Obama and Bolivia

In a recent post, I discussed in broad terms the Obama administration’s FY 2011 request for D&G programs. Overall, I wrote that I was pleased with the budget (except for Afghanistan). There were lots of details I did not include – some good, some bad – that seemed to narrow to address in an overview. Thus, I decided to leave them for future posts.

Our subject today is Bolivia, a country that has become substantially less democratic over the past few years. (To be clear, I am not against populism and there is no reason a populist can’t be a democrat. I am a bit of a populist myself.) US relations over the past few years have not been good with Bolivia, either. The Obama Administration is trying to improve relations with Bolivia and thus has given into the government’s demand to cut all D&G funding, in return for being able to run other programs.

I have to say I am pretty disappointed in the Obama administration for caving to this demand. Most important, countries tend to be poor because they have lousy governments. Thus, it makes little sense to continue other aid programs if you fail to work on better governance. Otherwise, aid is just a palliative, but has no long-term benefits. Arguing that cutting D&G programs is a small price to pay in order to keep other important ones going makes no sense in theory. Second, D&G funding, like most conditional aid, is supposed to be contentious – it’s about getting government to do things they don’t want to do. Cutting D&G funding means less money for groups who exist to hold the government accountable for its actions. Sure, its great for the government, but aid isn’t for them. It’s for the poor and throwing these folks under the bus (by continuing aid programs, but doing nothing about confronting the political roots of poverty) to keep good relations with the government seems like kind of a rotten thing to do.