Thinking about a career in international development? Duncan Green explores the future of the aid sector and the prospects for those who want to work in it… This post is adapted from his shiny new blog about activism, influencing and change, hosted by the LSE, which we’ll be sharing highlights from here. You can read more from it and subscribe here.
Last week a bunch of professors joined anxious students wondering if they had made a terrible mistake in studying international development to read the tea leaves on the future of aid. Chatham House rule, and definitely no certainty in the fog, but here is what I put together from that conversation and from reading and speaking to dozens of senior aid people.
A tsunami or a tide?
Will the current upheaval most resemble a tsunami, a change in ocean current, or a tide? A tsunami sweeps all before it, leaving a devastated landscape from which new life emerges; a current change means that the aid sector may find itself permanently swimming against the flow – exhausting, but possible; a tide means that the pendulum (to mix my metaphors) will swing back in a couple of years – so just hang in there.
‘Western governments of all political persuasions have immediately jumped on the bandwagon, cutting aid often in contravention of their political promises’
My best guess is that this is a tsunami. What is most surprising is not the dismantling of USAID, but the domino effect – Western governments of all political persuasions have immediately jumped on the bandwagon, cutting aid often in contravention of their political promises.
What happens next?
The world is still there, disasters and emergencies will still happen, people will get sick and new diseases will emerge and spread. So some form of human solidarity is likely to rise from the ashes. What might it look like?
Contemporary humanitarianism has been formalised as a global project, with global (soft) law and global institutions such as the UN. That is now looking very fragile. Conversations with senior aid insiders began with the premise that “the UN is dead”. That may be just the product of dismay, but I fear they may be right.
‘Resources and political capital are likely to switch to regional, national and local institutions, as the UN and other global bodies such as the World Bank or WTO either regionalise or go into decline.’
Resources and political capital are likely to switch to regional, national and local institutions, as the UN and other global bodies such as the World Bank or WTO either regionalise or go into decline.
Silver linings? Perhaps the long promised (but seldom delivered) localisation of aid will emerge from the bottom, rather than be conceded from the top, but it will be much worse resourced than the top-down version – more like community self-help than tidy little (or sometimes large) NGOs delivering services.
Implications for students and those early in aid careers
If you are next-gen and remain committed to a job in international development, then it may be worth thinking about initially finding jobs outside the aid sector and watching how the cards fall and what emerges from the ashes. For instance, if the UN goes down or regionalises (following the World Bank), that will shape who it employs (if anyone). As for government donors, if aid is being “weaponised” as an unabashed foreign policy tool, as the Economist expects, will you even want to work for those weaponising it?
When deciding where to look for jobs, it may be worth thinking about:
- Which activities in international development are more advanced in the sector than in domestic politics in the North? My monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) friends and relatives tell me that is one such area, perhaps because it is more allowable to critique funding to another government than to your own.
- Conversely, where does international development trail domestic politics, e.g. comms?
- What are likely to be the target institutions for whatever future aid agencies emerge? One target is finance, where aid is increasingly being talked of as a way to leverage private capital flows, rather than a significant source of funding on its own. The extractives sector looks set to remain another area of interest: countries will still want to drill and mine, so find out how that sector works while you’re waiting for the dust to settle.
Alternatively, you might target the more resilient bits of the current sector:
- Institutions: Foundations will still have their endowments and, as state funding falls away, will play an even more prominent role – not just the big beasts like Gates, but thousands of smaller family foundations, many doing some really interesting work. Then there is the booming field of social enterprises, which are likely to fill some of the gaps. Non-aid dependent NGOs such as faith-based organisations, or the Red Cross and Red Crescent, will be less affected too.
- Functions: the case for humanitarian response seems strongest in whatever aid phoenix emerges from the ashes. I also think the case for advocacy and influencing becomes stronger, as reduced aid dollars are directed towards trying to improve the accountability and performance of states and others, rather than delivering services on their own. The weakest link is long-term development – infrastructure, core funding for governments etc, work on norms change.
- What I would avoid, at least in the short term? Donors; “beltway bandits” (the huge, massively aid dependent contractors such as Chemonics); and highly aid-dependent NGOs.
If thinking of applying for a job, do your research and follow the money. Find out how the organisation is financed, because that is now going to matter more than ever for whether it is a good bet for you.
Duncan Green founded the From Poverty to Power blog and, though he has left Oxfam, is still part of our blog team with the new title of Blogger Emeritus.
He is a Professor in Practice in the LSE’s International Development department and Co-Director (with Tom Kirk) of the LSE’s Activism, Change and Influence programme and website. He can be reached at d.j.green@lse.ac.uk, or on @duncangreenlse.bsky.social. He doesn’t look at Twitter any more.