Aid and Ebb Tide: A History of CIDA and Canadian Development Assistance

Graeme S. Mount is a professor of history at Laurentian University. He
is the author of Canada’s Enemies: Spies and Spying in the Peaceable
Kingdom and The History of Fort St. Joseph, and the co-author of
Invisible and Inaudible in Washington: American

This book is encyclopedic, in both the best and worst senses. Morrison
has undoubtedly prepared the most thorough collection between two covers
of information about Canadian development assistance since World War II,
not simply since the creation of the Canadian International Development
Agency (CIDA) in 1968. The list of secretaries of state for External
Affairs, from Lester B. Pearson to Lloyd Axworthy, itself guarantees the
book’s usefulness as a reference tool. With the help of an excellent
index, one can examine Canadian government developmental aid to any
recipient of such aid: when it began, how many dollars were involved,
what it accomplished, and when it ended. Morrison also provides reasons
as to why projects began and ended. The Diefenbaker government took an
interest in francophone Africa so that Quebecers would have some sense
of involvement, and Trudeau suspended aid to Cuba when that country sent
soldiers to Africa. Morrison discusses the pros and cons of tied aid,
and he outlines CIDA’s work with Canadian churches, Canadian
Executives Services Overseas (CESO), Canadian University Students
Overseas (CUSO), and other nongovernmental organizations. Aid and Ebb
Tide is a “must-have” for any serious scholar of Canadian activity
in the Third World.

That said, few are likely to begin at the beginning and read it from
cover to cover. Without any pictures or cartoons, it is, frankly, too
dull. Replete with acronyms and statistics, it lacks anecdotes,
biographical information, or the human touch. While it tells what
Canadians did and where they did it, references to people are fleeting.
References to beneficiaries of CIDA’s largesse are even more rare. Did
anyone who escaped famine because of the Columbo Plan have an impact on
subsequent generations of Asians? Did any young Africans who had an
education at Canadian expense then accomplish something useful? Who were
the Jamaicans with a better quality of life because of what CIDA did?
Morrison does not say.

Perhaps these comments are unfair. Morrison was not trying to appeal to
a popular audience. However, given that Canadian taxpayers have financed
the activities that he outlines and will do so more willingly if they
are aware of CIDA’s accomplishments, somebody ought to write a more
human, more readable, more interesting book. Otherwise, Canadians will
lose whatever interest remains in Third World projects, and governments
will continue to find cuts to CIDA politically expedient.