Busan makes me think about George Harrison.
His song, “Got My Mind Set On You,” was playing on the van radio after my first trip to the World Bank in graduate school. At the time, I remember entreating my professor and classmates to pay close attention to the lyrics.
“Listen,” I said. “This should be the development aid anthem.”
(If the embedded video is not functional, click here.)
It’s easy to write off high-level policy discussions like what took place at the 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan. It’s the curse I face by looking at things from a practitioner’s, rather than a policy, perspective. Maybe it is just the nature of such meetings, but there always seems to be many more questions than answers. Many more “should”s than “can”s or “will”s.
Busan gathered a group of smart, driven, committed people. But unfortunately they were also largely a group of people who are often exhausted, overwhelmed, and discouraged by the perpetuation of aid institutions themselves. The Community Development Resource Association in South Africa describes the “particularly undevelopmental global development industry” as characterized by:
- the need to urgently disburse money;
- a tendency to focus on product rather than process;
- higher respect for suits and ties than rages and bones;
- a proactive rather than responsive orientation;
- centralized and hierarchical decision-making; and
- bureaucratic and instrumental rigidities, practiced largely (if unconsciously) for the benefit of those who intervene.
Therefore the ultimate measure of Busan’s outcomes is found when we can look back and see if it spurred new thinking and culture changes within the institutions that administer development dollars. It may be too soon to tell. But let’s ask: As a result of Busan, have we spent less of our time and energy dealing with the bureaucratic technicalities by which our day-to-day work is governed? Have our hands been less tied so we could open up processes that result in more local ownership of aid?
After all, we do not operate from a profit motive in this sector. We can change the game until the game doesn’t look the same.
I still think that it’s gonna take a plenty of money and a whole lotta precious time. And though my mind remains set, I’m still trying to figure out how to do it right, child.
We all are.
This post is part of an Oxfam-sponsored feature on Devex entitled, “One year later, where do we stand on commitments made in Busan?“
