Changing Donor Policy and Practice in Civil Society in the Post-9/11 Aid Context

Abstract

This article argues that the global ‘War on Terror’ regime has contributed in complex and differentiated ways to the increasing securitisation of development policy and practice. The global ‘War on Terror’ regime refers to a complex and contradictory weaving of discourses, political alliances, policy and legislative changes, institutional arrangements and practices. This is manifest in aid rhetoric, policy discourse, institutional convergence and programming. These processes have in turn affected the way donor agencies engage with non-governmental actors. On the one hand they have led to new forms of control over charitable agencies; on the other hand they have created new opportunities for interaction and resource access to ‘newly discovered’ civil society actors such as Muslim organisations and communities. The article explores these issues through the lens of development policy and practice by four donor countries, namely, the USA, Sweden, the UK and Australia.

Notes

1 We use quotations around war on terror initially to signal that the term ‘war on terror’, its very language and the set of military, institutional and bureaucratic practices it embodies, is a contested idea and that, as authors, we recognise this contestation. From here onwards in the article the term is used without quotation marks.

2 The article is based upon secondary research and fieldwork conducted in Afghanistan, Kenya, India, USA and the UK between 2005 and 2008. It forms part of a larger project on the ‘Global “War on Terror”, Civil Society and Aid’ funded by the Economic and Social Research Council programme on Non-governmental Public Action.

3 P Stewart & K Brown, Greater than the Sum of its Parts? Assessing ‘Whole of Government’ Approaches to Fragile States, Washington, DC: Center for Global Development, 2007.

4 For a detailed discussion of the emerging trends in thinking in the 1990s about development, civil society and security, see J Howell & J Lind, Counter-terrorism, Aid and Civil Society: Before and After the War on Terror, London: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2009, ch 2.

5 M Duffield, Global Governance and the New War: The Merging of Development and Security, London: Zed Books, 2001.

6 Other factors also added to a growing concern about national security in Australia, such as instability in Fiji, the Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste, and influenced the overall context of aid and development policy. See Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (oecd), dac Peer Review: Australia, Paris: oecd, 2005, p 22, at www.oecd.org/dac, accessed February 2008.

7 ausaid, Counter Terrorism and Australian Aid, Canberra: Government of Australia, 2002, p 4. For a detailed analysis of counter-terrorism policy in Australia and its effects on civil society, see A Pettitt, ‘Counter-terrorism policing in Australia—impacts on civil society’, in J Howell & J Lind (eds), Civil Society under Strain: Counter-terrorism Policy, Aid and Civil Society Post-9/11, Stirling, VA: Kumarian Press, forthcoming 2009.

8 ausaid, Counter Terrorism and Australian Aid, p 5.

9 B Davis, ‘Aid and security after the tsunami’, archived speech delivered on 27 October 2005.

10 Ibid.

11 T O'Connor, S Chan & J Goodman, The Reality of Aid: An Independent Review of Poverty Reduction and Development Assistance, 2006, p 2, at http://www.realityofaid.org, accessed 4 February 2008.

12 In 2003 47% of total bilateral Australian oda went to Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands and 42% to Asia.

13 A similar project is the Enhanced Cooperation Programme directed at Papua New Guinea. For a detailed critical discussion of this, see O'Connor et al, The Reality of Aid, pp 180–184.

14 In contrast the percentage of aid devoted to infrastructure over the same period fell from 15% in 1999–2000 to 7% in 2005–06. Ibid, p 177. For education it fell from 27% to 14%. Parliamentary Library, Department of Parliamentary Services, Research Note: The Changing Focus of Australia's Aid Programme—Budget 2004–2005, 59, 1 May 2004, p 1. Note that O'Connor et al put the 1999–2002 figure for education at 18%.

15 O'Connor et al, The Reality of Aid, p 177.

16 Parliamentary Library, Research Note, p 1.

17 oecd, dac Peer Review: Australia, p 39.

18 ausaid, Counter-Terrorism and Australian Aid, p 5.

19 oecd, dac Peer Review: Australia, p 21.

20 Ibid, p 20.

21 Ibid, p 12.

22 Ibid, pp 51, 24.

23 Condoleezza Rice, ‘Realizing the goals of transformational diplomacy’, testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 15 February 2006, at http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2006/61209.htm.

24 ‘Diplomats will be shifted to hot spots’, Washington Post, 19 January 2006.

25 Preface by then USAID Administrator Andrew Natsios to ‘US Foreign Aid: Meeting the challenges of the twenty-first century'. White Paper, Bureau for Policy and Program Coordination, US Agency for International Development, 2004.

26 usaid,‘Foreign Aid and the “War on Terrorism”’, usaid Summer Seminar Series, 2005, at http://www.usaid.gov/km/seminars/2005/0809.html.

27 Ibid .

28 oecd Development Assistance Committee (dac), United States Donor Aid Charts, at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/42/30/40039096.gif.

29 L Ploch, ‘Africa Command: US strategic interests and the role of the US Military in Africa'. CRS Report for Congress. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2007.

30 J Lind & J Howell, Aid, Civil Society and the State in Kenya since 9/11, ngpa Research Paper 21, London: lse, 2008.

31 K Dalacoura, ‘US democracy promotion in the Arab middle east since 11 September 2001: a critique', International Affairs, 81, 2005, pp 963–976.

32 USAID, ‘At freedoms frontiers. A democracy and governance strategic framework', PD-ACF-999, Washington, DC: USAID, 2005.

33 usaid,‘Foreign Aid and the “War on Terrorism”.

34 ‘Democracy's “special forces” face heat’, Christian Science Monitor, 6 February 2006.

35 ‘Democracy push by Bush attracts doubters in party’, New York Times, 17 March 2006.

36 ‘The realities of exporting democracy’, Washington Post, 25 January 2006.

37 For a detailed examination of the effects of counter-terrorism policy under the war on terror regime on US civil society, see K Guinane & SK Sazawal, ‘The post-September 11 counter-terrorism regime in the United States: a hostile environment for ngos’, in Howell & Lind, Civil Society under Strain, ch 4.

38 US Department of the Treasury, ‘Anti-Terrorist financing guidelines: voluntary best practices for US-based charities', at http://www.treas.gov/offices/enforcement/key-issues/protecting/docs/guidelines_ charities.pdf.

39 Duffield, Global Governance and the New Wars.

40 T Blair, ‘Prime Minister's Speech to Congress’, Office of the Prime Minister, 17 July 2003, at www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm, accessed 6 September 2005.

41 dfid, Fighting Poverty to Build a Safer World: A Strategy for Security and Development, London: dfid, 2005, p 3.

42 As stated in ibid, p5: ‘insecurity, lawlessness, crime and violent conflict are among the biggest obstacles to achievement of the Millennium Development Goals; they also destroy development’.

43 C Cramer, Civil War is Not a Stupid Thing. Accounting for Violence in Developing Countries. London: Hurst and Company, 2006.

44 dfid, Fighting Poverty to Build a Safer World, p 13.

45 Stewart & Brown, Greater than the Sum of its Parts?.

46 The Global Pool is chaired by the Foreign Secretary and the Africa Pool by the Secretary of State for International Development.

47 G McHugh & L Gostelow, Provincial Reconstruction Teams and Military–Humanitarian Relations in Afghanistan, London: Save the Children, 2004.

48 dfid, 2005(a), p 20.

49 It was originally chaired by the jdcc.

50 It should be noted, however, that these interdepartmental relations are not without tensions. See S Gordon, ‘Civil society, the “new humanitarianism” and the stabilisation debate: judging the impact of the Afghan war’, in Howell & Lind, Civil Society under Strain, ch 7, for a further discussion of this.

51 dfid, Statistics on International Development: 2002/3–2006/7, London: dfid, 2007.

52 dfid, 2005(a), p 24.

53 dfid, Eliminating World Poverty: Making Globalisation Work for the Poor, White Paper on International Development, London: dfid, 2000 p 30.

54 dfid, Why We Need to Work more Effectively in Fragile States, London: dfid, 2005, p 5.

55 Howell & Lind, Civil Society under Strain; and Lind & Howell, Counter-terrorism, Aid and Civil Society.

56 dfid, Fighting Poverty to Build a Safer World, p 12.

57 dfid, dfid Pakistan Factsheet, at www.dfid.gov.uk/Pubs/files.pakistan-factsheet, December 2007.

58 B Zagaris, ‘The merging of counter-terrorism and anti-money laundering regimes’, Law and Policy in International Business, 34 (1), 2002, pp 45–108.

59 M Norrell, Swedish National Counter-terrorism Policy after ‘Nine-Eleven’: Problems and Challenges, Stockholm: Swedish Defence Research Agency, 2005.

60 Development Cooperation Directorate, Development Assistance Committee, OECD, Aid Table on Afghanistan, 2007, at http://www.oecd.org/department/0,3355,en_2649_33721_1_1_1_1_1,00.html.

61 oecd, Sweden (2005), Peer Review: Main Findings and Recommendations, Paris: oecd, 2005.

62 ‘Sweden: gross bilateral oda, 2005–2006’, oecd-dac tables, at www.oecd.org/dataoecd/42/51/40039148.gif.

63 Swedish International Development Agency (sida), sida 's Direction: Where We Are. Where We are Going, Stockholm: sida, 2005.

64 oecd, Sweden (2005).

65 Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), SIDA's Direction. Where We Are. Where We Are Going. Sweden: SIDA, 2006.

66 ‘Focused bilateral development cooperation’, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, 27 August 2007, at http://www.sweden.gov.se/sb/d/9382/a/86595;jsessionid=a58J02FBzBqg.

67 sida, sida's Direction, 2005.

68 ‘Sweden tightens rules on Iraqi asylum seekers’, Reuters, 9 July 2007.

69 ‘The tragically high price of helping Americans’, Spiegel Online, 23 May 2007, at www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,01518,484047,00.html.

70 ‘Iraqi Afghan refugees face expulsion from Scandinavia’, Oneworld News, 8 August 2007, at http://us.oneworld.net/article/view/152096/1/.

71 Howell & Lind, Counter-terrorism, Aid and Civil Society.