Catalysing development?: a debate on aid

Honours Thesis, 2017

Over the years, aid in its many forms has sought to assist developing countries both in times of crisis, and in achieving developmental objectives. Developing nations have for long been recipients of donor aid from international donor agencies and governments. However, many developing nations are still faced with economic, social and political challenges that act as stumbling blocks to sustainable development. This paper seeks to map out the discourses on developmental aid by drawing on old and new literature. Much of today’s interactions between developed and developing nations are informed by old colonial relationships. Developing nations have experienced little autonomy over their own development policies and objectives. Development aid plays a part in the loss of this autonomy. However, this is being overcome by the shift in paradigms of development that place more emphasis on autonomy of the recipient nations’ state and citizens as the main drivers in achieving sustainable developmental goals.

Current Issues in Comparative Education, 2010

O ur world faces pervasive poverty and inequality: • the world's rich-poor gap has more than doubled since the 1960s; • 1.4 billion people live on less than $1.25/day; • hunger affects 963 million people worldwide; • nearly 1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water; • one in three children in developing countries suffers from malnutrition; • about 75 million children who should be in primary school are not; and • every year, nearly 10 million children under the age of 5 die from preventable causes. (Bread for the World, 2009; UNESCO, 2009; Dichter, 2003, p. 1) Hundreds of billions of dollars in international aid have been given or loaned to developing countries though bilateral and multilateral mechanisms, at least, ostensibly, in order to do something about these and other problems. Has such aid helped? Debates around this question have been ongoing for decades, perhaps intensifying in recent years. This should not be a surprise. It is far from straightforward to even determine how to investigate the question. At first glance, a researcher might want to look before and after to observe how well indicators, such as of poverty and economic growth, improved over a specific time period, and link that to changes in aid, controlling for other factors that might affect poverty and economic growth. While some research along these lines exists, this approach is generally a nonstarter, especially on a global level, but also even for specific countries. The question is just too complicated to be well-specified-for many reasons. For instance, there is a myriad of interactive factors that affect poverty and economic growth besides aid. Moreover, international aid serves many purposes other than these, such as supporting the foreign policy of rich countries, building nations, democratization, or fighting terrorism. Given that a supposedly 'scientific' approach cannot answer the question of the impact of aid, it is not surprising that the debates about it rely heavily on anecdotal and idiosyncratic evidence marshaled from particular ideological perspectives. Periodic studies and international meetings have reviewed aid and development linkages and made recommendations for improvement. For example, the World Bank-sponsored Pearson Commission in 1970 argued that "external resources, by adding to the resources available to a developing country, has had a positive impact upon development" and merited "large and sustained expansion" (Asante, 1985, p. 249). Subsequent studies like the Brandt Commission Reports in 1980 and 1983 reinforced these conclusions. In recent years, international meetings-Monterrey in 2002, Rome in 2003, Marrakech in 2004, and Paris in 2005-led to agreements on aid and development. The G-8 meeting in Scotland in 2005, with impetus from celebrity donors and entrepreneurial philanthropists, promised a doubling of aid to African nations. And perhaps most importantly, the Paris Declaration in 2005 lays out an international agenda to improve foreign aid 8 Current Issues in Comparative Education S. Klees by making it more transparent, accountable, aligned, harmonized, and effective. 2 Despite the fact that most of these official views of aid end up arguing that more is necessary, foreign aid has long had its critics from all sides of the political spectrum. For example, from the right, Peter Bauer, an early neoliberal economist writing before the term "neoliberal" was even coined, published in 1972 a book called Dissent on Development that summarized the critique he had been making for many years. He argued that rather than helping, "foreign aid…is likely to obstruct" development (p. 95) by creating dependency, distorting priorities, fostering corruption, and exacerbating market imperfections. His recommendation was to mostly eliminate foreign aid. This has also been a long-term political position of the neoconservative movement in the United States, as exemplified by the media commentator and former Presidential candidate, Patrick Buchanan (1998). A strong critique of foreign aid has come from some on the left as well. For example, in his classic article on dependency, Frank (1967) argues that foreign aid is a form of neocolonialism. Samir Amin (1980), in his book, Delinking: Towards a Polycentric World, argues the need for developing countries to delink from world trade and aid systems in order to focus on internal needs. Amin does not argue that trade and aid should be eliminated, just reduced.

International aid predominantly lies within the parameters of neo-colonial imperialism at worst or well intentioned paternalism at best. The focus of Overseas Development Aid (ODA) on governance, security and free trade on the macro side of development and poverty alleviation on the micro side, facilitates a barrier between international development efforts and enduring development (Esser & Williams 2014; Leo 2014; Hasenkamp 2012; Deacon & Cohen 2011; Carroll & Hameiri 2007; Stewart 2004). ODA commonly applies ephemeral strategies, rather than remedial solutions that are vital to move developing countries beyond the need for aid. Non-ODA aid can be a driver in redressing this imbalance and a leader in the redirection of international development towards building a more equal world. To progress international development beyond the goal of poverty alleviation towards enduring development and economic and social stability, the aid paradigm needs to shift its focus to self-determination, autonomy and political and economic inclusion. This essay highlights two key areas for reform that could be powerful catalysts in driving this shift in focus towards long term transformation, beyond economic and social instability and dependence. Drawing on micro and macro influences on governance, I have focussed on engendering self determination at both ends of the aid continuum, from delivery and implementation to international policy and institution building. Specifically, I see cash aid at the micro end and depoliticized aid allocations at the macro end, as primary strategies through which enduring development can be manifested for internally generated good governance.