The aid relationship in Afghanistan : struggling for government leadership

This case study explores the role of the Afghan authorities between 2001 and 2006 - the Interim Administration, the Transitional Islamic State of Afghanistan and the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan - in shaping the "aid relationship" between those authorities, and various components of the international community. It describes the strategies, frameworks, policies and systems that the Afghan authorities and the donors adapted or invented to manage aid. The case study analyzes the impact of those initiatives on the effectiveness of domestic and donor policy, and the drivers and constraints on the effectiveness of domestic policy. Given how recently the events described unfolded it is no surprise that there are as yet, at least to the author's knowledge, no accounts that convey the decision-making processes accurately. The account presented here is written from the perspective of a participant in many of the events in question who attended th e core meetings and policy discussions of the period in the UN, the Government of Afghanistan, and most recently in NATO/ISAF. Recognising that the author is therefore a participant as well as analyst, the case study nonetheless attempts to provide a factual description of the process, together with an objective analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of approaches taken against the goals they were intended to serve.