Photo Illustration by Ezinne Osueke / THE REPUBLIC. Source Ref: Donald Trump / Gage Skidmore.
THE MINISTRY OF WORLD AFFAIRS
Photo Illustration by Ezinne Osueke / THE REPUBLIC. Source Ref: Donald Trump / Gage Skidmore.
THE MINISTRY OF WORLD AFFAIRS
Donald Trump has hit the ground running for his second term as president of the United States of America and leader of the proverbial free world. Together with his trusty sidekick, Elon Musk, they have been working tirelessly to remodel the federal government, with a slew of executive orders passed within the first few days. While a lot has already been changed, including eliminating Diversity Equity and Inclusion efforts, ramping up mass deportations of (illegal) migrants, and making promises to annex independent territories, the most globally felt action is the cutting back on foreign aid, which took effect soon after President Trump assumed office. In an effort to figure out what is worth spending on and what is not, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has been earmarked as the biggest foreign aid demon that must be slain, and as a result, many workers have been put on an employment freeze.
Across the world, many USAID employees have lost their jobs. Perhaps, most concerning is the fact that funding cuts have dealt a blow to healthcare in the Third World. Countries that rely heavily on the USAID funding to address sexual and reproductive health and rights concerns are bearing the brunt as they run out of pre-exposure prophylaxis, post-exposure prophylaxis, condoms and antiretroviral medications that have been vital in treating HIV and preventing new infections. On the other side of the coin, sentiments sympathetic to the cause of the Republican administration have praised the USAID funding cuts, arguing that America has done enough for the rest of the world in providing ‘free money’ for decades and that these funding cuts will finally put America first, as Trump has promised. There have also been reports that the past USAID funding has been utilized to spread agendas conflicting with Republican conservative beliefs, with one report claiming that over $20,000 was spent on a drag show in Ecuador. These two points bear much analysis: while the former promotes an utter falsehood, the latter speaks to some of the intent behind foreign aid. Is foreign aid money really free, generous and beneficial to the citizens it reaches? On the surface, it would appear so. But a critical lens is essential to understanding the workings of foreign aid.
THE COLD WAR: A BATTLE TO HAVE THE THIRD WORLD FACE EAST OR WEST
The origins of the USAID date back to a few years after the beginning of the Cold War, a time when the United States was desperate to gain a foothold in newly independent nations and prevent the spread of communism. In Africa, the winds of change had already been blowing in favour of communism and socialism, with early independent nations like Ghana and Guinea working to ensure the independence of other African nations in a fashion that would promote social benefits for all, rather than for the capitalist few. As a result, the US worked through various means to maintain an influence over newly independent nations. While Presidents Harry S. Truman and John F. Kennedy—both Democrats—took different approaches, their actions reflect America’s desire to be seen as being altruistic and friendly. Initially, the US employed covert yet diplomatic tactics, later shifting to more overt and benevolent strategies to extend its influence across the Global South and beyond.
Much has been written about how the African arts suffered due to Western infiltration into their affairs during the Truman years, as the CIA covertly funded prominent authors across the continent, publishing their work in prominent magazines across the world. In African Literature and the CIA: Networks of Authorship and Publishing, Caroline Davis relates the plight of writers such as Wole Soyinka and Bessie Head, who later discovered that the cheques they received from prestigious publishing houses may have had nefarious motives that remain unclear to this day. The recent Johan Grimonprez film, Soundtrack to a Coup D’Etat, also exposes how the Truman administration used prominent jazz artistes to help unseat Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo and install a government more sentimental to the whims of the United States. The tentacles of empire are far reaching; while Truman favoured the utilization of these more covert CIA funding methods, Kennedy would later maintain the same agenda but leveraged soft power through the creation of the Peace Corps and USAID.
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WHITER, WESTERN BENEVOLENCE?
Today, the US appears to favour overt soft diplomacy over more covert, nefarious tactics—at least as far as we can tell, considering the actions of the CIA are often fully understood only in hindsight. Just like with the earlier methods of soft influence, the funding provided to the Third World and elsewhere is propped for specific projects. Often, international funding agencies, including the USAID, advertise that their aim is to promote healthcare, good governance and human rights. The similarity in the covert and overt methods of exerting influence lies in the fact that the means through which the money is disbursed are quite ingenious in nature, as funds trickle down to numerous NGOs in a country, with their use clearly dictated. These organizations fund media, governance initiatives and political programmes that, while initially may seem necessary, often promote a specific agenda.
The initiatives for good governance, in particular, aim to suppress socialist and communist movements while reinforcing capitalist, extractive leadership. These initiatives are also utilized to train the police and the military, providing the necessary militaristic gear to maintain ‘order and security’ by quickly quelling political dissent. In this way, markets remain open to the United States, so that it may be able to import raw materials at favourable prices while ensuring that its finished goods remain costly for these nations. When the goods are especially valuable, as in the Congo, it may be better for the US that the nation remains unstable—something agencies like USAID help ensure. It is no surprise, then, that countries such as Russia and Bolivia quickly ejected USAID from within their borders upon realization of its influence.
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UNDERSTANDING ‘EMPIRE’ IN A TIME OF OLIGARCHIC CAPTURE
The question remains: why would the Trump administration take such a drastic step that, to the untrained eye, weakens its international status while seemingly strengthening the democracies it once manipulated? The Executive Order freezing to foreign aid reads in section one:
The United States foreign aid industry and bureaucracy are not aligned with American interests and in many cases antithetical to American values. They serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.
This claim appears indisputable. But does stabilizing world peace truly serve America’s interests?
Speculatively, and in view of how white South Africans have redoubled their efforts to establish their own free republic within the Republic of South Africa, perhaps, Musk knows exactly what he is doing. Having witnessed first-hand how foreign aid helps stabilize South Africa for US trade, he may recognize that a South Africa heavily reliant on foreign aid leaves little room for a white minority uprising necessary for secession—since, at least on the surface, aid promotes good governance and representation.
Michael Parenti, in Against Empire, reminds us that ‘aid is a powerful means of political control. It is withheld when poorer nations dare to effect genuine reforms that might tamper with the distribution of wealth and power.’ Trump exemplifies this truism, threatening to sanction South Africa for not falling in line with Musk’s interest. Aid cuts both ways, in the promotion of rights and the withdrawal of the same, all with the aim of ensuring that American interests are served. It has always been, and will always be, America first.
South Africa is just one example, possibly driven by personal reasons behind the scrapping of aid. Other countries now pose a greater threat to the US with the shackles loosened. Already, leaders from Russia, Iran and Hungary have praised Trump’s decision to cut foreign aid. While this should signal alarm bells to any right-thinking authoritarian, it has yet to do so for President Trump.
Or, perhaps, Trump is some sort of evil genius after all. After reassessing foreign aid’s role in spreading repression across the world, he may bring back only the programmes that serve American interests, while scrapping the ‘fluffy’ projects—those that once made USAID and other foreign agencies welcome support for LGBTQ rights, healthcare, education and cultural projects. Already, there have been intimations that the Trump administration plans to use the USAID to bolster the use of fossil fuels, which the organization has previously opposed under previous administrations. This change in policy aligns with Trump’s ‘America first’ agenda, as the climate-change-denying president prioritizes the return of jobs that kept much of working-class America employed, in line with Project 2025. Meanwhile, nations most vulnerable to climate change, like the Congo, may suffer even more, continuing to be bled dry of the resources that rightly belong to them⎈
