A recent article on hunger aid and humanitarian assistance in the Nov/Dec 08 Utne Reader reprinted from Foreign Policy magazine presented a very well-written argument supporting the rationale behind this website: “Humanitarian groups and well-meaning charities keep failing countries afloat. They also create a crippling cycle of dependence.”
Dependence is a disease unless you’re a nursing child. It weakens one’s problem-solving abilities and diminishes the uniquely creative instincts in all sentient beings. Look at animals in zoos waiting for the next feeding. Consider humans standing in line for handouts of staple foods–year after year after year. Something goes numb. Apathy, lethargy, hopelessness become the norm. Even play is a distant memory.
This article by a trio of authors compares today’s monolithic amounts of foreign aid acquired and distributed by aid organizations, NGO’s and mega-philanthropies to the historic creation of colonial Empires in many of these same regions of the world–Africa, southeast Asia, the middle East. By creating dependence upon the invading powers, the European colonialists basically emasculated local tribal, national, ethnic political systems and eroded their central purpose in the lives of the locals. Using Afghanistan as an example, the article points out that 80 percent of all the basic services such as education and health care come from outside–from international aid organizations and NGO’s. “The result is a shell of a government, unable to provide basic service or assert its authority.” How can a people move beyond dependence and return its trust to its political system when the majority of people are dependent upon their basic needs for persons or groups outside their boundaries?
I appreciated seeing this argument in something as accessible as Utne Reader and encourage anyone interested in questioning the results of continuing to dump enormous amounts of aid to struggling populations. I agree with the authors that initial inputs of emergency relief, water and medicines is something all nations of the world might agree are part of being neighbors on this planet when one group suffers large-scale disasters, emergencies or an influx of refugees for any reason. Aligned with all those forms of aid could also be the creation of a self-sufficient growing system for food, traditional herbal medicines and forage for small animals. In this way, the immediate emergency is met while allowing the groups in question to maintain some semblance of autonomy and decision-making.
Who are the most influential and powerful NGO’s according to Foreign Policy magazine?
BRAC
Headquarters: Dhaka, Bangladesh
2007 budget: $480 million
Employees: 110,000
Major operations: micro-credit and poverty alleviation
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Headquarters: Seattle, Wash.
2007 budget: Of the foundation’s $37 billion in assets, more than $2 billion in grants was given last year.
Employees: 540, but growing quickly
Major operations: improving global health, eradicating poverty, improving American education
World Vision
Headquarters: Federal Way, Wash.
2007 revenues: $977 million
Employees: 31,000
Major operations: food aid and emergency assistance
Oxfam International
Headquarters: Oxford, England
2006-07 expenditures: $704 million
Employees: 6,200 field workers
Major operations: poverty alleviation and debt relief
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders
Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland
2006-07 expenditures: approximately $770 million
Employees: 27,000
Major operations: establishing health care services in poor countries and providing emergency medical care (Excerpted from the July 2008 Foreign Policy web exclusive)
These appear more like businesses than aid organizations, even acting as a major employer in the countries where they work. How could a group or people not become dependent upon them when locals probably obtain salaries they would otherwise not receive working for a local charity or government organization?
“As these groups deepen their presence in weak states,” according to the Utne article, “they often bleed the country of local talent.” I tend to agree strongly with that statement and it’s one of the foundations of why I initiated this website. Individuals and groups, even those we deem poor, hungry, indigent or in other forms of need, have the right to regain and hold onto their self-esteem, their sense of rightness, their decision-making powers however small the scale may be. Being poor and hungry does not equate to being stupid. Those in pain have the answer to that pain. But when the growling of their bellies is louder than the guiding voices in their heads, they begin the slide into dependence and hoplessness.
Any aid organization that does not put self-sufficiency and self-empowerment on an equal track with emergency supplies is probably setting itself up for a dependence-based relationship with the very people it ostensibly came to help.
Outrageous Gardens seeks to identify those groups, individuals or organizations whose primary work is establishing self-sufficiency and community independence. They are not the most flashy, well-financed or even the easiest to locate. They may, however, be the most effective “neighbors” on the planet. And worthy not only of our interest and support but also of imitation.
