Relational Governance: Rethinking Donor–Recipient Relations Through the Sawei Lens

ABSTRACT Contemporary international development aid is often undermined by relational weaknesses and technical gaps. Amid 2025 aid retrenchment and the de facto dismantling and reorganization of USAID, this article argues for a more relational approach to aid governance. Drawing on sawei (an Ulithian term literally translating to ‘food basket’), an Indigenous Micronesian exchange system from the Pacific, it identifies five principles: obligation, generational continuity, responsibility, symbolic reciprocity and distributed mediation. Rather than presenting sawei as a model for replication, the article uses it as a heuristic for rethinking how donor interests and recipient priorities might be aligned in more durable partnerships.