The Foreign Service Journal, April 2004

A P R I L 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 33 F OLLOWING A DECADE OF RADICAL DOWNSIZING , THE U.S. A GENCY FOR I NTERNATIONAL D EVELOPMENT IS REBUILDING TO MEET NEW CHALLENGES . B Y S HAWN Z ELLER F O C U S O N F S S T A F F I N G he numbers tell quite a story. Be- tween 1962, when the U.S. Agency for International Development came into being, and 2002, its full-time staff declined from a peak of about 15,000 during the Vietnam era to less than 2,000. During the 1990s alone, 37 percent of the agency’s employees either left and were not replaced, or were laid off in the 1995 reduction-in-force. “It was a painful time,” remembers Brian Atwood, USAID’s administrator for much of the 1990s. “Our operations budget was cut continually.” In just seven years, between 1995 and 2002, the agency lost over $50 million in funds for staff hiring. At the same time, then-Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C., led a campaign to move USAID under the State Depart- ment umbrella. Atwood fought to preserve the agency’s independence, arguing that its development mission was distinct from State’s diplomatic one. But Helms was partly successful, requiring the USAID administrator to report to the Secretary of State. When Atwood left the agency in 2001, he was badly shaken. Congress, it seemed, no longer cared about development. Morale at USAID was at rock bottom. But last year, in the wake of 9/11, the worldview of many politicians in Washington began to change. A consensus has emerged that terrorists breed in the poverty and desperation of the Third World and that foreign assistance, therefore, is a critical part of the war on terrorism. USAID funding for new hires in 2003 was boosted for the first time in more than a decade. President Bush also proposed creation of a new program — the Millennium Challenge Account, which was approved last year by Congress. It will fund development work in countries that rule justly, invest in their people and encourage economic freedom. USAID’s current administrator, Andrew Natsios, says the MCA “marks a revolution in foreign assis- tance.” Natsios welcomes the new program “as the strongest possible commitment by the Bush adminis- tration to making development a core element of our foreign policy.” As part of its core operations of setting the development agenda, letting contracts and over- seeing the results, USAID will play a substantial role in the MCA’s work. But as Natsios well knows, if the new enthusiasm for development is to translate into solid accomplish- ments, USAID will have to oversee its contracts and grants much more thoroughly than it has in the past. To do that, the agency will have to rebuild its core staff of Foreign Service officers, a process that is only just beginning. T O N THE W ORK F ORCE R OLLER C OASTER AT USAID