DEVELOPMENTAL AID: WHAT IS THE WAY FORWARD?

In the middle of downtown Vientiane, the capital of Laos, lies a monument to mis-spent aid. In the 1960s, the United States gave money to Laos to use towards the construction of an international airport. This would have benefited Laos as well as provided America a better base for its interests in Indochina. Instead, the funds and concrete were diverted to the building of a monumental arch, one similar to those found in the cities of France, Laos’s former imperial masters. Known as Pataxui or the Gate of Triumph, those in the know refer to Pataxui as the vertical runway. The arch, at first glance, looks strangely out of place, a European edifice in a South East Asian city, although the long, wide avenues in downtown Vientiane do give you a further feeling of France. On closer inspection, the concrete goliath has a very oriental feel, full of carved mythological beings and Eastern mysticism. Two graffitied staircases lead up to the top, where ones efforts are rewarded by panoramic views of the city (one of the least hectic large cities in South East Asia). This entire preamble about Pataxui was really to get to the point that aid money is often mis-used, mis-managed and mis-appropriated in the developing world.

Pataxui, the vertical runway, in downtown Vientiane.

Aid is big business. Each year, many billions of dollars a year are given to developing countries by developed countries. However, developmental aid (as opposed to humanitarian aid) is seldom an act of pure altruism. This money is given for a variety of reasons; to improve infrastructure (which may also be a way to extract a developing country’s resources easier), to give support to military allies, given as a reward for policies that favour the donor country. Aid may be dependent on certain companies being given contracts, on religious or ideological goals being met or done in ways that are atypical to the region. Aid can often be seen as a form of neo-colonialism, a way to push a country’s influence and interest (an agenda first started by European Companies like the East India Company that monopolized a country’s resources without actually going through the process of colonizing a country, and later refined through multinational companies and the conditional giving of aid). Aid given by the World Bank and the IMF has been criticized as a tool to open up areas to capitalists, with little regard given to the well-being of people in developing countries. The poorest countries are not necessarily the major beneficiaries of aid. For example, only one-fifth of US aid goes to countries that are classified as least developed. Most aid goes to ‘richer’ developing countries as these countries are potential new markets and/or potential military allies.

Even humanitarian aid has it critics. Well meaning groups sent pork to earth-quake survivors in Iran; medication is often sent to disaster areas without translation and therefore can’t be used. People in Haiti complain of mis-managed funds, of rubble being moved to allow aid workers SUVs to run up and down streets but nothing done to clear rubble from essential facilities. Humanitarian aid, however, remains an essential and important part of the world's response to disasters, emergencies and poverty. When I travel, I try to support fair trade initiatives or give money to groups who support beggars etc (rather than giving directly to beggars as this is likely to exasperate problems). In Laos, we bought books to give to ethnic children from hill-tribes we would meet on our hike. At the first village we came to, we proudly handed over our books to the children. It was then that our guide told us that these kids couldn’t read Laotian or English, the language the books were in. Money was wasted on these books that we could have spent on something that could have really benefited those kids. While this incident is small in scale, it can be used as an analogy for the wider malaise in the process of giving developmental aid.

The hill tribe kids we gave the books to.

I was in South Africa when I picked up a copy of Paul Theroux’s “Dark Star Safari”, which documented his journey from Cairo to Cape Town. Theroux is a great travel writer but is well known as being a curmudgeon, almost to the point of misanthropy. In this book, one of his constant gripes was how Africa had receded in the forty years since he had taught in Malawi and travelled the continent. Aid was a large point of discontent. As far as Theroux could tell, aid had done little to improve infrastructure or the living standards of many Africans. In fact, given the growth in populations, he felt the living standards in most of the countries he visited had actually decreased, even in the face of extensive aid. He dissects the aid workers he meets "they were, in general, oafish, self-dramatizing prigs, and often complete bastards." He argued that the waves of money and volunteers has accomplished almost nothing apart from lining the pockets of the sellers of the SUVs which are ubiquitous among foreign aid workers and has made a generation of people reliant on volunteers to be teachers or professionals. They feel the role of many educated Africans who emigrate to greener pastures and fatter paychecks. Being in Africa at the time and witnessing some of the poverty he spoke about first hand, his observations hit home hard.

Many experts have derided the way aid has been handled in developing countries. They have argued that foreign capitalism has, on a whole, slowed development. Others have argued that the distribution of aid supports regimes that are counter-productive to economic growth, supports governments that encourage corruption and is open to general abuse. Seemingly positive steps can prove disastrous to communities. For example, the importation of grain and corn cuts out local farmers as it is often sold at cheap prices on the black market before it reaches the people it was intended for. Likewise, the clothes donated by the West are often sold to suppliers. These people and groups profit from charity but also undercut local tailors, causing their businesses to suffer.

While corrupt governments are in charge of many developing countries, aid is unlikely to have much of an effect. Instead, the way aid is used must change. Developmental aid should be only given to stable governments who are act to limit corruption. Countries like Botswana, which has a long history of stable government, can be held up as an example of how aid can benefit a country. Plans must be made that take into account local conditions, knowledge, expertise and experience and that have long-term goals. Creating jobs and encouraging self-sufficiency is the only way to pull people out of the mire. Countries like Brazil, recently developed, give aid through the form of expertise and knowledge transfer. It is something Cuba, who have sent doctors and teachers, has done for a long time. Is this a new global model to how to give aid?