This article comes as no surprise to a person who has read William Easterly’s “The White Man’s Burden. The concept of the Millennium Challenge Corporation was flawed right from the beginning. Under a heading “Screening out Bad Governments” he wrote “The U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation gives aid only to governments that meet certain standards, such as democracy, investing in their people, freedom from corruption….as of June 2005, the Millennium Challenge Corporation had reached agreements on aid programs with two countries—Honduras and Madagascar. In 2004, Honduras’s government was ranked by the World Bank as among the worst third in the world for corruption. Madagascar is better; it is smack in the middle on corruption.”
Having traveled in Vanautu where I learned that MCC was putting in a perimeter road but no electricity - they have one light on an entire island, I questioned the common sense and leadership of the program. My intuition was right.
The world community needs to wake up and smell the coffee. The dictators in Africa such as Zenawi of Ethiopia are sustaining their power though the aid money from the western world. How long do our governments plan to support repression and the killing machines of dictators in Africa? Enough is enough, stand up for justice. Say no aid to the dictators in Africa and else where.
It seems that there’s a common agreement on the positive developments that Senegal has been doing in the latest years especially under the leadership of Mr. Wade who was << democratically>> elected for a second mandate. Off course some minorities can challenge this picture, but democracy implies that the majority rules and I just would really loved if other African leaders follow the global model of President Wade.
With regard to the investment environment in Senegal, I think that there should be a clear differentiation between private investors and institutional donors (such as the MCC).
While Senegal -and other developing countries- have a duty to protect their people from the avid greediness of some private companies that care only about raising prices and increasing profits, I think that these countries can’t sustain their economies without providing a positive field for socially responsable investors to collect their investments and dividends.
The social investments on the other hand should consider profitability but give a larger weight to the achievements of the strategic objectives of these projects and take in consideration the long term objectives of these goals such as the impact of infrastructures in transportation and health sectors on the global performance of the economy.
Whenever I hear MCC, I prefer to see it as a marshal plan rather than an objective financial investment and it takes a lot of investments in order to extract those poor countries from the web of poverty and corruption.
I think that President Obama took the right decision by requesting the increase of the MCC’s funds and think that the MCC should not only consult third parties in the benchmarking of the grantees, but even recommend their participation in the implementation and accounting of these projects in order to support ethics and good governance (especially when dealing with these third world countries).
Behind the Curve is only analyzing the indicators that allow a country to become eligible for MCC aid. It is not taking into account the years of planning and collaboration that take place before a country is able to receive a compact or the metrics that are established as part of the monitoring and evaluation process, which monitors the country’s progress through the compact life cycle. One of the main criticisms of MCC has been its lack of disbursement of funds, but that is actually rooted in the organizations desire to hold the Millennium Challenge Accountable (MCA) entities accountable for the funds and how they are being utilized. Further evidence of this accountability is that MCC has pulled out of country’s were its values are not represented. One of the countries cited in the article was Madagascar. After the coup earlier this year, MCC pulled out of the country as it was not upholding one of its key criteria - ruling justly. Additionally, MCC continues to track the third party indicators for the life of the compact and has established processes to work with any country on areas where their rating has lowered.
Another critical element in the article is the use of outside indicators for the selection of eligible countries. The use of outside indicators is a key factor in establishing eligible countries in an unbiased way. While it is true that it takes time for these indicators to be calculated and published, they are the best source of information to rank countries systematically and provide a mechanism for countries to work towards eligibility for these grants. It also provides a way for countries like Vanuatu to receive funding, which may not be of strategic interest for US foreign policy. While the effect of the MCC Effect has been debated, the structure does provide incentive for countries to improve their internal laws and policies to qualify for aid. If the author does not agree in this selection process, I would challenge him to put forward his ideas on how MCC should select countries in a clear, transparent, fair, and quantifiable way.
To quickly conclude, MCC has been in existence for five years and only in the coming year will be completing its first compact. It has been built to quantify the results of its investments and has worked to implement lessons learned throughout that period. I am excited to learn from both its successes and failures. Only through a model that is trying to do something truly different will we ever learn how to improve foreign assistance.
COMMENTS
BY John Gaynard
ON August 23, 2009 08:24 AM
This article comes as no surprise to a person who has read William Easterly’s “The White Man’s Burden. The concept of the Millennium Challenge Corporation was flawed right from the beginning. Under a heading “Screening out Bad Governments” he wrote “The U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation gives aid only to governments that meet certain standards, such as democracy, investing in their people, freedom from corruption….as of June 2005, the Millennium Challenge Corporation had reached agreements on aid programs with two countries—Honduras and Madagascar. In 2004, Honduras’s government was ranked by the World Bank as among the worst third in the world for corruption. Madagascar is better; it is smack in the middle on corruption.”
BY Rebecca Morgan
ON September 24, 2009 07:06 PM
Having traveled in Vanautu where I learned that MCC was putting in a perimeter road but no electricity - they have one light on an entire island, I questioned the common sense and leadership of the program. My intuition was right.
BY John Adems
ON September 24, 2009 08:47 PM
The world community needs to wake up and smell the coffee. The dictators in Africa such as Zenawi of Ethiopia are sustaining their power though the aid money from the western world. How long do our governments plan to support repression and the killing machines of dictators in Africa? Enough is enough, stand up for justice. Say no aid to the dictators in Africa and else where.
Injustice any where is injustice everywhere
JA
BY tarik h.p
ON September 25, 2009 11:02 AM
It seems that there’s a common agreement on the positive developments that Senegal has been doing in the latest years especially under the leadership of Mr. Wade who was << democratically>> elected for a second mandate. Off course some minorities can challenge this picture, but democracy implies that the majority rules and I just would really loved if other African leaders follow the global model of President Wade.
With regard to the investment environment in Senegal, I think that there should be a clear differentiation between private investors and institutional donors (such as the MCC).
While Senegal -and other developing countries- have a duty to protect their people from the avid greediness of some private companies that care only about raising prices and increasing profits, I think that these countries can’t sustain their economies without providing a positive field for socially responsable investors to collect their investments and dividends.
The social investments on the other hand should consider profitability but give a larger weight to the achievements of the strategic objectives of these projects and take in consideration the long term objectives of these goals such as the impact of infrastructures in transportation and health sectors on the global performance of the economy.
Whenever I hear MCC, I prefer to see it as a marshal plan rather than an objective financial investment and it takes a lot of investments in order to extract those poor countries from the web of poverty and corruption.
I think that President Obama took the right decision by requesting the increase of the MCC’s funds and think that the MCC should not only consult third parties in the benchmarking of the grantees, but even recommend their participation in the implementation and accounting of these projects in order to support ethics and good governance (especially when dealing with these third world countries).
BY LAD
ON September 28, 2009 06:03 PM
Behind the Curve is only analyzing the indicators that allow a country to become eligible for MCC aid. It is not taking into account the years of planning and collaboration that take place before a country is able to receive a compact or the metrics that are established as part of the monitoring and evaluation process, which monitors the country’s progress through the compact life cycle. One of the main criticisms of MCC has been its lack of disbursement of funds, but that is actually rooted in the organizations desire to hold the Millennium Challenge Accountable (MCA) entities accountable for the funds and how they are being utilized. Further evidence of this accountability is that MCC has pulled out of country’s were its values are not represented. One of the countries cited in the article was Madagascar. After the coup earlier this year, MCC pulled out of the country as it was not upholding one of its key criteria - ruling justly. Additionally, MCC continues to track the third party indicators for the life of the compact and has established processes to work with any country on areas where their rating has lowered.
Another critical element in the article is the use of outside indicators for the selection of eligible countries. The use of outside indicators is a key factor in establishing eligible countries in an unbiased way. While it is true that it takes time for these indicators to be calculated and published, they are the best source of information to rank countries systematically and provide a mechanism for countries to work towards eligibility for these grants. It also provides a way for countries like Vanuatu to receive funding, which may not be of strategic interest for US foreign policy. While the effect of the MCC Effect has been debated, the structure does provide incentive for countries to improve their internal laws and policies to qualify for aid. If the author does not agree in this selection process, I would challenge him to put forward his ideas on how MCC should select countries in a clear, transparent, fair, and quantifiable way.
To quickly conclude, MCC has been in existence for five years and only in the coming year will be completing its first compact. It has been built to quantify the results of its investments and has worked to implement lessons learned throughout that period. I am excited to learn from both its successes and failures. Only through a model that is trying to do something truly different will we ever learn how to improve foreign assistance.