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Senators Lugar and Kerry Urge President to Fill Development Leadership Vacuum
September 22, 2009
Last Friday, Senators Kerry (D-MA) and Lugar (R-IN), Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on Foreign Relations, sent a letter to President Obama underscoring their “concern about the direction of U.S. development policy.” While most specifically concerned about the leadership vacuum at USAID — still no USAID Administrator – the letter also communicates a broader concern that development voices are being shut out of major policy decisions and interagency processes at a time when U.S. leadership on development is more needed than ever. Referencing the greatest foreign policy challenges facing America today — wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and instability in Pakistan — the Senators argue it is “essential to empower a single development agency with the appropriate tools, resources and policy voice so that it can undertake its responsiblities in an effective and capable manner.” They urge the President to nominate a USAID Administrator ASAP, even to consider expediting the process by selecting a candidate with development credentials alreadyvetted for another position.
I must say, I love this letter. It supports all the positive actions undertaken (budget and staffing increase requests) and efforts underway (the Presidential Study Directive, the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, the Administration’s Global Health and Food Security initiatives, and their own Foreign Assistance Revitalization and Accountability Act) to upgrade U.S. development policy and foreign assistance. But it essentially argues that a strong, empowered USAID is a necessary ingredient to the success of them all.
The letter’s call for a “single development agency” with a “policy voice” harkens back to a portion of the Senators’ legislation that would restore development policy and planning capacity to USAID, distinct from that of the State Department. I fear that without that capacity restored and without a healthy degree of budget authority delegated, filling the Administrator and senior management posts with the calibre of experience necessary to present long-term development options into what are typically short-term decisionmaking processes (let alone implement them) will be difficult. And in that void, it should come as no surprise that all the debate in town this week on Afghanistan and Pakistan is around the leaked U.S. military strategy. If only, we had an equally serious civilian development strategy to leak and debate too.
2 Responses to “Senators Lugar and Kerry Urge President to Fill Development Leadership Vacuum”
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September 30th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Congrats on a bipartisan initiative, it seems too often lately, our representatives are more concerned with dividing themselves along party lines than with what they should be concerned: change for a better society.
The problem, I think, that comes with our over-thinking development issues (my opinion, of course) is that it opens us (as people) to paternalism. Added to, aid organizations (the ones with budgets) aren’t very well or oft regulated, and are both ineffectual and inefficient. What if we, instead of continually empowering ourselves to help the world, actually did as we proclaimed and empowered the world?
October 6th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Merlyn “shakes the nut tree” around a long-neglected issue in our international development efforts; i.e., coming across as paternalistic, and delivering resources &/or assistance that is/are often ineffective, counter-productive (or both).
The major fault area is in the “full-of-ourselves” attitudes & approaches we take to such aid.
But US Gov’t., Agencies aren’t the only ones guilty of this; World Bank & IMF, et al, have been equally guilty.
As a long time international CED practitioner (with service to 80 nations on 5 continents), & once director of that field’s international professional association, I raised this issue with WB’s James Wolfensohn some years back: He was as frustrated as I was, but felt powerless to change all the bad habits.
The major missing ingredients, in the vast majority of our efforts in this field, are:
1) Failure to appreciate the need to do things WITH, rather than FOR, recipient clients; and,
2) concomitantly, fully engage them in the full range of their projects, while leaving a strong residual ability to maintain & sustain same.
If we had even a fraction of the $ we’ve leaked away on totally worthless/useless developmental projects over the years, we wouldn’t even have to be scrambling for adequate funding now!