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FORUM 2009

The Future of Development Assistance Opening banquet panel highlights the challenges and opportunities ahead. BY LUISA CÓRDOBA, SENIOR RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT ASSOCIATE, INTERACTION

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EPRESENTATIVES OF THE philanthropic, NGO and public sectors discussed the future of development assistance in a plenary session at the Forum’s opening banquet moderated by Carol Lancaster, Interim Dean, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University. Bringing a philanthropist’s perspective to the discussion, Jane Wales, Founder and CEO, Global Philanthropy Forum, discussed six broad trends she believes are shaping the evolution of development assistance, including the strategic focus of a new generation of foundation leaders and “new philanthropists” or those who have become relevant actors during the last seven years: • Foundations supported by living benefactors are matching the scope and size of foundations created as a result of an estate; • New philanthropists are bodacious and entrepreneurial, take on exceedingly large problems and treat them like systems that need to be analyzed from several vantage points; • New philanthropists place heavy emphasis on sustainability. Their partnerships and investments come naturally, and seek to obtain maximum leverage to achieve longterm program effectiveness;

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MONDAY DEVELOPMENTS September 2009

• The rise of new philanthropists has accelerated the ongoing convergence between the private and public sectors; • Despite the convergence between the public and private sectors, new philanthropists understand that while markets serve the rational distribution of wealth, markets do not necessarily support an equitable distribution and so, policy matters; and • New philanthropists largely believe in the importance of informing individual decisions that are made around the world. New philanthropists want to inform millions of individual choices. In Mrs. Lancaster’s view, the old and new philanthropists will never replace official development assistance (ODA). Instead, they will play a limited role with their limited dollars. For highimpact and entrepreneurial programs, old and new philanthropists remain well positioned to provide capital to generate knowledge and take risks. Philanthropists will continue to turn to their governments for scale and sustainability. Jean-Michel Severino, CEO, Agence Française de Développement, said that if the international NGO community wants to be truly efficient in its advocacy work, and also convince

the public to support greater national engagement and enforcement of ODA commitments, it is our responsibility to clarify what exactly is considered ODA. The next step would be to conceptualize a framework that is comprehensive enough to report back to our constituencies. Mr. Severino listed some of the challenges of measuring ODA and emphasized the need to reach common “measurement” agreements between nations. According to Mr. Severino, there has been a major change in the politics and policies of foreign aid are designed and implemented. Private philanthropy has changed drastically the aid landscape, and new governments actively intervening in the development and humanitarian effort make the system more costly and difficult to organize. Mr. Severino believes the new era of development assistance will include participatory processes to better describe the costs and, more importantly, the impact of the programs each of our organizations has managed over the years. Future cooperation will not be achieved by creating more institutions and organizations to manage ODA, but through new behaviors and taking new angles on old, chronic problems. For example, a project combining data from the World Bank, the OECD, large foundations and NGOs could improve widespread access to key information. Charlie MacCormack, President and CEO, Save the Children Federation USA, invited the audience to think of ways the InterAction community could contribute to organize the interdependent and increasingly diverse system of development assistance, to include all funding sources from the private and public sectors in a more efficient and effective way. While challenging, “it’s a very optimistic time,” he said and noted that the potential for public engagement on these issues has never been greater. “There has never been a new generation as engaged in philanthropy.”

FORUM 2009

For Mr. MacCormack, development has always been about human ingenuity, creativity and mutual support, pointing out that the real, proven successes of development have always brought together multiple stakeholders and creative and complementary public and private partnerships. He also underscored that the new trends in

development and humanitarian affairs demand new, rationalized rules of engagement for our community across sectors and actors, in international fora and with domestic constituents as well. He believes we must focus on identifying and making better use of synergies in this complicated system of actors, instruments and benefactors.

Shaping Public Opinion on Development and Humanitarian Aid

tinue to create awareness at the local community level. “It only takes one to begin and others will follow.” He went on to say, “America has shown improvement in its ability to be open to societal change with the election of President Barack Obama, but much room for

Mr. Edwards suggested that celebrity engagement can be risky. It is imperative, he said, that NGOs identify celebrities who are authentic in their interest and are willing to “truly embrace the organization’s mission and live the type of life necessary to be an effective advocate.” He put forth Bono and George Clooney as exemplary celebrity advocates. According to Ms. Smith Ellis, corporations aren’t much better than celebrities. “A corporate partner must also be willing to embrace an NGO’s mission before they should be seen as an effective advocate. Some are looking for a way to improve a tarnished image.” Ambassador Hall brought the faith component to the session, referring to his success in engaging 4,000 people to participate in a fast to highlight global hunger. He said that, “with a church on every corner, we can do better. All of them operate clothing and food banks in their communities. If the faith community did a better job of working together,

improvement still exists.” He believes that before we can totally turn the corner and have a positive impact on the world, “all Americans must feel as if they are being represented by their government.” Many NGOs have turned to celebrities to help them promote their organization’s work and to attract donors, but

it would be close to unstoppable.” The discussion was a fruitful one that many in the audience hope will help NGOs change how they connect with the American public. Concerns remain, however, about how NGOs should engage Americans while they are enduring a severe economic recession. MD

Luncheon plenary tackles the challenges of turning good will into action. BY TAWANA JACOBS, SENIOR PUBLIC RELATIONS MANAGER, INTERACTION

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ISCUSSIONS ABOUT SHAPing public opinion on international development and humanitarian action were big on the first full day of the Forum. A group of InterAction member CEOs and senior policy and communications staff met with (RED) campaign CEO Susan Smith Ellis and actor and Chair of Shoe4Africa Anthony Edwards just before Tuesday’s luncheon plenary and engaged in an intimate discussion about the expectations of celebrity advocates, potential future collaborations, and a number of other topics. Ms. Smith Ellis and Mr. Edwards were then joined by Ambassador Tony Hall, John Dau (President of the John Dau Sudan Foundation) and Susan McCue (President & CEO of Message Global) at the luncheon plenary. Right off the top, all the discussants agreed that Americans support, in concept, the work of U.S.-based international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), including the InterAction alliance. However, one big one question remains unanswered: How can we get the public to actively engage in global development? According to Mr. Dau, we must con-

While private philanthropy mobilizes an estimated $36 billion per year for development assistance, and the questions remains whether those funds are being invested in the most effective way. We must work together to better understand and tell the story of the effect of this aid and our work in alleviating poverty. MD

MONDAY DEVELOPMENTS September 2009

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