The Effects of War and Peace on Foreign Aid

Louis Kerry Holmes Jr.
Strayer University
SOC 300
Professor Terry C.
October 31, 2014

The Effects of War and Peace on Foreign Aid War comes with many costs, and Foreign Aid is one among the many. In fact, there has been many cases the biggest that a nation had to pay. In International relations, overseas aid or foreign aid being used in the form of a voluntary transfer of resources from a developed country, such as the United States of America to developing nation like Bangladesh or India. A part of the objective behind this act of giving is often Humanitarianism and altruism. Humanitarianism meaning the ethic of kindness, Benevolence and sympathy extended universally and impartially to all human being for welfare of humanity. Similarly altruism stands for selflessness, a concern for the welfare of others: These aids have other functions too. It may be given as a signal of diplomatic approval, or to strengthen a military ally, to reward a government for behavior desired by the donor, to extend the donor's cultural influence, to provide infrastructure needed by the donor for resource extraction from the recipient country, or to gain other kinds of commercial access. There are all kinds of aid: Emergency aid, development aid, official development
Assistance or ODA, private giving, cash aid, in-kind aid, air priorities, logistics, etc. In developing countries like India and Bangladesh, foreign aid has played a very important role in the development process. For instance, 100 percent of Bangladesh's development budget depends on aid that has made a significant contribution to the
Reconstruction of its' economy: In India, foreign aid has financed over 8 percent of the domestic investments and about 15 percent of imports.
Effect of War on Foreign Aid (Negative): The Iraq War of 2003 cost more than the amount given in foreign aid over the past
50 years. People are often under the impression that a lot more being spent on foreign aid then it is. US citizens consistently estimate that around 25% of the Federal Budget used on aid and said that they believe that the figure should be around 10%. In fact, the US spends less than 1% of the Federal Budget on foreign aid. The amount the developed world spends is tiny compared with its wealth. In 2012, governments of developed countries spent $128 billion on foreign aid and private aid from citizens Added $56 billion. However, the total aid was only 0.4% of the combined national income of those countries or four dollars out of every thousand." The total aid was only $152 per person living in developed countries. There are 5.84 billion people in developing countries: which means that the total aid was only $33 per recipient. Had there been a war you can only imagine where it would leave these developing nations and who desperately needed the support. So yes, without a doubt it may appear that
War can only have a negative effect on foreign aid. However, there's more to the story .Foreign Aid hasn't always used in the best interest of the recipient. Many times, there is more in it for the donor than there is for the receiver. For example, International aid provided to Ethiopia and Rwanda and Afghanistan has only helped gangsters and fighters, while innocent victims have suffered. Humanitarianism has become a massive industry that, along with the global media, forms an unholy alliance with warmongers. Since the end of the cold war, the business of humanitarian aid has flourished. During the proxy wars fought by African and Asian states backed by the Soviet Union, China and the USA, aid agencies found it very difficult to gain access to War zones. But with the end of the Soviet Union, regions afflicted by war became something like charity enterprise zones, creating a massive expansion in the aid industry. Back in 1980 there were about 40 INGOs [international non-government organizations] dealing with Cambodian refugees on the Thai border. A decade later, there were 250 operating during the Yugoslavian war. By 2004, there were 2,500 Involved in Afghanistan. The result is not what it says in the charity brochures. One of the most striking cases was the aftermath of the genocide in Rwanda in which the Hutu killers fled in mass across the border to what was then Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo). There, in Goma, huge refugee camps were assembled and served. By an enormous array of international agencies back in Rwanda; Where Tutsi corpses filled rivers and lakes, and aid was not so important. Hence it doesn't hurt to think that had there been a war resulting in deep cuts in the budget leaving no room for such Foreign aid. It would have saved a lot of lives.

References:
Marcelo, Ray. “India Opts to Decline Aid from All but Six Countries” in The Financial Times,
July 8, 2003.
Meernik, James, Eric L. Krueger and Steven C. Poe. “Testing Models of US Foreign Policy: Foreign Aid During and After the Cold War” in The Journal of Politics, Vol. 60, Issue 1.
Southern Political Science Association,1998. Neumayer, Eric. “Is Respect for Human Rights Rewarded?” London School of Economics and Political Science. http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/geographyAndEnvironment/whosWho/profiles/neumayer/pd f/humanrightsaidarticle.pdf http://www.givingwhatwecan.org/why-give/myths-about-aid

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2010/apr/25/humanitarian-aid-war-linda-polman