Knowing our limits

This is the fourth of seven parts in the Devex series “Foreign aid effectiveness: A radical rethink,” written by Diana Ohlbaum — a former deputy director of USAID's Office of Transition Initiatives and senior professional staff member of the two congressional panels overseeing U.S. foreign affairs.

Fifty years of development experience has taught us important lessons. We’ve learned that sending kids to school doesn’t help if there aren’t enough trained and paid teachers, that hand-washing may be the most effective way to prevent respiratory and diarrheal infections, that investing in women produces enormous benefits for families and communities. Our agricultural and scientific research has led to the Green Revolution and the possibility of an AIDS-free generation. Our specialized knowledge — whether about stock markets or computer technology or constitutional drafting — is sought and valued around the world.

While we can and must apply the lessons we’ve learned and the expertise we’ve acquired to our aid programs, we can’t assume we know what’s best in any given situation. As David Bell noted, foreign aid “is often described as a method of transferring know-how, but this is plainly wrong; it is instead a process of developing know-how — a process of finding out what will work in Nigeria, not of transferring what has been found to work in Nebraska.” Our local partners usually know the context a lot better than we do. And ignoring that context, as we did for too long with regard to burial practices during the Ebola crisis in West Africa, can sometimes lead to deadly results.