A majority of French people support an increase in development aid

Since 2013, a dynamic shows that more and more French people support an increase in development aid, although this trend is slowly decreasing since June 2020.

French public support for increasing official development assistance (ODA) rose from 18% in December 2013* to 27% in January 2024, with a peak of 37% in February 2020. This support started to drop between January 2020 and June 2020, just after the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In parallel, this trend is reinforced by a progressive fall in the same period (from 43% in September 2013 to 26% in January 2024) in the number of French people who want the government to reduce ODA.

These are opinions are given to a question which specifies the amount of ODA provided by France to developing countries (around 15 billion euros or only 0.56% of GNI). In reality this figure appears derisory compared to France’s overall GDP of 2600 billion euros, also provided in the question.

The results given to this question over the years demonstrate a growing space and attention for development issues in the French public arena. According to the last figures collected in September 2023, when we examine the data more closely, we can see three trends emerging:

– 58% of French people are in favor of increasing or maintening the amount of French ODA,
– For some groups (notably far-right voters, or those who say they are not concerned by global poverty), increasing (or maintening) ODA is less priority,
– For those already concerned, informed or involved in development or global poverty, there is a strong swelling of support for increasing ODA.

Which hypotheses to explain this increase?

– Successive civil society campaigns, which slowly "imprint" a better knowledge or awareness of development aid issues over time;

– (Social) media coverage, or a growing ease in a globalised world to access, see or share information related to global poverty.

– The emergence of migration issues, which have sparked debate and awareness about the reasons for migrants and refugees to leave their home countries in search of a better life.

*Please note: Results collected between September 2013 and July 2018 are from the Aid Attitudes Tracker (AAT) research project, while from May 2019 onwards, results relating to the same question are from the Development Engagement Lab (DEL) project. Although these two studies are sufficiently similar to show the evolution of the responses, they are based on two slightly different sampling methods, which may explain, in part, the evolution of the results between AAT and DEL from May 2019 onwards.

Looking at the previous data (Sept-Oct 2023) which were collected with a large panel (6000 respondents), support to increase (a bit or a lot) French development aid to poor countries is something which is particularly visible in young respondents (18-34) compare to their elders (45+): + 13 percentage points.
Also, increasing ODA is much more important for left-wing voters compare to average of right wing voters: +32 percentage points.
While questionned on increasing (or maintaining) ODA, center voters are much more close (72%) to left-wing supporters (77%) than to right-wing voters (53%).
Similarly, the desire to see ODA spending reduced is something which is typical of those over 35 or right-wing voters.

Political preference is a fundamental (and proportional) indicator of support of development aid. Left-wing voters agree with an increase, while far right-wing voters want to see ODA decreased. Center-voters are those who are most likely to give an opinion one way or another, and also (alongside the traditional right-wing voters) the highest percentage of those preferring to keep the status quo (neither increase nor decrease).