Population Action International

Foreign Assistance Reform

PAI has a history of highlighting how FP/RH programs fit into larger efforts at improving the effectiveness of U.S foreign assistance. In keeping with this legacy, PAI currently is working in several coalitions to reform, restructure, and modernize the U.S. foreign assistance program. These efforts stem from a growing bipartisan consensus in Washington that the current U.S. foreign aid system, a relic of the Cold War era, is outdated and badly broken.

As a member of InterAction and the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network and a partner in their foreign aid reform efforts, PAI seeks to ensure that more and better coordinated resources are provided to U.S. foreign assistance programs. In addition, we are advocating that international FP/RH programs receive greater financial and institutional support in: (1) any rewrite of the legislation governing U.S. foreign assistance that may take place in Congress and (2) any organizational restructuring of the U.S. foreign assistance bureaucracy, including USAID.

Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network

MFAN Open Letter to Obama

In March of 2009, the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network, an influential and diverse group of more than 140 businesses, non-profits, and former leaders from the government and the U.S. military, sent President Obama and Congressional leaders a letter urging them to “make modernization of our foreign assistance programs a priority… [and] make global development a co-equal pillar of U.S. foreign policy alongside defense and diplomacy.” It was released to show President Obama, his advisors, and Members of Congress that strong individual, institutional, and grassroots support exists for their unprecedented efforts to elevate global development.

PAI’s President and CEO Amy Coen endorsed the letter alongside well-known organizations including the International Rescue Committee, Save the Children, and World Wildlife Fund, and influential leaders including former Joint Chiefs Chairman John Shalikashvili, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, William H. Gates, Sr., former Goldman Sachs Chairman John C. Whitehead, former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, and three former USAID Administrators.

To get involved and show your personal support for the restructuring of foreign assistance, we encourage you to download a “badge” to post on your social networking profiles, blogs, and personal websites to spread the word. You can download the badge and also sign your name to MFAN's open letter to President Obama at:

For further information, including a press release on this topic and the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network’s proposal for the Obama administration, please visit:

U.S. Global Leadership Campaign

In 1995 PAI was a founding member of the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign, a national coalition of more than 400 businesses, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and community leaders that advocates for a stronger, more robust U.S. international affairs program and budget. Members of the USGLC – a diverse, influential network that includes 400 corporate, humanitarian and development member organizations, an Advisory Council of prominent foreign policy and national security experts, statewide business and community leaders and activists from both sides of the political divide – engage policymakers in the nation’s capital and educate the public around the country to build support for these essential programs.

For a U.S. Global Leadership campaign analysis of 20 major commission and think tank reports on U.S. global engagement and “smart power” that unanimously recommends increasing funding and resources for civilian-led foreign assistance agencies and programs, especially for the State Department and USAID, please visit:
http://www.usglobalengagement.org/tabid/3667/Default.aspx