Does size matter? Foreign aid in Taiwan's diplomatic strategy, 2000–8

This article is the first systematic attempt at estimating the size of Taiwanese foreign aid and, thus, the cost of Taiwan's aid diplomacy. It questions the Republic of China (ROC) President Ma Ying-jeou's justification of his ‘diplomatic truce’ with China as necessitated by an ineffectiveness of his predecessor Chen Shui-bian's costly aid diplomacy. Deriving its evidence from the ROC governmental budgets, local media reports and interviews with Taiwanese officials involved in foreign aid implementation, the article argues that President Chen did not engage in ‘generous financial aid’ and proposes that this parsimony, rather than futility of aid diplomacy as a strategy to expand Taiwan's international space, should be considered as contributing to Taipei's diplomatic failures from 2000 to 2008.     

Policy versus Practice. Behind the Scenes in Dutch Development Aid, 1949–1989

The history of development aid has often been analyzed on the level of international politics and ground breaking ideas on big overriding issues. But the policies developed in the various Western capitals do not in themselves provide a full picture of foreign aid. It is important to examine the field more closely: what did actually happen ‘on the ground’ as a result of intentions and agreements on aid? Did the practice of aid projects influence aid effectiveness? The present article looks at the history of aid provided by the Netherlands, a country that for a long time liked to portray itself as occupying a guiding role in the vanguard of international development. It is based on archival study of project files, set in countries that were at the core of the Dutch aid effort. They are taken from the time span of four decades in which the aid effort was developed and flourished, before the end of the Cold War changed the scenery in 1989. The article aims to shed new light on how policy aims were translated and provides an indication as to why the desired results failed to come about.     

Australian aid after the ‘Golden Consensus’: from aid policy to development policy?

ABSTRACT

In the decade preceding the election of the Abbott Coalition Government in 2013, a so-called ‘golden consensus’ governed Australian aid policy. During this period Australia’s aid spending increased by over 80% in real terms. However, after winning government the 2013 Federal Election, the Abbott Government made a series of significant and unexpected aid policy decisions, cutting the aid budget three times in fifteen months and integrating AusAID, Australia’s aid agency, into the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. This article considers the future role of aid in Australia’s diplomacy primarily by engaging with a prior question: how was it possible for the golden consensus to be uprooted so easily? Conducting a post-mortem reveals that Australia’s development constituency bears some responsibility for the fragility of the consensus. This analysis also reveals the critical role the development constituency will play in determining the extent to which Australia is able to embrace the ‘beyond aid’ agenda. To meet this contemporary challenge, the development community must heed the lessons of the collapse of the golden consensus and, in particular, overcome its reticence to engage in broader foreign policy debates.     

我国的危机管理呼唤服务型的政府

我国危机管理的现状要求尽快建立科学的危机管理体系,其前提是转变政府职能,而服务型政府的建立有利于科学的危机管理体制的最终形成。     

U.S. Financial Aid for Iraq Under the Engagement Policy, 1988–1990

Abstract

This article reframes our understanding of the pre-Gulf War U.S. policy toward Iraq away from the issue of why the Bush administration ignored evidence that Saddam Hussein was not reciprocating U.S. efforts to moderate his behavior. Rather, it asks why the Bush administration did not consider Saddam’s abuse of U.S. export credit programs as relevant for evaluating Iraqi intentions and the efficacy of the engagement policy. It traces debates among federal agencies about two export credit programs to show that strategic considerations drove decisions to preserve or suspend these programs even though Iraq’s financial behavior offered insights earlier in time about its strategic intentions. While the Bush administration intended for engagement to reward or punish Saddam depending on his behavior, my examination of export credit controversies shows that it did not establish a rationale for deciding when and how to punish Iraq for threatening or abusive behavior.     

促进还是抑制:中国对非直接投资的对外援助效应

论文聚焦中国对非援助与对非直接投资的不确定性关系,将援助细分为社会基础设施援助、实物资本援助、经济基础设施援助、政府和民间社会援助四种类型,构建了援助与投资的解析模型;基于中国对非洲52个国家的援助项目数和直接投资项目数,利用分位数回归方法,分别考察了中国对非援助项目总量及各类型援助在对非直接投资项目中的作用。研究发现：①中国对非援助集中在东非、南非,援助项目总数、各类型援助项目数、对非直接投资项目的空间分布具有很高的相似性。②中国对非援助类型结构相对均衡,对非援助在中国对非直接投资中发挥着先锋促进效应。其中,经济基础设施援助的促进效应强劲、稳定,且强度随分位数提高有浅U型变动特征;实物资本援助、社会基础设施援助的促进作用分别在对非直接投资项目少、中等数量下促进效果显著;政府和民间援助的促进作用不显著。③友好城市关系、出口关系与双边政治关系分别仅在中国对非直接投资项目较少、中等规模、大规模情形下显著,空间关系的影响不显著。④受援国人口规模的促进影响最清晰、最稳健;成本规避、资源寻求、受援国的投资环境质量和腐败状况的影响尚不清晰。中国在非投资有追随他国投资区位的倾向,但这一倾向仅在经济基础设施模型中显著。     

‘Fighters without guns’: humanitarianism and military action in the aftermath of the Second World War

Abstract

This paper makes a contribution to the debate about the interplay between military action and humanitarian aid. It takes on the case study of post-World War Two Europe and in particular the activity carried out by the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), which offers a useful key for highlighting the entanglements between relief and reconstruction projects. It is from this perspective that the interaction between humanitarianism and military undertakings also acquires a special meaning, which recalls both the development of the international aid regime and the post-war history of Western countries. The matter will be addressed from two points of view. First to be analysed is the set of agreements stipulated by UNRRA and military authorities, for the zones under Allied administration after the liberation, but also with respect to specific areas of intervention, like the Displaced Persons Operations. The terms of the official agreements allow the delineation of the tasks actually assigned to the agency by the United Nations and the role of control and protection reserved for military organizations. Based on the formal agreements, it is already possible to reconstruct a vision of relief understood as the result of the inextricably linked action of military and humanitarian actors. Next, the interplay between different interpretations of activities to help civilians affected by the war will be examined. This section will focus on the personnel deployed by UNRRA, on their origins, and on duties they are called on to fulfil. People with extensive experience in the welfare sector were a substantial part of the personnel, but a significant number of UNRRA employees came from military ranks. This essay, therefore, has a twofold objective. It analyses the normative and institutional frame that shaped relief work in Liberated Europe. At the same time, it aims to uncover competition and cooperation between military and humanitarian actors in the field. The aim is to highlight how the co-construction of the aid operations between military and civilian personnel that occurred during the second post-war period followed a series of complex, nonlinear paths that conditioned the development of the humanitarian regime from within.     

Do we need more economics in Australian economic diplomacy?

ABSTRACT

Economic diplomacy—that is, informal and formal processes and links between states and non-state actors on international economic issues—is a current focus of Australian foreign policy. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s stated economy diplomacy aims are liberalising trade, boosting economic growth, encouraging investment and assisting business. If Australia is to embrace a genuine and effective notion of economic diplomacy there are two problems to be overcome. First, DFAT’s economic diplomacy framework is incomplete and misses the bigger economic picture, particularly the role of Australia’s key economic agencies, Treasury and the Reserve Bank of Australia. Second, DFAT does not consistently apply economic principles to foreign affairs issues including trade, foreign aid and the global investment agenda. Going forward, Australia should abandon the focus on the four narrow pillars and instead focus on developing a clear, coordinated international economic strategy that articulates Australia’s core international economic objectives and priorities.     

基于科学发展观的旅游业危机管理责任与机制

主动承担危机管理责任是旅游业落实科学发展观的具体体现和必须做出的选择。应该通过外部强制力量和内部企业文化的有效互动来构建旅游业危机管理机制。     

Chinese Aid in the South Pacific: Linked to Resources?

Abstract

China’s emergence as a global development actor has implications for developing countries and “traditional” donor agencies. Its current provision of foreign aid and other forms of development assistance to developing countries throughout the world presents both opportunities and challenges for all actors. At the same time, China’s growing need for natural resources and its policy of securing access through state-led “resource diplomacy” are causing concern. While most scholars and commentators are focused on the “China in Africa” dimension, China’s engagement in the South Pacific region has also been growing rapidly over the past decade and offers some interesting and unique insights. This article examines the dynamics of China’s provision of foreign aid and its quest for natural resources in the South Pacific region, with comparative references to other regions. Drawing particularly upon interviews and site visits in Fiji and Papua New Guinea, it argues that although major commercial resource contracts do appear to be supported by Chinese Government assistance, resources deals are not explicitly part of Chinese foreign aid in the region.     

A comparative survey of the economic decline of Empires

Abstract

On 15 December 1965 Tanzania broke off diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom (UK) because of Harold Wilson's policy towards Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI). Although Tanzanian president Julius Nyerere took this course of action to comply with a resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Organisation of African Unity, he made the support for Rhodesian independence a central pillar of Tanzania's nation-building project. Since 1967 human dignity, African liberation and opposition to racialism and colonialism became central tenets of both Tanzania's foreign policy as well as the Ujamaa socialist policy implemented internally by its government. The loss of a British £ 7.5 million loan notwithstanding, Tanzania's unyielding criticism of British policy towards UDI strengthened Nyerere's national and international legitimacy and reinforced the Tanganyika African National Union's hegemony over the national political space. Relations between Tanzania and the UK were finally restored in July 1968, after the other African governments had re-established them. Nyerere felt sure that this policy reversal would not put at risk his government's political legitimacy.     

Vulnerabilities of Highly Skilled Immigrants in Canada and the United States

Despite similar permanent status immigration categories (Economic, Family, and Refugee), the experiences of skilled immigrants in Canada and the United States are quite different. The point system used to select applicants for the Economic Class in Canada makes skilled immigrants vulnerable to a number of perils after the migrant lands. Foreign credentials and work experience are discounted by Canadian employers, who also impose a discriminatory income penalty on minorities. While previous cohorts of Economic Class migrants may have been warned of these perils via reliable migrant networks, new Canadian research suggests that recent cohorts have no such safety net. This article examines the economic integration experiences of Economic Class migrants in the United States in light of the Canadian experiences. The vulnerabilities reported in Canada do not appear to be transferable to the United States, because immigration policy in the US stresses pre-landing employment commitments via employer sponsorship. Accordingly, prospective Economic Class migrants to the United States do not migrate without first knowing how their credentials and “minority status” will affect employment opportunities. However, for the 85,000 skilled workers admitted to the United States on H-1B temporary visas each year, the perils noted in the Canadian experience are relevant, as are a number of additional concerns.