Jon Harald Sande Lie

Reproducing Development’s Trusteeship and Discursive Power

Reproducing Development’s Trusteeship and Discursive Power

The humanitarian–development nexus in Northern Uganda

The instituted order of humanitarianism is both changing and challenged by shifting circumstances in the area in which humanitarian organisations operate. This article addresses the transition between humanitarian action and development aid in Northern Uganda, a transition that was driven by and large by the host government’s ambition to reassert its humanitarian sovereignty in the area, enabled by its discursive recast of the situation from one of crisis to one of recovery and development. This recast happened in spite of the persistent humanitarian sufferings and needs in the post-conflict area. Yet, it drove humanitarian donors and organisations to reorient their work. While some withdrew, others moved into more development oriented aid, showing organisational malleability and that the humanitarian principles are losing their regulatory hold over humanitarian action. In response to the transition, some originations payed heed to the sanctity of the humanitarian principles fearing jeopardising the humanitarian space, while other took a pragmatic stance to continue assist the civilians regardless how the situation was being portrayed. Hence, this article, demonstrating the formation of a humanitarian—development nexus, speaks to the wider debates about the relationship between humanitarian principles and pragmatic approaches and the evolving humanitarian mission creep – all central to general debates about the nature and future of humanitarianism.

The limits of global authority: World Bank benchmarks in Ethiopia and Malawi

Global benchmarks (re)shape political conversations and institutionalise authoritative languages. It does not necessarily follow, however, that benchmarks can exert a lasting or significant influence over policies and behaviour of benchmarked actors. We analyse how the World Bank uses benchmarks to manage its relations with both donors and recipient governments. We analyse the role of the World Bank’s Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA), both at headquarters and in relation to the recent history of two countries in Africa: Ethiopia and Malawi. We find that the CPIA is not – and contrary to what one would expect from the CPIA’s nominal function and the literature on benchmarks – a very important tool for signalling incentives and allocating funds, or shaping the policy dialogue or the World Bank’s strategy in these two countries. Rather, the CPIA is used highly selectively as one factor among many in the negotiations between World Bank staff and governments. We conclude that the CPIA helps establish the World Bank as an actor that embodies global authority on development issues, including with donors, but that there is a tension between such global authority on the one hand, and concrete authority to shape policy in domestic contexts, on the other.

Developmentality. An Ethnography of the World Bank-Uganda Partnership

Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork within the World Bank and a Ugandan ministry, this book critically examines how the new aid architecture recasts aid relations as a partnership. While intended to alter an asymmetrical relationship by fostering greater recipient participation and ownership, this book demonstrates how donors still seek to retain control through other indirect and informal means. The concept of developmentality shows how the World Bank’s ability to steer a client’s behavior is disguised by the underlying ideas of partnership, ownership, and participation, which come with other instruments through which the Bank manipulates the aid recipient into aligning with its own policies and practices.

Etiopia: sterk økonomisk vekst - med bismak