Description
In the context of new international security threats and domestic institutional change (I.e. creation of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office) this paper sheds light on the bureaucratic structures, incentives and interests that determine UK development aid funding decisions in conflict-affected states. Driven by domestic security considerations, UK development policy states that development aid should be used to create democratic, inclusive, well-governed societies in order to establish peace in conflict-affected states. However, actual funding decisions in these states often favour shorter term humanitarian aid and conflict prevention and security projects, rather than democratization projects. It is this gap between stated policy and the actual funding of projects that this paper analyses. Given that aid commitments that divert from policy may prolong or exacerbate conflict, impact UK security through the movement of people, terrorism and transnational crime, and waste tax payers’ money, this is an urgent area for research. Using new interview data from semi-structured face-to-face interviews with key decision makers at the UK’s newly created Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, this paper identifies how aid donors actually make the decision to divert from stated policy when distributing aid and constructs a theoretical framework through which to analyse and understand the gap between policy and actual aid commitments.
