U.S. Aid to Pakistan: Planning and Accountability

"U.S. Aid to Pakistan: Planning and Accountability"
Christine Fair

Since the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001, the United States and many other donor countries have fundamentally altered the logic of development assistance.  Pakistan, perhaps better than any other recipient country of concern, illustrates the “securitization” of aid. While there are no robust studies demonstrating the efficacy of development assistance in promoting peace, mitigating conflict or dissuading populations from embracing violence extremism, Professor Fair argues that this approach likely has had considerable adverse impacts upon U.S. efforts to reach out to Pakistanis and, ironically, may have engendered more distrust rather than mitigating the same.