The Eminent Person and The Sherpas

The Grand Bargain lingo that has to go

The Grand Bargain in 2021 independent review has arrived — packing a hard punch. It points out that the ´participation revolution´ claimed to be sought has not been achieved nor has the ´localisation´ agenda progressed. In fact, it has reversed, whereby direct funding to local / national level responders has halved from a measly 4% to a microscopic 2%.

The Grand Bargain is meant to be a vehicle working towards achieving the goals of, fundamentally, levelling the system, equity, fairness and as a result greater aid effectiveness. Seeing as this is evidently still not happening, can we take a moment to stop and ask: how well equipped is a vehicle, so openly influenced by colonial era hierarchies and tropes, to realise these aims? Might it instead be contradictory to continue to refer to its leadership as ´The Eminent Person´ alongside reference to other roles as ´The Sherpas´?

When I start to question my persistent distraction as pedantic, I ask myself. How would I feel if the name of my ethnic group whose use in diplomacy “started off as self-deprecating slang for underappreciated members of the diplomatic corps” is now routinely appropriated to describe the roles that do the leg work? Would I receive the impression that a group of predominantly white diplomats, who went by the name of my…