At an event on Thursday to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, co-hosted by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Brookings Institute, House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.) unveiled a discussion draft of the Global Partnerships Act of 2011, aimed at “reshap[ing] foreign assistance, making it more relevant ‘by incorporating the best practices and lessons learned over the last half century,'” he said, the Malaria Policy Center’s “Malaria Watch” blog reports (Todd, 9/9). Released as a draft instead of a numbered bill in order to spur discussion, the document covers “the full spectrum of foreign aid — development, democracy promotion, arms transfers and nuclear nonproliferation — but doesn’t include spending levels,” according to AEI’s “The Enterprise Blog” (Johnson, 9/8).

Foreign Policy’s blog “The Cable” reports that “[s]ome of the key reforms in the 813-page bill include: a new comprehensive system for evaluating and monitoring the success of foreign assistance programs, a rule that would peg USAID operating expenses to a percentage of program funds in order to limit dependence on contractors, and a requirement that comprehensive country strategies are developed with Congress’s participation and funded on a multi-year basis.” The blog writes, “In some ways, the bill adds implementation strategies for the broad goals set forth in the State Department’s Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review [QDDR] released last December. But it also goes beyond the QDDR by speaking directly to Congress’s role in the process (which the QDDR doesn’t cover) and mandating stricter oversight” (Rogin, 9/8).