NGOs: The Missionaries of Empire

03-03-2012 • by Devon DB

Non-governmental organizations are an increasingly important part of the 21st century international lanscape performing a variety of humanitarian tasks pertaining inter alia to issues of poverty, the environment and civil libertites.However, there is a dark side to NGOs. They have been and are currently being used as tools of foreign policy, specifically with the United States. Instead of using purely military force, the US has now moved to using NGOs as tools in its foreign policy implementation, specifically the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House, and Amnesty International.

National Endowment for Democracy

According to its website, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) is “a private, nonprofit foundation dedicated to the growth and strengthening of democratic institutions around the world,” [1] however this is sweet sounding description is actually quite far from the truth.