American aid and its political compulsions

Ideally, international aid should be routed to parts of the world where there is greatest need and demonstrated political will to use incoming aid to address the plight of the less fortunate. In practice, much aid is co-opted to serve realpolitik goals, where it often becomes a ‘carrot’ to entice poorer countries to do the bidding of wealthier and more powerful ones.

America, being one of the largest contributors of international aid via bilateral and multilateral agencies, has long used aid to influence other countries. Pakistan, for instance, got rewarded with aid for joining Cold War alliances (like CEATO and SENTO), for helping create the ‘holy warriors’ to repel the Soviet from Afghanistan, and thereafter to side with the US in the ‘war against terror’.

However, under the current US administration, foreign aid budgets have been threatened by drastic cuts. Following the 2018 decision to reduce State Department and other foreign aid funding and diverting money to the military instead, the secretary of defense (General Mattis) himself warned: “If you don’t fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition ultimately.”

The current US administration has not only become more stringent in the use of bilateral aid, it has pulled funding from NGOs like Planned International which provides vital reproductive health services around the world. Amid a global health crisis, the President recently announced that he is pulling out of the World Health Organization.

Many American policymakers are distraught by their diminishing role in the international community. A new debate around the need for inclusivity and diversity training within US government agencies is further adding to this sense of consternation.

A presidential executive order issued in late September has banned racial diversity and inclusion training for all federal agencies. The impact of this decision is feared to be wide-ranging, which could undermine efforts to combat stereotyping and discrimination. Moreover, the impact of this order would not be confined to the US alone, as agencies like the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) are also bound by these new regulations.

Given that aid is used to achieve political or economic rather than purely altruistic goals makes it difficult enough for international aid to do what it is meant to do. Powerful donor agencies have not been very transparent in terms of how to operate, nor have they been accountable to poor countries which are recipients of their aid. Donor agencies are thus being encouraged to pay more attention to issues of inclusivity and diversity in hopes that this in turn would also influence how these entities go about designing and implementing their projects on the ground. The US Government’s Accountability Office had also been recommending that USAID increase diversity by allowing underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities more say within the organisation. Yet, this latest executive order would undermine such efforts.

The order claims that it wants to prevent what is considered offensive and anti-American stereotyping and scapegoating. It is unfortunate that training USAID staff on topics such as critical race theory, the notions of white privilege or systemic racism, or what is meant by intersectionality or unconscious bias could now be construed as being divisive and hence subjected to a ban.

Development practitioners are concerned that if USAID is prevented from creating greater sensitivity about issues of race and gender within itself, this would impede its ability to adopt development policies which are inclusive and best suited to diverse contexts of different poor countries around the world.

There is pushback on this executive order especially at a time where there is broader reckoning concerning the need to combat inherent racism within the US. A lot will now depend on who wins the next presidential elections. If the current administration gets another term, more definitive guidance that makes it much more difficult to administer inclusion and diversity training programmes in federal agencies, including USAID, would not be far away.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 23^rd, 2020.

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