Interrogating the Dilemma of Foreign Aid as a Tool for Economic Development in Latin America in the 20th Century

Abstract

The paper examines the dilemma of foreign aid as an invaluable tool for the economic development of Latin American region up till the 1990s. The study employed the narrative and analytical historical methods of research and analysis. Data was generated through library search. It was critically analysed employing the qualitative technique of content analysis of historical documents. The study notes that some advanced countries like USA, Canada, and Australia pumped and has still been pumping vast amount of money as aid to the region since the 1930s. Some goals of the aid regime were to: stimulate improved standard of living of citizens of Latin American states; alleviate poverty; promote rural infrastructural development and; enhance economic growth and sustainable development. Ironically, however, the paper records that all the Latin American states had to show for the huge inflow of foreign aid have been unparalleled level of corruption; huge foreign debt profile, significant level of illiteracy; political instability; incessant regime change; endemic conflicts; low level of domestic savings and significant impoverishment of women population, among others, with the possible exception to Cuba. It concludes that leaders of Latin American states should institute economic policies that are domestic-savings dependent and shun corruption to ostensibly promote sustainable development in the nearest future.