The United States Foreign Aid Program: An Appraisal

Abstract

The United States has maintained a foreign aid program since World War II, but the objectives of aid have been mixed. When President Truman announced the technical assistance program in 1949, many hoped that we had embarked on a continuing commitment to assist poorer coun tries toward economic development. Actually, aid in recent years has been largely military aid, and even economic assist ance has been concentrated in a few countries of strategic value to us. Aside from this overemphasis on military aid, our main problem has been the failure to recognize that haphazard, project-by-project economic grants or loans, administered by many agencies, do not much help poor countries. Economic development requires capital, technical skills, and entrepre neurship in combination. It will not take place without educa tion and social reforms creating incentives for progress among the majority in any country. The new program proposed by President Kennedy could go far to correct present deficiencies. It would commit the United States to long-term development assistance, administered by a new aid agency, in accordance with plans to be worked out by recipient countries. The role of the United States will continue to be difficult. We must learn to tie together money, projects, and people in effective ways and to supervise all programs closely. Yet we will have to avoid giving offense to countries which ask for aid, and we must persuade them to invite increasing participation by United States businesses in all types of enterprise. We should continue to try to strengthen the economic foundations of the free world, but we must not try to buy friendship, and we must be sympathetic toward true neutralism in politics.