Re-Orienting Australia-China Relations: 1972 to the Present by Nicholas Thomas

Author:Nicholas Thomas [Thomas, Nicholas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: International Relations, Political Science, General
ISBN: 9780754632450
Google: d8RyAAAAMAAJ
Goodreads: 4947804
Publisher: Ashgate
Published: 2004-01-15T13:09:45+00:00

Conclusion

What tends to happen in bilateral aid is that the aid agency develops an overall template intended to give coherence and strategic purpose to the aid policy and programmes, across all countries. While great efforts are made by the agency to interpret this flexibly in each country, other requirements, particularly the accountability requirements that measure performance against criteria derived from the overall template, mean that the agency ends up stretching the template to fit local circumstances. One consequence is that the fit is inexact and often inappropriate. All donors acknowledge this problem to a greater or lesser extent. Another is that the agency becomes strongly ‘generalist’, geared more to the template needs than the country needs, and wedded to the orientation that expertise resides in process, for which it is not necessary to know about a recipient country or to have been there previously in order to know how to diagnose its needs and devise relevant responses. In the case of Australian aid programmes in China this has led to non-China specialists making micro-level decisions on projects without possessing detailed personal knowledge of the local situation. This results in less than effective projects, and has a self-reinforcing effect on the template approach.

The refocus on governance strategies for poverty alleviation outlined above implies potential for an approach that would give greater play to the composition of the Chinese political and bureaucratic systems as well as local society. It would also entail recognition of Chinese needs in the evolution of any aid programme. It implies the potential for a much closer integration of aid policy and the overall bilateral relationship, because it entails working collaboratively at the highest levels of political and ministerial leadership and with the most imaginative and creative forces at the grass roots, with demonstrable outcomes that benefit all, especially the Chinese poor. Over the longer term, this would help bring Australia into a productive close quarters engagement on China’s development and poverty reduction with a range of leaders who are influential in our relations now, and networks of bright people who will be influential in our relations in the future. As the nature of the issue is so central to the concerns of the Chinese leadership, and so benign, it has the potential to help build a closeness and mutual understanding and respect between the two countries around this issue. This is not a stated objective of Australian aid to China but it’s not a bad strategic gain, for both countries.

To do a programme of this kind is quite hard. It requires very tight discipline and management, and a determination not to settle for less than best in order to meet deadlines or template requirements. This includes determination at key points to engage collaboration from people only at the very highest levels of the Chinese government, which is how the World Bank and some other multilateral agencies operate but not how the Australian programme has worked in the past. It needs great flexibility. It can work only if

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