Few first‐hand accounts on advising exist by government advisors working in Third World countries. Other writers suggest that such advising is different from that found in the governments o f the industrialized countries. A framework for comparing expatriate advisors in Africa with senior policy analysts in the United States is developed which finds a great deal of similarity between the two types of advisors. Examples are drawn from the literature (much of it fugitive) about advisors and policy analysts working in Africa, Europe, and the United State