ABSTRACT
The introduction to the book begins by stressing the importance of studying aid relations in the DRC, highlighting the importance of international engagement with the DRC since 2001 and the scope of the investments made broadly conceived, including in diplomatic terms, in peace-building/peacekeeping, and in the sheer amounts of development aid channelled. It then proceeds to underline the deep-seated contradictions in which international engagement has been enmeshed, all the while stressing how difficult it is to neatly separate international actions and initiatives from the Congolese responses they have in turn triggered, thereby introducing the reader to a notion the argument relies on - that of co-production. The book’s subject matter is also introduced and justified - its focus on state reforms in Congo, especially administrative reform, to shed light on the nature of aid relations, as well as the time frame retained of 2001-2011. The introduction then provides a summary of the argument and deploys some key findings. Foremost among those are the accommodative characteristics of the involvement of development agencies and donors with the Kabila regime, which albeit disquieting to the former, have by no means prevented them from disbursing aid. Administrative neglect has found itself at the centre of this process: even though it is unavoidable for the implementation of development projects through the association of civil servants, or for the implementation of sectoral reforms, the remarkable negligence of the central administration and the demise of the half-hearted and poorly supported civil service reform from 2003 to 2011 - relegated to low priority by the national authorities but equally sidestepped by donors - has not hampered aid flows from being disbursed, however impairing this configuration has proven in practice. Donors during this period showed little sign of scaling down their engagement, given the high stakes the country had come to represent as a locale of high international investment broadly conceived - in diplomatic, political, humanitarian terms and, more recently, exacerbated by the arrival of Chinese actors on large-scale, economic terms as well. Finally, the introduction outlines the structure of the book.
