At a June 10, 2010 hearing before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, about increasing the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance, aid experts said bureaucratic red tape and insufficient capacity at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) stymies effective programming and grantmaking procedures. Calling the process by which USAID vets grantees “burdensome” and “dysfunctional,” nonprofit and think tank experts described their sector’s achievements of working with international partners to provide aid and promote human rights. The speakers also addressed safety concerns for  employees of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) working overseas due to  programs such as the proposed Partner Vetting System (PVS), which makes them appear to be arms of the U.S. government.

Thomas Carothers, Vice President for Studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said USAID’s operating procedures  produce “inflexibility, cumbersomeness, slowness, cookie cutter approaches” to aid mechanisms.   Carothers called for increasing transparency and flexibility throughout the assistance giving process, including procurement, implementation and evaluation rather than “stricter controls, more regulations, and tighter procedures.”

Carothers explained why programs like PVS, which require NGOs receiving USAID money to submit personal information about their local partners to USAID to be checked against secret intelligence databases, are dangerous to aid workers and ineffective in delivering assistance. If the people receiving the aid perceive the NGOs to be “the work of outside actors, especially foreign governments with significant geopolitical interests, the legitimacy of such efforts will be questioned,” he said.   Carothers also said, “extremely detailed, fixed-term, technically oriented contracts in which U.S. implementing organizations provide a predefined list of “services” to USAID” does not produce the best results and discourages U.S. groups from creating “real partnerships with local actors, in which the local actors have a substantial and sustained say in what the goals will be and what methods will be employed to achieve them.”

 

The Executive Director of Freedom House, Jennifer L. Windsor, told Committee members that USAID policies did not always ensure the most efficient or effective assistance programs. “USAID’s cumbersome bureaucratic processes and procedures have hampered the ability to implement flexible, effective democracy programs. The procurement process is particularly burdensome. Grant agreements incorporate a growing thicket of myriad regulations….the cumulative effect is to create a heavy administrative burden on the organizations that receive U.S. assistance. Local non-governmental organizations abroad are often ill- equipped to comply with these complex regulations, and as a result, NGOs that receive U.S. assistance may not be those who can be the most effective in promoting reforms.”

Exclusive control by the U.S. government of aid distribution and democracy promotion around the world is inefficient, counterproductive and “undercuts a great American asset – our vibrant civil society,” Windsor said. She told the committee that the U.S. nonprofit sector has a successful history of working with international groups to maximize the benefits of foreign assistance and these efforts “have produced some of the most significant successes over the past two decades.”

 

Windsor also criticized vetting programs like PVS, saying they undermine the very people they are designed to help. “Some within the U.S. government advocate more direct U.S. government funding to local groups abroad, bypassing U.S. civil society groups entirely. While more funds – especially institutional support – should be provided to local civil society, the value added of U.S. civil society should not be underestimated,” Windsor said. She explained how local NGOs draw on the expertise of their more established U.S. counterparts and integrate these best practices into their own networks. She also emphasized that the assistance and partnerships between local and international nonprofit groups continues “even after the U.S. government has turned its attention and funding elsewhere.”

 

Elisa Massimino, President and CEO of Human Rights First underscored the importance of NGO independence from government actors in global hot spots. “Assistance that is too closely associated with the U.S. government may put organizations at risk and undermine their effectiveness. Independent organizations themselves are in the best position to assess the risks,” she said. She recommended the government “should facilitate, support, and strengthen engagement by independent civil society organizations” to bolster the credibility and effectiveness of aid programs.

 

Also speaking at the hearing was the President of the International Republican Institute, Lorne W. Craner.  He said official government statements from the President or Secretary of State about defending human rights and freedoms are heard by a global audience and need to be strong and clear. “The degree of administration support for democracy and human rights is watched closely by autocratic and totalitarian foreign leaders. They are trying to discern how to manage relations with the world’s most powerful country. When American leaders diminish our emphasis and consistency on democracy and human rights, foreign leaders understand that they don’t have to do as much on those issues to maintain good relations with Washington,” he said.