The Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law, in collaboration with the grass-roots organizations RESULTS and CARE, organized a forum on foreign aid reform on November 9, 2009 to discuss important issues that U.S. foreign assistance policy needs to address. The panelists, experts in policy-making, project implementation, legislature and advocacy, discussed different perspectives from their experiences of working at the policy level and in the field.
A full report on the proceedings is available to download (PDF).
The discussion highlighted the following issues as critical to the success of U.S. foreign aid.
- Making aid programs more transparent and accountable.
- Strengthening USAID with additional staff, budget, and mandates.
- Focusing the monitoring and evaluation of foreign assistance programs on outcomes and promoting independent evaluation of USAID programs.
- Prioritizing poverty alleviation, enhancing country ownership and establishing a robust results and accountability system.
- Making foreign aid budgets more flexible to introduce innovative programs for addressing local problems.
- Discouraging corruption in U.S. foreign assistance.
- Coordinating U.S. aid with other donor programs to complement joint efforts.
Ms. Jennifer Fox, Analyst, Health and Human Services Team of the Legislative Budget Board, welcomed the panel in her opening remarks to the Foreign Aid Reform Forum. Ms. Fox read statements from Sen. John Cornyn and a joint statement from Rep. Michael McCaul, Rep. John Carter, and Rep. Lamar Smith on the need to reform U.S. foreign aid. The statements are in the appendix of the report.
Dr. Catherine Weaver, Strauss Center Distinguished Scholar and Assistant Professor of Public Affairs at the LBJ School introduced the panel members ” Ambassador Lewis Lucke (Ret.), Dara Francis, John Fawcett, and Kate Phillips-Barrasso ” and moderated the panel discussion.
Dr. Weaver gave a brief background of foreign aid and the S. 1524 “Foreign Assistance Revitalization and Accountability Act of 2009.”¬ù The Bill was introduced by the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee John Kerry and Senators Richard Lugar (R-IN), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Bob Corker (R-TN), James Risch (R-ID), and Benjamin Cardin (D-MD). She initiated the discussion by asking the panel members to describe one big issue that they would like to change in U.S. foreign aid.
Ambassador Lewis Lucke (Ret.), a retired USAID officer, former U.S. ambassador to Swaziland and USAID mission director in Iraq, highlighted that transparency and accountability need priority in foreign aid reform. He also underscored the proliferation of government and nongovernmental organizations in foreign aid after 9/11. The difference in mandates of the agencies is challenging their ability to implement development programs on the ground. He said, “USAID has been marginalized and the need to reestablish USAID with additional staff, budget, and mandates is critical.”¬ù
Dara Francis, a specialist in African democracy promotion, brought a practitioner’s perspective and emphasized the importance of monitoring and evaluation of foreign assistance programs. She noted that USAID programs are being tracked by outputs rather than outcomes, which makes it more difficult to measure impact and ensure the effectiveness of these programs. In addition, there is no independent evaluation of USAID programs. The existing monitoring mechanism allows USAID staff to monitor their own performance, which brings the credibility of the monitoring process into question. She also underscored the need for experienced staff in the field. Aid programs on the ground have good people, but the majority of them are mid-career or younger professionals.
John Fawcett, Legislative Director for RESULTS, emphasized three aspects of foreign aid that need priority attention ” focusing on poverty alleviation, enhancing country ownership and establishing a robust results and accountability system. First, the U.S. Government spends more money for national security issues (e.g. Jordan) than for poverty reduction (e.g. Ethiopia). He said U.S. foreign assistance needs to take a broad perspective to redefine poverty and include human rights and health as priority sub-sectors. Second, there is a need to establish a country coordination mechanism to encourage models like the Millennium Challenge Account and The Global Fund for promoting ownership of recipient countries. Lastly, Mr. Fawcett advocated setting clear objectives and measuring learning outcomes of development programs.
Kate Phillips-Barrasso, Senior Policy Advocate for CARE, focused on the centralized decision making process of U.S. foreign aid. She argued that there is little dialogue between Washington and the field, which has pushed decision making further away from the latter. In addition, she highlighted a conflict between Congress’ expectations for quick results from the development programs and the time it takes for such programs to create long term results. Ms. Phillips-Barrasso suggested that decision makers need to take a long term perspective when dealing with foreign assistance. She further emphasized that the budget for U.S. foreign assistance needs flexibility to deal with local issues. The earmarked budget and predefined programs narrow the focus on spending rather than addressing local problems or introducing innovative programs.
Watch the full presentation below: