Aid and conflict: the policy coherence challenge

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes In a BBC documentary radio broadcast (27/11/03), Justin Forsyth, Oxfam Policy Director, expressed the concern of leading UK charities about a potential shift in resources from poverty‐oriented programs in, say, Bolivia, Peru, or the Philippines, towards reconstruction in Iraq. Similarly, Patrick Cronin, Vice President of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, noted that budget allocations for the US Millennium Challenge Account had shrunk from US$1.7 billion to US$1.3 billion to US$0.8 billion, given the demands of Afghanistan and Iraq reconstruction. More aid has been promised than delivered. For example, a decade ago at the International Conference on Population and Development, industrialised countries committed to contribute US$5.7 billion to family planning and reproductive health programs. By 2001, they had only contributed only US$2.5 billion. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, world military expenditures have been rising since 1998 and accelerated sharply in 2002, increasing by 6 percent in real terms to US$794 billion in current prices, accounting for 2.5% of world GDP, and US$128 per capita. Aid receives only seven percent of the resources absorbed by the military worldwide (US$56 billion versus US$794 billion). According to Malaria Journal study authors Vasant Narasimhan and Amir Attaran, US$1.5 billion is needed each year to ensure that the WHO Roll Back Malaria Program launched by WHO in 1998 succeeds. Online at www.malariajournal.com (visited April 2003). See also Michael Renner and Molly O'Meara Sheehan, ‘A Strategy for Defense’, International Herald Tribune, 3 June 2003. The term civil war tends to connote that the conflict is intra‐state. This is not always the case with the new local wars. World Development Indicators Data Base (World Bank); figures for 2002. The 2002 survey results were released in June 2003. They are available online at http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,,contentMDK:20114414 The US National Security Strategy of September 2002 includes a section on development assistance as an integral part of the war against terrorism. It highlights the vulnerability of weak states to terrorist networks. Forty‐eight poor countries mostly located in Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia that, according to a World Bank Taskforce, have not assembled the basic prerequisites for development and exhibit poor or deteriorating policy performance indicators. Of course, the quality of aid is important: poorly targeted or poorly administered aid helps no one and may even induce, prolong, or re‐ignite conflict. For a gentle treatment, see Radelet (2003 Radelet S 2003 Will the Millennium Challenge Account Be Different? in Lennon ATJ (ed.) The Battle for Hearts and Minds Washington Quarterly Reader. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). This is not surprising since, until recently, aid policy has not focused on conflict prevention. Economics Focus: ‘The Price of Peace’, The Economist, April 24, 2004. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, between 1993 and 2002 the growth of military expenditures was far higher in developing countries than for the world as a whole (3%): it reached 38% in the Middle East; 30% in Africa; and 23% in Asia. Developing countries currently absorb two thirds of arms deliveries by rich countries. See also Grimmett (2001 Grimmett RF 2001 Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations US Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, 16 August [Google Scholar]). They spent US$43 billion on arms imports in 1999, according to the United States Department of State. They also note that defence development would be consistent with the ‘tough love’ approach to aid that the United States currently favours, as illustrated by the criteria‐based allocations of the Millennium Challenge Account. The MDGs are described at http://www.development goals.org Additional informationNotes on contributorsRobert Picciotto Robert Picciotto is a Visiting Professor at King's College, London and Director, Global Policy Project. Robert Picciotto is a Visiting Professor at King's College, London and Director, Global Policy Project.