Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

In reports of USAID shutting down, the soft power vacuum being filled by Russia or China is discussed ( https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/05/diplomats-usaid-letter-rubio ). Nobody ever mentions the #EU. Why? Two reasons:
- Nobody thinks the EU can do it.
- Nobody would be concerned if the EU did.
But with talk of EU dumping €800bn into defense, which is good, why is nobody suggesting that the EU find €50bn or so to fill the soft power vacuum? It would be good policy. Here's why: 1/
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Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

USAID hasn't always been effective, but there are buckets of programs they funded that are both worth discussing and immensely valuable to the EU. Broadly:
- Democratic institution strengthening
- Journalism and transparency
- Public health
- Cultural promotion
Each of these has a direct impact on the safety of European (and American, and global) citizens, and on world peace. 2/
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Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

Strengthening democratic institutions involves things like providing small amounts of money to facilitate meetings among young people or women who aren't likely to otherwise get into politics, in countries where there's a risk politics might be taken over by oligarchs or specific ethnic groups. It's a small thing but it helps long term stability of those countries, making the less likely to become a source of war, refugees, or threats in the future. 3/
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Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

Another form of democracy strengthening is funding training courses for election monitors, judges, and so on to increase the likelihood that democratic elections be run fairly, or providing educational materials in schools for better coverage of topics like democracy and geography that might otherwise be ignored. Both reduce the risk of countries becoming problematic. 4/
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Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

The journalism and transparency bucket contains things like funding investigative groups who track organized crime, exposing money laundering, arms trafficking, human trafficking, drug trade and more. (I used to do this for a living, and yes, USAID paid a small fraction of my salary for a while.) This kind of activity is cheaper and more socially acceptable than funding police forces and can compliment them, reducing entire categories of problems. 5/
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Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

It's ironic that the Trump admin talk so much about stopping fentanyl and such flows from Mexico but then defund the organizations that are best suited to expose and publicly discuss the problem. Funding independent journalism is incredibly important. You don't get to buy the results you want, but you do get to make sure somebody other than (often corrupt) police are paying attention to what's happening. 6/
Smári McCarthy
Smári McCarthy  ·  4 days ago

Content Warning

Public health measures include things like awareness campaigns that can reduce the spread of STDs like HIV/AIDS or waterborne illnesses, improve sanitation, and support vaccinations, all of which reduce infant mortality, contribute to reducing poverty, and thereby reduce the likelihood of epidemics, famine, and related civil unrest and refugee flows, etc. 7/
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