Ties without strings?, the Colombo Plan and the geopolitics of international aid, 1950-1980

grantor: University of TorontoThe dissertation is a study in the politics of aid. It explores the connections between British, Commonwealth, and American aid policy--and how this affected western approaches to the Asia/Pacific region (and the third world in general) at a crucial point in the Cold War. Its frame of reference is "The Colombo Plan for Cooperative Economic Development in South and Southeast Asia"--the first multi-national aid program which linked the West with the non-communist countries of Asia. The Plan was initiated in 1950 by the Commonwealth. By 1973 it had twenty-six members, five western and twenty-one Asia/Pacific states The thesis argues that the Plan was motivated by Cold War geopolitics; that this was why it was targeted only at countries within the strategic and security orbit of the Soviet Union and China; and that it was the Commonwealth's contribution to western efforts to contain communism in South and Southeast Asia. The establishment of the program was based on the logic that poverty and underdevelopment, and a huge population, made the non-communist states in the region vulnerable to communist subversion. Economic development, the program's Commonwealth sponsors argued, was the most effective measure against the communist threat. The Colombo Plan was the medium through which western aid--capital and technical assistance--was to be made available for this purpose. The dissertation analyzes the politics and diplomacy of expansion of the program's membership; the strategic, security and economic motivations of the participating countries, both in their capacity as individual actors, and as members of a collective concerned with problems of the Cold War. It also analyzes the structure and functions of Colombo Plan institutions, as well as the program's peculiar architecture--a multi-national institution operating on the basis of the bilateral principle. The dissertation is a work of synthesis drawing together the national and parochial perspectives of participating countries. The approach is holistic and global. The methodology is comparative and interactive. The context is Cold War geopolitics.Ph.D