Foreign aid has rapidly evolved from the underfunded assemblages of volunteers it was up until only a few years ago. Corporations and government agencies the world over are jumping on board with large-scale international philanthropy—if not for public image purposes alone. However, is it an indicator of progress that the public now expects corporations to participate in foreign aid?
The Council on Foreign Relations hosted the program “Beyond Whole of Government: Public Private Collaboration to Achieve U.S. Foreign Policy Goals” on February 9th to discuss the direction of foreign aid. Those on the panel included Timothy L. Fort, Executive Director of the Institute for Corporate Responsibility at the George Washington School of Business, Lieutenant General P.K. Keen, Military Deputy Commander, and Stanley S. Litow, President of the IBM International Foundation.
The two main drivers of recent foreign development are the extraordinary expansion of U.S. direct investments overseas and the unprecedented public expectations of conspicuous corporate responsibility. Litow says that not only has IBM benefited from their foreign development efforts, but that they’ve in fact seen a 3:1 return on the investments. He claims that being fully engaged in developing countries and understand their needs fosters rapid technological innovation and offers consulting services that result in immediate feedback. In addition, the leadership training that it provides for IBM employees has proven invaluable.
But Lieutenant General Keen, who helped oversee the U.S. military response in Haiti, says the lack of communication between public and private sectors proves to be an obstacle in delivering effective aid. Keen reiterated, “We need to organize ourselves so that we aren’t meeting each other for the first time after a disaster strikes. In Haiti we were exchanging business cards with NGOs on the tarmac. Hopefully we can develop some sort of structure where that doesn’t happen anymore.” Coordinating with NGOs continues to be so difficult primarily because of how quick their volunteer turnover rates are, constraining the quality of training available to those on the ground. In addition to this confusion, the private sector has tended to maintain almost no communication with government agencies.
Fort and Litow both say that we can expect this to change drastically over the next few years. While it’s easy to remain cynical of corporate-sponsored foreign aid efforts, and perhaps with good reason, they claim it is inevitably the way of the future for all business. Says Litow, “Full global integration is the new objective. Not just being stationed in different countries, but integrating completely into their cultures and becoming a part of their environment—that’s what it will be about.” Fort agrees, asserting that “corporate citizenship” will soon be a term in every business’s vocabulary. The shape that this citizenship will take has yet to be seen, as this culture of business ethics is still in the early stages of development.
The panel raised more questions than it answered, but all of the participants agreed on these points: foreign aid is an increasingly necessary investment for our nation’s security, and we have a lot of room for improving how we go about providing it.
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Foreign Aid and the Private Sector
February 20, 2011
Foreign aid has rapidly evolved from the underfunded assemblages of volunteers it was up until only a few years ago. Corporations and government agencies the world over are jumping on board with large-scale international philanthropy—if not for public image purposes alone. However, is it an indicator of progress that the public now expects corporations to participate in foreign aid?
The Council on Foreign Relations hosted the program “Beyond Whole of Government: Public Private Collaboration to Achieve U.S. Foreign Policy Goals” on February 9th to discuss the direction of foreign aid. Those on the panel included Timothy L. Fort, Executive Director of the Institute for Corporate Responsibility at the George Washington School of Business, Lieutenant General P.K. Keen, Military Deputy Commander, and Stanley S. Litow, President of the IBM International Foundation.
The two main drivers of recent foreign development are the extraordinary expansion of U.S. direct investments overseas and the unprecedented public expectations of conspicuous corporate responsibility. Litow says that not only has IBM benefited from their foreign development efforts, but that they’ve in fact seen a 3:1 return on the investments. He claims that being fully engaged in developing countries and understand their needs fosters rapid technological innovation and offers consulting services that result in immediate feedback. In addition, the leadership training that it provides for IBM employees has proven invaluable.
But Lieutenant General Keen, who helped oversee the U.S. military response in Haiti, says the lack of communication between public and private sectors proves to be an obstacle in delivering effective aid. Keen reiterated, “We need to organize ourselves so that we aren’t meeting each other for the first time after a disaster strikes. In Haiti we were exchanging business cards with NGOs on the tarmac. Hopefully we can develop some sort of structure where that doesn’t happen anymore.” Coordinating with NGOs continues to be so difficult primarily because of how quick their volunteer turnover rates are, constraining the quality of training available to those on the ground. In addition to this confusion, the private sector has tended to maintain almost no communication with government agencies.
Fort and Litow both say that we can expect this to change drastically over the next few years. While it’s easy to remain cynical of corporate-sponsored foreign aid efforts, and perhaps with good reason, they claim it is inevitably the way of the future for all business. Says Litow, “Full global integration is the new objective. Not just being stationed in different countries, but integrating completely into their cultures and becoming a part of their environment—that’s what it will be about.” Fort agrees, asserting that “corporate citizenship” will soon be a term in every business’s vocabulary. The shape that this citizenship will take has yet to be seen, as this culture of business ethics is still in the early stages of development.
The panel raised more questions than it answered, but all of the participants agreed on these points: foreign aid is an increasingly necessary investment for our nation’s security, and we have a lot of room for improving how we go about providing it.
