ABSTRACT
In the early 1990s, the issue of policy coherence towards developing countries came to the fore in the international donor community. In December 1991, a high-level meeting of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) called for development concerns to be taken into consideration in all dimensions of North-South relations: macro-economic policies, trade, export credits, tied aid, direct investments, agriculture, the environment, migration (including policy on refugees), the arms trade and drugs [OECD, 1992: 31 ff]. The perspective was, necessarily, that of donor governments. The main concern was that aid should be effective and that the policies and the aid-giving practices of different donors vis-à-vis a recipient government should be coherent and not conflicting. However, policy coherence does not operate in a political vacuum; the objectives set for a coherent donor policy constitute the most crucial issue.
