The recent ‘defection’ of Senegal (switching official relations from Taiwan to China) has provoked a lot of talk recently about Taiwan’s “overseas aid” to its allies ( e.g. at ESWN, MeiZhongTai, Sun Bin, Michael Turton). Recently, President Chen Shui-bian mentioned that Senegal had received about NT$5 billion in aid over the last ten years (i.e. ~NT$500 million each year). Ignoring the crass way that this was announced (foreign aid has nothing to do with the upcoming elections in Chiayi), it does raise a question about whether these figures should be made public, and whether Taiwan is getting ‘value for money’.
There are two main problems with the current policy of buying allegiance from UN member nations:
- The money that is given to Taiwan’s allies is shrouded in secrecy. At the best of times, overseas aid often has problems reaching the people who actually need it (usually diverted into the bank accounts of various politicians and administrators along the way). Taiwan’s ‘under the table’ deals mean that you can almost guarantee that the majority of it ends up in various officials pockets.
- Taiwan’s allies provide very little in return. Apart from giving China an opportunity to throw its weight around each year when one of Taiwan’s allies nervously mentions that letting Taiwan join the UN would be nice, there seems to be no payback for Taiwan. From this perspective, all the aid is a huge waste of money.
So, a change of policy would be good. What follows is my suggestion.
What should Taiwan’s foreign policy be?
All overseas aid provided by Taiwan should follow the following basic rules:
- Complete transparency. Taiwan will publish exactly how much aid it is providing, and for what. In return the recipient country will publish accounts of how it is spending the money. This won’t stop corrupt officials skimming off their cut, but it will massively reduce it. It will also allow the Taiwanese voters and tax-payers to know where their money is going, and to have a mature debate about how much aid should be given.
- Base aid levels on international norms. The United Nations sets a target for every developed country to spend 0.7% of its Gross National Product on overseas aid – however the current spending of developed nations who are members is only 0.22% (source). If Taiwan wants to be treated as a serious member of the international community then it should probably spend somewhere between these two figures. Thus, the main purpose of the donations would actually be ‘aid’; support for Taiwan’s international status would be an (important) secondary effect.
- Primarily donate aid to allies. A majority of all aid should go to countries who officially recognise Taiwan, and are willing to speak up for Taiwan’s representation in international bodies. Clearly, humanitarian disasters should be exempt from this (for example, Pakistan earthquake recovery aid should not be limited by political issues – even though Pakistan has refused aid from Taiwan for political reasons).
What would be the effects of these policies? Well, Taiwan could (with a clearer conscience) talk about how it is helping developing countries – in the way it was helped itself in the 50s and 60s; this would then be something for the Taiwanese to be proud of rather than the current embarrassment at today’s dodgy dealings.
The fact that the aid packages were public would mean China would know how much they would have to increase their aid to compete – while this may result in the loss of a few more allies, it wouldn’t be too many. After all, the less allies Taiwan has, the more aid each ally would get, and so the harder it would be for China to lure them away.
The final big question, is how much aid? Well, the GNP for Taiwan in 2005 is estimated to be NT$11.9 trillion (source). So if we conservatively assume that 50% of all aid goes to the allies, and that we take 0.22% of the GNP as a baseline, we end up with a package of NT$26 billion – of which NT$13 billion would go to allies.
If this policy had been in place before Senegal switched ties, then Senegal (which made up over 10% of Taiwan’s allies by population) would have been in line for ~NT$1.3 billion a year – or in other words almost triple the amount of money they were actually given.
Looked at from this perspective, it seems that Taiwan is not giving enough international aid, is promoting corruption in the aided countries (via secrecy), and scoring a massive public relations own goal by hiding the figures.
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The .7% ideal is for developmental aid only, right? While it isn’t stated as such, I think that is how Jeff Sachs and others conceptualize it. The aid to Senegal and other allies would rightly be a completely different category: foreign aid for political purposes. While the former should be complely transparent, it may make sense to blur the return address of the latter. Additionally, lots of the latter won’t gain Taiwan any recognition in the international community. Does America’s aid to Israel buy any good will? Hardly.
Your program basically accepts the loss of Taiwanese allies. One assumes that if the aid doesn’t line the right pockets, the alliance would shift, otherwise why would the aid exist in the first place? Basically Taiwan is buying a few key decision makers and convincing them that it is in their personal interests to do Taiwan’s bidding instead of the bidding of their people. That isn’t democratic or pretty, but it works. To be more free and open about it, Taiwan would have to pump enough money into the economies of these countries to counterbalance the lost trade with China. While in theory, this could be accomplished by trade, not aid; in reality Taiwan is unlikely to be able to offer the volume of trade China could. Thus Taiwan’s only hope is offering more money. Less money is required if it goes to the right people.
Yep. I am proposing that Taiwan only gives developmental aid. ‘Foreign aid for political purposes’ (i.e. bribes which go straight into officials pockets) is a complete waste of money. Developmental aid is actually useful.
My suggestion would probably result in some allies being lost – so what? There is no difference between having 25 allies or 15. Just keep a handful to pipe up for Taiwan in the UN occassionally. I would much rather Taiwan spends more money for worthy causes than less money to a handful of officials. If my taxes are going towards building schools, bridges and hospitals in 15 allied countries I would be much happier than if it is going towards luxury yachts for 25 corrupt leaders …
Incidentally, it is perfectly possible for countries that recognise Taiwan to trade with China isn’t it? Probably harder, but not impossible – after all China’s in the WTO.
This misses the point to some degree (0.7 degrees?).
Taiwan should not even think of having an ally unless they are worth having.
One example (quick Google search comes up for 2001, but it is the same every year — by the way, we have 25 allies now):
For Immediate Release August 28, 2001
Ten Allies Support Taiwan Return to the United Nations
On August 7, ten of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies in the United Nations—El Salvador, Senegal, Dominica, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Nicaragua, Chad, Tuvalu, Palau, and Belize—filed a proposal with the UN Secretariat asking that the General Assembly convene a working group to study Taiwan’s bid for a UN membership.
ONLY 10? Why the fuck do we support “friends” who don’t support us? With diplomatic recognition, and all the perks attendant, must come support for the ROC’s causes internationally.
Otherwise, Wolf says, “Fuck off to Beijing, commie-lovers!”
Wolf – I don’t disagree with you. I proposed that aid should go to countries that are willing to speak up for Taiwan.
But the key issue for me is transparency … if you know that (for example) Panama is being given NT$200 million, and it is not supporting Taiwan then you can complain about it (and let’s face it, just about the only thing that Taiwanese legislators do well is complaining). At the moment, noone knows how much aid is being given, so noone can say anything. Perhaps the ‘allies’ who didn’t support Taiwan did have their aid cut – we just don’t know.
For me, it is not a question of how much (“Sister gets more attention than brother!”) aid is given. This will vary and should not be made public. Having Liberia as an ally never seemed an issue regardless of that country being run by a dictator.
Taiwan must not try to simply have a “how many marbles do we have in our bag” game. Wooo…Palau recognizes us! Big fucking deal.
On the other hand, if Taiwan wants to buy whores, just let the world know what we will pay for friends. It is the oldest profession after all….