How foreign aid is like counterinsurgency

The increasing militarization of foreign aid is a point we have raised many times on this blog. What strikes me more recently is the increasing congruence in the factors that determine the success of foreign aid projects and in US policy towards Afghanistan. People working in foreign aid have long recognized that country ownership – leadership over development policies and strategies - is essential for these projects to succeed. To put it bluntly, donors can’t want reform more than recipients. Abu Muqawama uses almost identical language in defining the critical aspects to community engagement efforts in Afghanistan:

The first phase…involves a careful reconnaissance of a potential community to determine whether or not local buy-in makes the community ripe for engagement.

My first thought after reading that line is that it sounds like something the World Bank would write. On the surface this may seem surprising as foreign aid and ending the war in Afghanistan seem to have little in common. Upon further reflection it makes perfect sense: in both cases, external actors are attempting to introduce reforms that outsiders see as important, but that local leaders may not want. That finding local champions is a constituent element of both successful foreign aid and community engagement programs is perhaps not surprising at all.