The Role Of US Foreign Aid In Haiti’s State Governance

For a long time,political factions in Haiti have been fighting endlessly,politicians have done nothing,abuse of power and corruption have been repeatedly banned,and state governance has almost failed.At the same time,the United States has been deeply involved in Haiti affairs and has given Haiti a lot of assistance,but has failed to help Haiti get rid of its governance dilemma.What’s causing Haiti’s governance woes?Why US aid to Haiti failed to help Haiti get out of its governance dilemma?These questions are the reasons why the author wants to study the US’s involvement in Haiti’s state governance.The author makes a specific analysis of Haiti’s governance dilemma,and believes that the failure of Haitian state governance is manifested as follows:First,the failure of political governance,the fragility and instability of the political system,the chaos and decay of the political order,the corruption of officials,and the collusion of officials and bandits;second,the failure of economic governance,the inherently poor conditions in Haiti,the inability of small peasant economy to bear the burden of primitive capital accumulation,and the inability of industry and service to develop;third,the failure of social governance,the proliferation of violence,the lack of peace,the high degree of fragmentation of society,the serious imperfection of people’s livelihood facilities,and the serious destruction of the ecological environment Fourth,human rights protection has failed,people lack education and health resources,the rule of law operates in disorder,and impunity is prominent.In view of the humanitarian crisis facing Haiti,the international community has been actively engaged and assisted for a long time.The United States,in particular,is both the biggest external factor affecting Haiti and the country that assists Haiti the most.In 1944,the United States began to provide assistance to Haiti through the Lend-Lease Act;during the Cold War,although several presidents suspended aid to Haiti under dictatorship for the sake of human rights diplomacy,the United States still provided assistance to Haiti out of anti-Soviet and anti-communist needs;at the end of the Cold War,the United States achieved democratic transformation of Haiti,and the scale of assistance became larger and larger.The motivations of the United States to aid Haiti include the geopolitical and economic need to control Haiti,the export of values such as democracy,human rights and a liberal economy,and the psychology of redemption.Like other US foreign aid,US aid to Haiti has the following three characteristics:First,the United States dominates aid;second,aid attaches a lot of political conditions;third,non-governmental organizations and multinational companies are responsible for the concrete implementation of aid.After analyzing some aid cases,the authors found that the following phenomena exist in the US aid to Haiti:first,the excessive expenditure of aid resources in solving high-level human rights problems rather than development issues makes it difficult for aid to form synergy;second,the use of funds by some non-governmental organizations is not transparent;third,the salaries and administrative expenditures of international organizations and non-governmental organizations are large,resulting in waste of aid funds;and fourth,the collusion of non-governmental organizations with indigenous armed groups and gangs has weakened the authority of the Haitian government;fifth,multinational companies seem to have solved some employment,but in fact,they have realized the transfer of low-end industries in their countries through the exploitation of cheap labor;sixth,multinational companies have enriched themselves with aid funds under the manipulation of the Hillary family.Under this aid model,most of the aid funds returned to the Americans,the Haitian economy is still extremely underdeveloped,the Political Situation in Haiti is still turbulent,and Haitian society is still fragmented.As a result,US aid has failed to help Haiti out of its governance woes,and it is difficult to say that it has been effective.In this article,the US aid failed to play an active role in the national governance of Haiti,and failed to help Haiti get rid of the dilemma of governance.This has both internal reasons and external reasons.Haiti has failed to find a suitable political development path,nor has it found a suitable economic development path.The American-style democratic constitutionalism exported by the United States did not help Haiti achieve political stability,but instead gave birth to political chaos and decay in Haiti;the liberal economy under the Washington Consensus could not help Haiti’s economic development;the US aid was at the economic level and influenced by consciousness.The problem of mismatch between morphological interventions and specific implementers（including NGOs and multinational corporations）.The most fundamental reason is that the US aid to Haiti is by no means goodwill and selflessness.Its ultimate goal is to firmly put Haiti under its own control,monopolize its economic lifeline with its own capital and export its own values,and ultimately it is for itself.This article draws three lessons from Haiti’s governance dilemma:first,development requires the self-reliance of its own government and people;second,political and economic development must be combined with the actual conditions of the country;and third,we should conduct a deep reflection on US aid.