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International aid is crucial to the UK’s ‘Global Britain’ ambitions
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Date: None

The UK government’s decision to break its manifesto pledge by reducing the aid budget from 0.7% to 0.5% of gross national income raises a serious question: how can the UK deliver on the ambition of a Global Britain while disengaging from the world in such a profound way?

Over recent weeks, the government has started to communicate decisions as to where reductions are being made. The cuts are steep, involving both bilateral and multilateral aid for everything from humanitarian work to service delivery to the use of evidence in policymaking and global anti-corruption efforts.

The government has explained that these cuts in aid spending, which are intended to be temporary, are necessary because of the severe economic downturn the UK is experiencing as a result of COVID-19, and, presumably, Brexit. As different analysts have argued, however, the savings from aid are likely to have an almost insignificant effect on the UK’s overall fiscal situation, while for the world’s poorest the impact will be much greater.

Described by different partners, policymakers and experts as “devastating”, “shameful” and “maddeningly short-sighted”, the cuts include an 85% reduction in aid to a United Nations Population Fund family planning programme intended to help prevent maternal and child deaths; plans to cut funding for water, sanitation and hygiene projects across the developing world by more than 80%; and cuts of 95% in funding to eradicate polio. Funding for the UK Research and Innovation, which oversees the government’s research funding, has been cut by more than two-thirds.

As these cuts are being implemented, the UK has also published an Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy that outlines the government’s vision for the UK’s role in the world. This vision is anchored in the idea of a post-Brexit ‘Global Britain’ that can act as a ‘soft power superpower’. Foreign secretary Dominic Raab has also identified the fostering of ‘open societies’, based around free trade, democracy and human rights, as a core international priority.

The aid cuts seem to be in tension with such global ambitions, as was highlighted in a live discussion hosted by openDemocracy earlier this year. These internal incongruities are characteristic of the ‘have your cake and eat it, too’ approach to policy that has become characteristic of the current UK government. However, as we saw during Brexit negotiations, it is not always possible to get everything one wants, and choices made in one realm are likely to have consequences in others.

Stating that the UK is a soft power superpower does not automatically make it one. Commitment matters, and actions speak more loudly than words.

So what are some of the main sources of soft power that the UK has drawn on to date to contribute to achieving a safer, more equitable and prosperous world?

[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/international-aid-is-crucial-to-the-uks-global-britain-ambitions/