which I found in a volume entitled Aid that Counts: the Western Contribution to Development and Survival in Nicaragua, published by Transnational Institute (TNI). Founded in 1974 and committed to the struggle of social movements internationally, TNI issued Aid that Counts at the height of the Contra War in an attempt to stop the trend of diminishing aid to Nicaragua.
I am still trying to figure out how to demonstrate changes in the amount of grant money over time. I hope to be able to show how aid to Nicaragua dried up after the United States began pressuring European and Latin American states to take a harder line with the Sandinistas. At the same time I would like to depict the changing flow of Soviet aid to Nicaragua, which was due to a myriad of complex issues. Hopefully, given more time to mess around with the tool I will be able to sort these things out.
Andrew W. Wilson 