I would love for you to take a look at the specific case of Afghanistan. It is political and there are much more bigger factors at play than aid (the effects of war, American politics, Soviet politics, regional politics). However, an argument that makes sense to me is that the Taliban had significant popular support because the institutions were so inefficient most people did not like the previous government, and these were institutions sustained by aid (their budget was 75% aid or so according to World Bank).
Sorry for going slightly off-topic, by I wanted to share this which is only related to the initial part of your post:
I am one of those people sustaining aid can be worse than no aid, but not just from the perspective of political institutions. I have a couple of assumptions based on my experience, that put together make me thing most aid has a negative outcome.
Most programs financed through aid and implemented by states and NGOs have a very modest effect, no effect, or a negative effect (usually also modest).
Most of these programs are implemented through institutions that implement systematic corruption. Non-profits and government units that are de facto for profit teams but can’t say it, so they have to collect this profit through corrupt processes.
Executing corrupt processes takes time, skill, and effort. You need to know how to fabricate financial reports and documentation, how to falsify beneficiary data, how to create the right paper trail, how to create an extortion network. To do it very well, you have to involve several people carefully, often your whole team, discuss it abundantly, and plan everything. Sometimes your donor or supervisor finds out or kind of finds out and you have to fabricate more explanations or defend yourself. It takes time. So for most of the professionals in these teams, corruption is a significant time sink, maybe 50% of their daily work gets dedicated to activities related directly or partially to corruption, maybe 25%, but for some people it could be more than 50%.
In many developing countries these institutions are very relevant economic actors and they attract some of the best minds in the country. In most developing countries there are not enough jobs in the private sector, and everyone practices entrepreneurship but wants to step out of it. Charities and government are a major employer when put together. In many cases, they pay top salaries. The worse the situation in the country, the more humanitarian and development funding, and the more significant these institutions are.
So we have an economic activity that does not have any significant positive effect (not when all budgets are aggregated) and where a substantial portion of the time is spent un a useless or harmful skill (it is not good for anyone that people learn to do this, maybe a small percentage can eventually be re-oriented to fraud prevention, but we don’t need this number of people learning all this) and the best people in the workforce are doing these “useless” tasks every day.
If there was less aid funding, there would be less of such corrupt teams, and people would be forced to start businesses, work for the private sector, or to emigrate and send back money, all seem better options for the good of the country.
Claims 1 and 2 are not hunches, I have worked in these type of programs at all levels and I have seen enough institutions to say that if this is not true then I might have had an extremely unusual sample in front of me. I have worked for close to 10 years in Cameroon, Nigeria, and Afghanistan and every day I had to work with, against, and around these type of teams.
This is very interesting!
I would love for you to take a look at the specific case of Afghanistan. It is political and there are much more bigger factors at play than aid (the effects of war, American politics, Soviet politics, regional politics). However, an argument that makes sense to me is that the Taliban had significant popular support because the institutions were so inefficient most people did not like the previous government, and these were institutions sustained by aid (their budget was 75% aid or so according to World Bank).
Sorry for going slightly off-topic, by I wanted to share this which is only related to the initial part of your post:
I am one of those people sustaining aid can be worse than no aid, but not just from the perspective of political institutions. I have a couple of assumptions based on my experience, that put together make me thing most aid has a negative outcome.
Most programs financed through aid and implemented by states and NGOs have a very modest effect, no effect, or a negative effect (usually also modest).
Most of these programs are implemented through institutions that implement systematic corruption. Non-profits and government units that are de facto for profit teams but can’t say it, so they have to collect this profit through corrupt processes.
Executing corrupt processes takes time, skill, and effort. You need to know how to fabricate financial reports and documentation, how to falsify beneficiary data, how to create the right paper trail, how to create an extortion network. To do it very well, you have to involve several people carefully, often your whole team, discuss it abundantly, and plan everything. Sometimes your donor or supervisor finds out or kind of finds out and you have to fabricate more explanations or defend yourself. It takes time. So for most of the professionals in these teams, corruption is a significant time sink, maybe 50% of their daily work gets dedicated to activities related directly or partially to corruption, maybe 25%, but for some people it could be more than 50%.
In many developing countries these institutions are very relevant economic actors and they attract some of the best minds in the country. In most developing countries there are not enough jobs in the private sector, and everyone practices entrepreneurship but wants to step out of it. Charities and government are a major employer when put together. In many cases, they pay top salaries. The worse the situation in the country, the more humanitarian and development funding, and the more significant these institutions are.
So we have an economic activity that does not have any significant positive effect (not when all budgets are aggregated) and where a substantial portion of the time is spent un a useless or harmful skill (it is not good for anyone that people learn to do this, maybe a small percentage can eventually be re-oriented to fraud prevention, but we don’t need this number of people learning all this) and the best people in the workforce are doing these “useless” tasks every day.
If there was less aid funding, there would be less of such corrupt teams, and people would be forced to start businesses, work for the private sector, or to emigrate and send back money, all seem better options for the good of the country.
Claims 1 and 2 are not hunches, I have worked in these type of programs at all levels and I have seen enough institutions to say that if this is not true then I might have had an extremely unusual sample in front of me. I have worked for close to 10 years in Cameroon, Nigeria, and Afghanistan and every day I had to work with, against, and around these type of teams.