Is US Humanitarian Aid Based Primarily on Need or Self-Interest?

Abstract

The United States has made repeated public commitments to provide humanitarian aid based on need alone. However, some scholars suggest that US self-interest is a stronger predictor of US humanitarian assistance than need. We examine the tension between self-interest and need by studying the allocations made by the US Agency for International Development's Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance for more than 100 developing countries between 1989 and 2009. Moving beyond previous studies, we measure need based on both natural (floods, earthquakes, hurricanes) and man-made (conflict related) disasters. Contrary to much previous scholarship, we find need factors shape the decision to provide aid more than US self-interest does. We also find important differences in how much humanitarian assistance is distributed in the pre- and post-9/11 eras, with foreign policy affinity to the United States and battle deaths playing useful roles in how much aid a country receives in the post-9/11 period. The findings generally point to the ongoing importance of need as a driver of humanitarian aid decisions.