The Foreign Service Journal, January 2010

The Bush administration’s lack of faith in USAID also manifested it- self in the decision to push for cre- ation of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which Congress au- thorized in 2004 to provide devel- opment assistance to poor demo- cracies. The administration swayed a skeptical Congress in part by dis- paraging USAID. As the argument went, the MCC would fund only worthy development efforts in countries that respect the rule of law. By comparison, USAID’s work was dismissed as overly politicized and ineffective. At the same time, during the Bush years, much of the develop- ment focus shifted to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, which was widely praised but notably placed outside the control of the USAID Administrator. And as USAID weakened, other agencies have also stepped into the void. Last fall, for instance, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Richard Lug- ar of Indiana, wrote to Sec. Clinton and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vil- sack to ask why the Foreign Agri- cultural Service, and not USAID, was leading agricultural develop- ment efforts in Afghanistan. Both secretaries responded that FAS’s work there was part of Obama’s “one government approach” to dealing with the situation in Afghanistan. Yet the result of FAS’s expansion into a development role, along with two dozen other agencies across the gov- ernment, is a situation where “little or no coordination” ex- ists among foreign development programs, Lugar said. Indeed, he added, “We do not have adequate knowledge of whether programs are complementary or working at cross-purposes.” Obama has not moved to reverse this trend. In fact, 20 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 0 C O V E R S T O R Y Rather than seeking to fold the Millennium Challenge Corporation into USAID, Pres. Obama wants to expand it.