Summary: This graphic uses a web diagram with three main columns and countless sub-categories to depict the confounding complexities involved in the current foreign aid system and how those complexities greatly hinder its efficiency and effectiveness.
Topic: Should the state department of the Obama Administration double foreign aid for Africa?
Category: Academic Research Blog
What Is It? A web diagram graphic
Title: U.S. Foreign Assistance Legislation, Objectives, and Organizations
Publication Information: Johns Hopkins University Global Health and Foreign Policy Blog, July 19, 2007
Author: Harley Feldbaum, Professorial Lecturer of International Policy and Associate Director of the Global Health and Foreign Policy Initiative at Johns Hopkins University
Location: http://globalhealth.sais-jhu.edu/category/harley-feldbaum/
Accessed: March 3, 2009
Support:
• Lael Brainard’s “Security by Other Means: Foreign Assistance, Global Poverty, and American Leadership”
• Steve Radelet, Center for Global Development
• 1961 Foreign Assistance Act
• U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee
The graph itself comes from Brainard’s book, “Security by Other Means: Foreign Assistance, Global Poverty, and American Leadership,” which is both cited on the graphic itself and within the blog post where I found the graphic. The book was published by the Brookings Institute in 2006, which is where I’m assuming Brainard found his information to create the graphic. Steve Radelet is referenced in the blog post as someone who spoke with Brainard at the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee for July of 2007. The 1961 Foreign Assistance Act is referenced as something that both Radelet and Brainard want to reform. They spoke at the Foreign Relations Committee to present the web diagram graphic and argue that the whole U.S. Foreign aid system needs to be completely overhauled.
Audience and Agenda: The Johns Hopkins University Global Health and Foreign Policy Blog starts in May of 2007 and consists of intermittent posts made by various professors and directors at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Harley Feldbaum, Josh Michaud, and Scott Barrett are all either faculty members or doctorate students on the subject of international studies, and they seem to making the vast majority of the posts on this blog. The blog is supported by Johns Hopkins University and the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, both of which aim to educate first and foremost. They are writing for a very small audience probably mostly consisting of colleagues at Johns Hopkins or students in the Advanced International Studies program.
Usefulness: The graphic itself is a very useful demonstrative tool to illustrate exactly how convoluted the U.S. Foreign Assistance program is and how badly it needs to be reformed in order to streamline its effectiveness. It makes a very strong argument in favor of reform. The creators of this graphic argue that the state department shouldn’t be handling foreign aid, and that it needs its own integrated agency in order to get all the attention it really deserves. So in response to whether or not the State Department should double foreign aid, the short answer would be, no; although, they wouldn’t be against the idea of it, they would argue that it needs to be handled more effectively before any doubling takes place. The graph is meant to address those who question the need for foreign policy reform; it’s ridiculously convoluted enough to make those people think twice.
Works Cited:
The Global Health and Foreign Policy Initiative, Staff information page
Harley Feldbaum’s information page
Brooking’s Institution Press page for “Security by Other Means”
Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies
