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Debate
“There is a lot of money
in these projects”
Democracy put to the test
The dawn of genuine
development policy
05/2006 |
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[ Comment ]
The dawn of genuine development policy
Policy approaches to development have changed over the decades, and future results cannot be extrapolated from past failures. For good reason, the Grand Coalition in Germany plans to increase its development budget and meet the EU target of spending 0.7 percent of GDP on aid by 2015.
[ By Rudolf Dolzer ]
For a long time, development policy-makers paid little attention to the issues of law and democracy. From 1945 to 1990, two geopolitical phenomena overshadowed all decisions and approaches: decolonisation and national reconstruction on the one hand, and the East-West conflict on the other. Driven by these parameters, development policy-makers in practice felt the need to focus on issues other than democracy and the rule of law. Under the circumstances, the priorities were dictated by political dimensions beyond the control of Western donors, and retrospective criticism would be cheap and inappropriate.
This climate of relative indifference to genuine development was indirectly fostered by the rules of international law which turned a blind eye to the way power was exercised in any given country. After all, the main guideline was the rule not to interfere in other countries’ domestic affairs. In theory, the inclusion of human rights concerns in the UN Charter of 1945 modified that principle. But it hardly had any practical consequences in the post-war era when it came to hard decisions on allocating resources and designing policies for development.
In the early post-1945 phase, the emphasis of development programmes was on funding infrastructure projects. In due course, it became clear that individual projects might help to make for better relations with the partner governments, often selected on the basis of extra-developmental criteria, but did little to promote long-term prosperity. In a second phase, macroeconomic stability became policy-makers’ complementary focus.
The indifference towards democracy and the rule of law lasted until the early 1990s, when, in the light of the “lost development decade”, developing countries began to place less emphasis on their national sovereignty. Moreover, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, East-West rivalry was no longer an issue for the donors. For the first time, Western Governments felt free to re-gear development programmes and bring them into line with fundamental principles of freedom, equality, prosperity, and human dignity.
Thus, the time for policy-makers in foreign and development affairs to focus in practice on democracy and the rule of law did not arrive until about a decade ago. Today it is broadly accepted that the emphasis on these aspects is not just an expression of “Western values”. From a developmental viewpoint, this emerging consensus matters more than any focus on projects and it is widely accepted that macroeconomic stability does not suffice. The ultimate goals of development policy – the promotion of prosperity in liberty and peace – cannot be attained without the rule of law, without well-functioning institutions of governance and without practical concern for the interests of all strata of society, especially the poor.
This new conceptual framework is supported by empirical evidence. Generally speaking, the achievements of post-1945 development efforts were very modest. Empirical research now indicates that the rule of law, popular participation, sound governance, democracy, and a focus on social justice are vital strategic elements of effective policy-making. The call for an effective reorganization along these lines has considerable practical implications. Among other things, it impacts on the public scepticism about the point of development expenditure. Given the meagre fruits of past endeavours, some continue to conclude that the sums spent on international development should not be increased. For those who adhere to this view, setting an international ODA target of 0.7 percent of GDP for donor nations is naive at best (German development spending at present only amounts to around 0.35 %). However, the sceptics’ view is based on the false assumption that development activity has remained the same. The truth is that the basic parameters have changed and that the goals, tools, and opportunities confirm to be adjusted.
Conceptually, a cohesive development policy which takes account of law, institutions, and democracy has only operated for about a decade. Building appropriate institutions in developing countries is a long-term task. It requires more time than implementing projects and drafting schemes for macroeconomic stability. We have just begun to witness the dawn of genuine development policy. Frustration and disappointments of the past must not be allowed to serve as guideposts for the future inasmuch as the new insights and policies unfold and develop their potential in the future.
Prof. Dr. Dr. Rudolf Dolzer
teaches international law at Bonn University.
rdolzer@jura.uni-bonn.de
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