Campaigns such as Make Poverty History & Drop The Debt
Collective effort in intervention.
Civil society
movements have
grown to become
'big business'
Oxfam, World Vision, Care.
A lot rely on government
funding & undertake
government contracts.
Are these orgs independent from gov influence?
More concerned with rasing the big bucks for job
security and less focus on what they are trying to
achieve?
Why we give aid.
Altruism, charity, obligation, supporting allies in the Cold
War, political stability, access to natural resources & create
pathways for foreign investments.
From the 1970's, there was a focus on
developing countries to move forward into
industrialisation & the technological age.
Lots of developing countries were plunged into lots of
debt with 'pushy' tactics from banks in the North in the
70's.
In the late 70's,
countries in the
North stopped
lending, and
pushed interest
rates upas the
second oil crisis
happened.
With the
Cold War -
developing
countries
were
forced to
choose
sides.
What is aid?
'Foreign aid' includes all transfers (money, goods, skills, military & civilian aid, grants & loans.
ODA - Official Development Assistance - aid coming from states & other official agencies.
Which contains a
grant element of at
least 25%.
A lot of bargaining by 'donors' &
'recipients' of aid - conditions
attached.
Power in aid relationships - aid
is desperately needed
sometimes so the donor has
more power.
This is the largest
category of aid.
Followed by NGO &
humanitarian aid (although much
of this comes from gov funds
too.
Who has legitimacy to develop the capacities of another?
Interventions can create contention.
Different voices, interests,
roles & responsibilities
coming together.
The State, Int Orgs
(UN), NGO's & local
community groups &
associations.
Poverty agendas change
- more emphasis on the
poor's own agency.
Although, Moser, states this means that the
poor has responsibility for their own poverty
- causes aren't being tackled.
From the 1990's -
change.Poverty
was caused by
features of the
world economy that
disadvantaged the
South or some
people thought
problems arose
from within these
countries.
The World Bank thought it was the latter.
There was a lot of contention though - which resulted in more reforms in the 90's.