Analysis | USAID Expertise is a Critical Foreign Policy Tool
Ambassador (ret.) Gordon Gray
On January 25, 2011, Tunisia’s capital was under a dusk-to-dawn curfew due to the unstable security situation there. Just 11 days earlier, mounting nation-wide protests in Tunisia had forced President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali into exile after 23 years of increasingly dictatorial rule.
January 25 was also the date of President Obama’s second State of the Union address. Driving through the capital’s deserted streets to the U.S. Embassy that evening for a virtual meeting with policymakers in Washington, I wondered what — if anything — the president would say about the dramatic turn of events in the country where I was serving as U.S. ambassador.
President Obama recognized that what came to be known as the Arab Spring was an important turning point for the region. His words that evening were simple but powerful: “We saw that same desire to be free in Tunisia, where the will of the people proved more powerful than the writ of a dictator. And tonight, let us be clear: the United States of America stands with the people of Tunisia, and supports the democratic aspirations of all people.”
Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle leapt to their feet, enthusiastically endorsing President Obama’s support for the Tunisian people, their revolution, and their dreams for the future. Americans soon forgot those two sentences in his 61-minute speech, but they resonated powerfully in Tunisia. A wide range of Tunisians, from cabinet ministers to ordinary citizens, told me the same thing: President Obama’s remarks and the standing ovation they evoked brought tears to their eyes.
The president’s comments were clear marching orders for all of us at the U.S. Embassy: support the Tunisian transition from authoritarian rule to a more open political and economic system. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) provided invaluable support as we sought to implement this policy — which had broad bipartisan support — even though there was no USAID mission in Tunisia at the time. Three success stories from 2011 illustrate how USAID experts did so imaginatively, nimbly, and at little cost to the U.S. taxpayer.
Disaster Assistance
Inspired by the Tunisian people’s overthrow of Ben Ali, anti-Qaddafi protests erupted in neighboring Libya the next month and the country slid toward civil war. The ensuing chaos led Libyans and third-country workers to flee the country, overwhelming the capacity of the already over-taxed Tunisian military.
USAID played a key role by deploying a Disaster Assistance Response Team to the Tunisia-Libya border to provide support and ease the burden. Specifically, the USAID experts identified humanitarian needs on the ground and helped coordinate international response efforts. I saw the effectiveness of their work first-hand on a trip to the border town of Ras Jdir with then-Assistant Secretary of State Eric Schwartz and then-USAID Assistant Administrator Nancy Lindborg, and I heard Tunisian appreciation for U.S. support time and time again in the weeks and months thereafter. U.S. experts were on the ground helping Tunisia. In contrast, China, Russia, and Iran were nowhere to be seen.
Projecting U.S. Influence by Providing Electoral Support
Neither Ben Ali nor his predecessor, Habib Bourguiba, allowed fair and free elections. Consequently, Tunisians lacked experience in campaigning for office or developing a policy platform. When interim Prime Minister Béji Caid Essebsi announced on March 3, 2011 that elections would be held later that year for a constituent assembly, USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives swung into action by deploying experts to provide essential electoral training to Tunisians.
The election was a success and Tunisians accepted the results as legitimate, even if their preferred candidates did not win. The Carter Center — one of many observer groups — hailed the election as giving “voice to the Tunisian people to elect their political leaders in a transparent and democratic process for the first time since independence.”
Promoting Economic Opportunity
Widespread discontent about high unemployment and reduced economic opportunity catalyzed the massive protests that forced Ben Ali into exile. So, USAID temporarily assigned to the U.S. Embassy an expert with extensive private sector experience to assist Tunisian business innovators. His work laid the foundation for USAID’s support for small- and medium-size enterprises and entrepreneurs following the revolution, which created thousands of private sector jobs for Tunisians. Fostering economic prosperity highlighted U.S. soft power, led to more commercial opportunities for U.S. businesses, and helped counter the despair that terrorist ideologies feed upon.
After taking the oath of office on January 21, 2025, Marco Rubio said that he wanted the answers to three questions to guide every State Department action: “Does it make us safer? Does it make us stronger? And does it make us more prosperous?” USAID’s effective support for the bipartisan U.S. policy toward Tunisia in 2011 made us safer, stronger, and more prosperous. USAID’s expertise continued to do so around the world in the second Obama administration, the first Trump administration, and Biden’s term in office.
USAID is a critical foreign policy tool, not a “criminal organization” as Elon Musk so falsely claims. His goal of “feeding USAID into the woodchipper” will only weaken the United States. Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, and Ali Hosseini Khamenei are undoubtedly gleeful about this self-inflicted wound as they eagerly await a U.S. retreat from the global arena. Nature may abhor a vacuum, but our adversaries do not.
Gordon Gray is the Kuwait Professor of Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Affairs at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. He was a career Foreign Service officer whose assignments included Deputy Commandant of the National War College, Ambassador to Tunisia, Senior Advisor to the Ambassador to Iraq, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs. Follow him on Bluesky: @AmbGordonGray.bsky.social
Interested in learning more about Tunisia and U.S. foreign assistance? Check out ISD’s in-depth case studies library and join the faculty lounge to access free instructor copies:
