“We Should Be Doing More Than We Are”: The Colombo Plan, Papua New Guinea and the Australian External Aid Review, 1957–1965

Abstract

In this chapter, Ferns provides the first in-depth historical analysis of the 1964–1965 Australian External Aid Review. The review was the brainchild of Paul Hasluck (who had moved to the External Affairs portfolio in September 1964), and it was important because it provided the first in-depth re-examination of Australian aid policy since the establishment of the Colombo Plan in 1950. The review demonstrated that Australian aid policy was about more than just engagement with Asia and other diplomatic imperatives, but was also driven by a strong belief in the developmental approaches that had been evolving since the end of the Second World War. Furthermore, the aid policy review marked the formal incorporation of Australia’s colonial grant to PNG into foreign aid calculations. Ferns explains that the aid review provided a platform for interested Commonwealth departments to present their competing attitudes regarding development and foreign aid. These debates culminated in a series of recommendations that shaped Australian aid policy in the decades after 1965, and which illustrate the evolution of Australia’s involvement in the age of international development.