There has been a lot of discussion in the DC foreign policy circuit about a possible "comprehensive foreign aid rewrite." Details, however, as to what exactly this means, whether it will happen and how it would get done are lacking. One of the basic reasons why the bill would be updated is fairly simple: the numbers. The Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) was written in 1961 (48 years ago) and was last comprehensively reauthorized in 1985 (24 years ago). The more substantive reasons include a fragmented and uncoordinated foreign aid reality. At this point, the 1961 FAA has been patched so many times that it is more patches than whole cloth. How divided is it?
Most people likely think of AID (Agency for International Development) when they think of "foreign aid." However, AID only administers 20% of the traditional "aid" money and the State Department handles 64% -- more than three times as much. In addition, the way "aid" is defined means there are as many as 14 other agencies involved in providing it, most notably the Defense Department. Part of the reason why the administration of aid money is divided into so many departments is the rationale for it.
At the start, the underlying policy for aid was anti-communism as we had just witnessed a successful rebuilding of Europe through the Marshall Plan. Aid was, therefore, in the U.S. global national security interest. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, foreign aid became less globally strategic and more regional – promoting democracy in Eastern Europe as a good example. For many, aid was based on commercial and humanitarian grounds. We needed strong economies to buy our goods and we had a “moral imperative” to help the needy. With anti-Communism gone, however, aid throughout the 1990s declined. Then came 9/11 and the “War on Terrorism.”
In 2002, President Bush released his National Security Strategy establishing global development as the 3rd pillar of U.S. national security, along with diplomacy and defense. Foreign aid was seen as a tool in the war against extremism and aid began to increase.
In addition to asking Congress for more aid money, the Bush Administration made some organizational changes of its own as it sought to “transform” traditional U.S. diplomacy. One such move involved creating a “Director of Foreign Assistance” in a new “F” bureau – a move that has both supporters and detractors. In addition, the Bush Administration created the Millennium Challenge Corporation and large funds for HIV/AIDS and malaria programs. Any administration, however, can only do so much if the underlying foreign aid legislation is not changed. Congress and Representative Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, would then introduce many changes.
Chairman Berman heads the House committee in charge of foreign policy authorization. The Senate counterpart is the Foreign Relations Committee. In the fall of 2008, he told his staff he wanted to do a comprehensive rewrite of the FAA. As if this were not ambitious enough, he said he wanted to complete that job in 2009. Berman has been on the committee since the 1980s and has seen other such attempts – most notably by the powerful chairman Representative Dante Fascell in the late 1980s. In other words, Berman has no illusions about how difficult this will be (hence the Don Quixote image in the title).
The House Foreign Affairs Committee clearly plans to move forward on a rewrite in 2009 which means there will be many hearings on the overall structure of, and rationale for, foreign aid. Timing is a tough issue because the Senate’s interest in this task is still unclear. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has additional Constitutional authorities their House counterpart does not have, such as confirming senior officials and ambassadors. These confirmations will take a lot of time as the Obama Administration staffs out.
So, the House could act in 2009 and send it to the Senate. The question then becomes is 2010 – an election year – a good time to work on foreign aid? For the House, the answer would traditionally be “no” since its entire membership is up for election every two years. The Senate is different, so 2010 could work, but that could mean not having a House-Senate reconciliation of their different versions of the rewrite until 2011, which is a long way away.
In other words, what we can count on is some feverish House Foreign Affairs Committee action, but what lies beyond that is unclear. The big question mark is the Obama Administration and what role it will play. If the President and the Secretaries of State and Defense were to weigh in in favor of a rewrite this year things could move very quickly. As things develop, we will keep you updated.
By John Lawrence, Manager, Congressional Affairs