The Foreign Service Journal, September 2008

delivery mechanisms and procurement; • Promoting a culture of innova- tion and risk that emphasizes the piloting, testing and rollout of new ideas, while accounting for the com- plexities of change management; • Institutionalizing opportunities for coordination, including accounting for the inter-relationship between country and sector-based planning and the integration of regional and global approaches; and • Breaking down the stovepiped approach to funding that currently hampers effective delivery of assis- tance. Discussion is needed both to clarify the relative roles and responsi- bilities of all foreign assistance agen- cies and to move beyond the F process to achieve coherence among valued presidential programs and the full range of development programs — whether they reside within the same institutional tent, as proposed by some, or continue to proliferate through a range of loosely coupled, but tightly coordinated operating units. As the nation prepares for a presi- dential election that offers the promise of a significant shift in the direction of U.S. foreign policy, the time is ripe for comprehensive reform. The choice is not between pursuing the F process or returning to the status quo — and, with it, the con- tinued fragmentation of foreign assis- tance programs. The universal con- sensus, as reflected in the HELP Commission report, is that “tweaking” the F process will not suffice. Rather the status quo must change signifi- cantly. The major stakeholders now rec- ognize a historic opportunity to shape the future by rewriting the Foreign Assistance Act. In this spirit, let us hope that supporters of reform will not limit their imagination to over- hauling the F process, but look ahead to new opportunities. n S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 55