Institutional corruption and Canadian foreign aid

ABSTRACT

Traditional forms of corruption pose problems for Canada’s foreign aid, but “institutional corruption” evidenced by deception, financial inconsistency and unpredictability, by constantly changing priorities, by opacity and reprehensible diversions from its stated aims, is arguably worse, undermining the effectiveness, the trustworthiness and the very purpose of foreign aid.

RÉSUMÉ

Les formes traditionnelles de la corruption soulèvent des problèmes pour l’aide étrangère du Canada, mais la « corruption institutionnelle », se manifestant à travers les fraudes, les incohérences et l’imprévisibilité financières, le changement constant des priorités, l’opacité et les détournements répréhensibles de ses objectifs déclarés, est sans doute pire, en ce sens qu’elle sape l’efficacité, la fiabilité et le véritable objectif de l’aide étrangère.

Notes

1 In 2013 the Harper government merged the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) into the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), naming the new entity the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD). In 2015 the Trudeau government renamed the department Global Affairs Canada (GAC). The acronyms used in this article are contemporaneous with events described.

2 The Bank confirmed that figure in its 1990 WDR, saying “In 1985 more than one billion people, or almost one third of the total population of the developing world, were living on less than [US] $370 a year.” Ten years later in its 2000–2001 WDR, it was still reporting that “Of the world's 6 billion people, 2.8 billion – almost half – live on less than [US] $2 a day, and 1.2 billion – a fifth – live on less than $1 a day” (World Bank 2001). Over the past decade, however, the Bank began to tinker with the 1980–1981 base. For example, “The Bank's annual statistical report, World Development Indicators 2004 (WDI) … shows a drop in the absolute number of people living on less than [US] $1 a day in all developing countries from 1.5 billion in 1981, to 1.1 billion in 2001” (World Bank 2004, Table 1d, p. 3). In other words, the 1981 base had increased to 1.5 billion. And it kept rising thereafter to its current level of 1.9 billion. What remains constant is the 1.1 or 1.2 billion people living in poverty “today” (whether that “today” is 2013, 2004, 2000, 1985 or 1980).

3 You will need a calculator: 56.8 per cent of 508 million sub-Saharan Africans in 1990 lived in absolute poverty. In 2012 the numbers were 42.7 per cent of 947.4 million. Relative poverty declined but total numbers increased by 116 million (World Bank, 2016).

4 The total is roughly CAD $5 billion for each (National Allied Golf Associations, 2014).