Australian aid: re-colonisation by default?

A huge divide exists between enabling people to run their own lives, to make their own mistakes and to determine their own futures, and the paternal controller mode that sees centralist systems managing and delivering all government functions.

This is especially so when the controller mode is grafted on and reinforced through external interventions. In Papua New Guinea the poor performance of the post-colonial administration, which is a confused hybrid of centralised and decentralised systems, combined with low capacity levels of public servants, has left a populace that distrusts central government. Community disillusionment and a sense of disempowerment are growing. This feeds civil unrest and crime.

The centre can provide a coherent and efficient policy and budget management platform, but it is fruitless if good governance principles and resources are not applied locally and if local user groups cannot engage government.

A pivotal role for civil society and government interaction is to legitimise and manage central resource planning and distribution. By contrast, the current aid strategy can be characterised as imposing more central governance, global market prescriptions, more white faces, more police and what was the question again?

The outcome is a form of re-colonisation by default, which can sap the confidence of local people to run their own country. Efficient and fair central resource management is vital, but only in as much as it facilitates local participation and accountable and equitable service delivery on the ground. It is important to get palpable improvements for local people to legitimise the process in their eyes.

The crux of the Melanesian problem is weak institutions and chronic lack of working systems, poor management and training capacity and a lack of bridges to the people in their villages.

Through an insidious form of cultural imperialism there is a risk of whittling away respect for Melanesian identity. For instance, there is a tendency on the part of many Australians operating in Melanesia to over-simplify, undervalue and even demonise wontok or reciprocity systems, but these are the cement that binds customary society. Reform processes must work within these cultural parameters, not outside them.

A failure to value traditional culture has seen the baby go out with the bathwater, with young people in particular feeling disenfranchised. This cultural devaluing process can alienate young people from their communal moorings, leaving them disengaged, owing allegiance to nothing and measuring success by the acquisition of material cargo.

An integrated approach is needed to strengthen systems and resources management at all levels of government. It is essential to emphasise and value local participation and ownership, to strengthen home grown training capacity and to focus a large slice of Australia’s program on the hard yards of service decentralisation and local user group engagement.