In April, I was fortunate to attend an event organised by VSO. It was the unveiling of their official partnership with United Nations Volunteers (UNV), including the launch of UNV’s first ever State of the World’s Volunteerism Report 2011.

The title of the event, “Framing the future of development:  putting people first”, was intriguing. In essence, it puts volunteerism at the centre of participatory development approaches by both acknowledging the forthcoming focus on creating the next international framework  (post Millennium Development Goals), and winking at the past (via association to Robert Chamber’s seminal 1983 book “Rural Development: Putting the Last First”).

As I sat and listened to Flavia Pansieri, Executive Coordinator of UNV, and Marg Mayne, Chief Executive of VSO, I was struck by the perhaps unsurprising convergence of discourses. They expressed a need for “social development to converge with economic development”, and the importance of “active citizenship” which gives rise to “the voices of people to influence policy-making”. I did have a moment where a cynical voice said “isn’t this what was being said in the 1980s?” Perhaps, but I think there are some fundamental differences, including the emergence of information and communications technologies in development, and the increasing importance of establishing systems for accountability.

As a former volunteer for a range of organisations in different capacities, I began to ask myself the question: well, if volunteering is such a dynamic and (dare I say it, at risk of compounding its overuse) robust approach, then why is it still underestimated and under-used? It is often viewed as an activity either for the young or the retired in the so-called global North. Or it remains invisible amongst the everyday acts of service and community responsibility acted out in collective societies (for example the Guthi system in Nepal).

And so, here are a few reflections as to what I think is holding back the role of volunteerism in development:

1. VSO and UNV espouse that “volunteerism is a universal concept”, which can mean that it becomes a way of doing (and being) that is everything and nothing at the same time.  The UN General Assembly (2001) defines it as: not for financial reward; based on free will; and of benefit to someone else. There are several threads of volunteerism which are informal and perhaps invisible. Indeed volunteers may also not want to be seen or to be recorded/labelled as such, because this very visibility can detract from the value of service. It is in some respects the quintessential “do gooder” label, which is imbued with a series of contextual power relations.

2. In many countries in the so-called Global South, volunteerism is often perceived as something foreigners do. The State of the World’s Volunteerism report sees this as problematic and states that, “in parts of the ‘developing’ world, the term ‘volunteer’ is a recent import from the North and refers essentially to expressions of international volunteering…[it] still flies under the radar, yet many societies would be hard pressed to function without it” (2011:3). Robert Leigh, the lead author of the report noted that there is still a tendency to also write that “national volunteers are written of as providing service in kind, rather than as volunteers”. Again, what does this tell us about the power relations (as Bourdieu would be quick to analyse) and what are the consequences of this?

3. Volunteerism is not inherently good. Just because a person is a volunteer, it doesn’t mean that they are: a) a good person; b) doing a good job. I know this is somewhat of an obvious statement, but there is a lot of naivety out there. Marg Mayne reminded the audience that it’s about getting “the right volunteer into the right (needed) placement, and supported by the right people”. No easy feat!

4. There should be more emphasis on the processes of volunteering, rather than on the end effect on the individual volunteer. In this way, volunteerism becomes less about the end in itself (i.e. a fulfilled, personally developed volunteer), but rather about the how, and the what (i.e. the evidence of positive/negative outcomes on a community). Volunteers can be amazing channels/tools that bring adaptation and innovation. But there needs to be more evidence of this, and as Danny Burns from Institute for Development Studies said, “if you are not looking for it – you won’t find it!”.

5. A tension that can arise with volunteerism, which essentially is related to the nature of exchange, and that these are clearly articulated by all people involved. Although a volunteer is doing something for no financial gain, is there something else that they are hoping to gain in return? Is it a time bound exchange? Can volunteers voice a change in expectations? Are there opportunities for the relationship/identity to change? Managing expectations is crucial.

6. “Volunteerism is a way to get out of marginalisation”. I was struck by this statement made by Flavia Pansieri. Indeed, there is a whole chapter on this in the report. VSO and UNV are commissioning some research on the impact of volunteerism, which I think is very timely indeed.  I look forward to the evidence generated from this, which will no doubt further the learning from which Flavia’s statement springs. How volunteerism is talked about is very important. It is a similar challenge in the youth development field, in which I work.  The normative role of volunteerism is transitional – volunteering is something you do at a transitional stage (young/old in life) for a given period of time. Yet, as the UNV’s report highlights, this is a limited view of volunteerism; it is an approach for development for all ages.

You no doubt have some of your own reflections/experiences to add and challenge me with – please do so with a comment below.

In the meantime, hats off to the volunteers behind whydev,  Brendan, Weh and Allison – a refreshing example of collaborative volunteerism in action.

Everything that we do in development is about selling a message. Whether it’s conveying an organisation’s work to a corporate donor, convincing the public that foreign aid actually works, or recruiting people for a local HIV-testing program in Zimbabwe, we all need to convince people of what we ourselves believe.

Despite all his, discussion in development rarely revolves around the most effective ways in which we can influence other people. Previously, on whydev.org, we talked about the tendency to hold onto existing biases more strongly whenever views are challenged. When a message goes against the grain of what people already believe, convincing them of this message is complex, and requires effective strategies.

Courtesy of a recent study cited in New Scientist, here is one strategy that may work better: change the messenger, not the message.

Around the middle of last year, Republican politicians in the United States claimed that the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine was a potential cause of intellectual disability, despite a lack of strong scientific evidence. Unsurprisingly, whether or not people believed them was highly correlated to their political stance. In one study, subjects were questioned on their beliefs across a wide range of issues, and then classified as liberals or conservatives. Scientists then examined their attitudes towards the HPV vaccine. When presented with balanced arguments for and against administering the vaccine, 70% of the liberals and 56% of the conservatives thought it was safe to do so.

The experimenters then created fictional experts who portrayed themselves as liberals or conservatives. With the more “natural” pairing of the liberal expert arguing in favour of the vaccine and the conservative expert arguing against it, the number of liberals who supported the HPV vaccine increased, and the conservatives who disagreed decreased. No surprises there.

The interesting result occurred when they swapped the messengers around, so that the liberal expert argued against the vaccine and the conservative expert argued for it. Under this scenario, 58% of liberals and 61% of conservatives supported the HPV vaccine. In other words, simply swapping the messenger around resulted in more conservatives than liberals being convinced by the safety of the vaccine, a complete reversal to initial findings.

This seems to suggest that it’s not so much the message that is crucial, but instead, the messenger. Recent calls from British PM David Cameron to end foreign aid to African governments who do not uphold gay rights do not acknowledge this research. Apart from the futility of such a threat, the British leader is only likely to bring up not-too-distant memories of Western imperialism and aid conditionality.

Who then, is the best messenger to convey the message we want to give? Let’s go back to the three examples that I opened with individually.

Conveying an organisation’s work to a corporate donor

Often, it is the fundraising department, sometimes coupled with someone who works “in the field”, that tells corporate donors how money donated impacts people’s lives. However, a more ideal messenger could be someone who doesn’t even work for the NGO – perhaps someone who works within the corporate sector itself. Apart from speaking about the good work of the NGO to colleagues, this person is also able to discuss the tax benefits of regular workplace giving.

Convincing the public of the merits of foreign aid

Again, having someone outside of the aid sector could be the best messenger. A trusted public figure with an average income (i.e. not Bill Gates) might be best able to explain how he or she saw the impact of aid work on a recent trip overseas. It is crucial that this figure is someone the public can relate to. Recently, Jet Li was criticised for encouraging people in China to donate more willingly to good causes, as they believed it was his responsibility, as someone wealthy, to do more of the donating himself.

Recruiting people for an HIV testing program in Zimbabwe

Rather than foreign NGO workers, a local Zimbabwean who was diagnosed with HIV and successfully treated for tuberculosis may be a more effective person to convince local people of the need for testing. Having a voice that local people can relate to could lead to the message being more influential and believable.

In life, there are many other instances where we also need to sell a certain message. It could be telling friends about the value of caring for the environment, eating foods that we think are healthy, or why watching back-to-back episodes of Glee on a Saturday night is not only bad for your social life, but also your general health and wellbeing. In development, we need to give serious thought about how the issue is being framed. But, before we even do that, we need to be selective about who it is that is doing the framing.

This post originally appeared on How Matters, a site that explores the “how” of doing development work, in all it’s shapes and forms. I highly recommend you add it to your list of regular reading.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

Rich countries delivered $3.2 trillion of aid to poor countries between 1960 and 2008. Yet only 36% of aid workersthink projects achieve their intended impact.

It wasn't that long ago that I was a "budding" aid worker. Chinhoyi, Zimbabwe 2003

Aid recipients agree, calling for a change in aid’s business model—from that of delivery of goods and services to one focused on relationships.

I have experienced the impact and potential of alternative funding and support mechanisms that could serve the conservatively estimated 1,000,000+ local groups and grassroots movements operating across the globe – see Wiser.org, for example.

A major obstacle to this, however, is the estimated 595,000 aid workers (ALNAP, 2010) who are rarely called to examine the bureaucratic rigidities that govern their day-to-day work and that deflate and/or marginalise local activists and changemakers. Cynicism, burnout, and jadedness on the prospect of any “real” progress can seriously compromise the hopefulness that many workers had when they entered the aid industry (see discussions with Satori Worldwide and  Mindfulness for NGOs, for example). Much of the time, the needs of aid institutions and philanthropies overshadow the needs of grassroots-up initiatives, with SO much being lost in the over-technicalisation of aid work and grant-making.

Yet in my experience as a loudspeaker for “local changemakers,” I’ve seen a growing cadre of skilled professionals that openly, bravely, and constructively question “business as usual” in the aid industry. And they are so needed. Connecting aid workers who want to instill and/or re-cultivate a sense of public service and downward accountability within their roles is the first step to change.

Imagine if just a small percentage of the large-grant aid resources are “unlocked” for grassroots-up initiatives. To re-direct even 0.01% of industry resources for local changemakers would be a tremendous win.

By supporting and encouraging dedicated and self-identified change agents within aid institutions to create more trust, equity and mutual accountability with those we serve in the developing world, the system-wide reform needed becomes possible. Like you, I no longer want to see local civil society organisations as the lowest common denominator of international development assistance. It’s time to recognise local initiatives and indigenous organisations as vital to supporting demand-driven development that can genuinely challenge power asymmetries, and unleash social change.

I support whydev.org‘s initiative to build an international support network for isolated aid workers because I think this effort could help share the good practices and actionable insights about how to better serve local partners, from within the system and outside of it. Now is the time to be corrective and imaginative, shifting the cognitive frameworks with which we talk about international aid.

No matter how you relate to your role in making the world a more equitable and peaceful place for its people to share in its prosperity, you have to do the internal work to know yourself first. In order to “be there” for anyone else, whether it’s your partner you sleep next to or the partner to which you give money, your own sense of well-being is the first thing that affects how effective you are in relating to and supporting others.

To meet the challenges of the 21^st century, we will have to “flip the aid system” to put more local and national actors in the driver’s seat of development. I, for one, want to make sure the next generation of aid workers is ready.

You too can support whydev’s campaign to build a support network for aid workers across the globe here.

Women Deliver recently came out with their annual “Women Deliver 50” list of inspiring ideas and solutions put forward by women and girls. The women and groups celebrated in the list cover a broad range of topics and programs, from midwives in Ethiopia to advocating for women’s voices in Libya.

One that sparked my interest was “Africans feeding Africa” by Backpack Farm, which is a social enterprise that hosts trainings for small-scale farmers in East Africa and sells them green agriculture technologies and supplies– all in a backpack.

I caught the founder, Rachel Zedeck, in the middle of the busy planting season in Kenya, but she managed to spare some time to tell me about their program and some of the challenges in pursuing the social enterprise model.

Tanya Cothran: Where does your funding come from? What drew you to the commercial model as opposed to the donor-funded aid model?

Rachel Zedek: I used my life savings to build the company, which is a registered LTD (limited company) in Kenya. In retrospect I think I was naïve. A hybrid NGO/for-profit model would have been best in the early days to help strengthen our operations with access to more grant funding. Now, more commercial capital is moving into the market but still not as much as you would think. Finance continues to be our biggest challenge to scaling our operations. Just five years ago, no one believed in for-profit for smallholder farmers. Now they have been included in the Davos and G20 agenda so I am hopeful this will help attract new agriculture investors into Kenya and the wider East Africa Community.

TC: Your focus is assisting smallholder farmers. What does this term mean and how about many smallholder farmers are there in Kenya?

Geoffry is a Backpack Farm Agronomist at the Eldoret farm.

RZ: We differentiate between a smallholder who has 2-5 acres of land and earns their primary income from farming versus a “last mile” or subsistence farmer who typically has less than ½ acre of land and lives in a semi-arid region with little or no access to water. It is infeasible for the majority of subsistence farmers to move above the poverty line through horticulture farming.  What’s more exciting is that 80% of the region’s food is produced by women. While we aren’t gender biased, we do work with a lot of women.

There are approximately 27 million smallholder farmers in Kenya (76% of the population work in rural agriculture). I and others estimate that approximately 21 million are truly smallholder with the remaining 6 million being subsistence farmers who are also pastoralist, such as the Maasai, Turkana, Borana, ethnic Somalis, Pokot, and other tribes.  They love cattle and goats and have limited desire to farm.

TC: How much do the backpacks cost? How do they reach your customers?

RZ: Backpack materials cost anywhere from $10 (for refill of products) to more than $2,000 USD for a full acre of inputs. This is 1/7 the cost of other commercial inputs. More than 75% of that cost is for the drip irrigation and water tank. This may seem like a large investment but on its own, irrigation can double or triple crop yields. If I had my choice, I would want every smallholder farmer to have access to a drip irrigation kit. The refill packs for each new planting season include seeds and cutting edge biological & botanical inputs enhancing soil nutrition (fertilizers), and crop protection.

These products are distributed through a network of franchise training and distribution centers. If the customers only want to attend training then they pay 20 KES (less than $0.25 cents) but they aren’t required to buy any inputs.

TC: How are your product and trainings marketed in Africa?

RZ: We are primarily leveraging local agriculture shows and our own farmer field days. Right now, we are shopping for finance, and so not able to invest in big marketing campaigns.  In the future, we plan to use more print and radio ads and our mobile tool to target specific regions with SMS campaigns.

Our website media is primarily used to attract franchise partners, investors and donor partners who want to leverage our technical program.

TC: Do you find that many people already know about some aspects of sustainable agriculture when they come to the trainings?

RZ: Yes, farmers do have a lot of local knowledge as well as bits from other NGO programs or national campaigns. The issue is not the desire to learn but a complete understanding of why they should be committed to implementing the techniques. We offer 47+ classes, covering a range of topics, with the biggest impact in water and soil fertility. In the last 10 years, we have suffered from eight years of drought or late and short rains. Better water management is critical to accomplishing regional food security.

So many NGO programs have popped up over the last 20 years. In fact, it has been a huge stumbling block for us. So many communities are indoctrinated with “free.” This is one reason we charge for our classes. When we launched free training, no one would come. We learned that free has no value.

Now we are asking farmers to invest in their own success through training or new farming technologies like drip irrigation. When you make an investment, you demonstrate the determination to see the return on investment. By giving them access to a demonstration farm, they can see the long term benefits of both the training and technologies. Farming is all about patience. At least with drip irrigation, we can show them a pretty immediate impact in their use of water (which is a cost input) and how well their seeds germinate. The longer-term impact comes from the strength of the plant as well as how much and what quality it produces at harvest.

TC: Is there any help for selling their crops, in addition to growing them?

RZ: Currently, we do not link farmers to a specific market but wholesalers are welcome to attend a farmer field day and meet farmers. In the future, farmers will be able to link to buyers through our mobile training tool, “KUZA Doctor.”

TC: If you received a large donation or investment today, how would you use it? How would you grow/expand/improve?

RZ: Ahhhh…the magic question of money. If we raised the investment we need today, I would do the following:

1. Hire four new staff including a new Director of Operations
2. Buy new equipment including two new cars and four computers
3. Move into a new office with space for a demonstration garden in the middle of Nairobi. It’s amazing how many city dwellers are secret weekend farmers.
4. Build a minimum of five new franchise farms. Build it and they will come – making it much easier for us to find partners in key agriculture regions like Meru and Nanyuki.
5. Plan a marketing campaign for the upcoming planting season. If all goes well, the short rains will arrive in October and November.

Visit Backpack Farm’s website to learn more.

Richenda Vermeulen, friend of whydev, sent out the call for bloggers to write about dreams and how they enrich, fuel and motivate our lives. But also how they change, how they come true, and how we struggle to reach them. You can see the posts others have written on her blog here. Here’s Allison’s take on what she’s learning about the nature of dreams and those who attain their dreams.

I’m in that shimmering phase of life where your dreams start to find you.

I used to think dreams started from the inside and worked their way out, that they came from your core and grew until they got so big you couldn’t contain them anymore and had to act.

I still think that’s true to a degree, but as I said, I’m now seeing that my dreams are finding me.

My dreams didn’t include working on a project to potentially help thousands of people across the world; now I’m one of three people here at whydev working on a peer coaching initiative for aid workers that may in fact do so. (You can support us as we work towards this dream over at StartSomeGood.) They didn’t include learning how to improve how organisations run until I started my first real job in an organisation; now I have dreams of doing an MBA. (One day, I hope to meet someone that makes me dream about family and domesticity in a way I don’t right now.)

These are just two examples of how two of my dreams found me. Now they influence the conversations I have, the plans I make, the things I read, the people I learn from, the friends I have, the way I perceive the world. I don’t think it’s much of an exaggeration to say they influence every aspect of my life.

As my dreams have found me, I’ve been more and more interested in observing those around me who have reached their goals and lived their dreams. As I work towards my personal and professional dreams, I find it helpful to look to those who are living their own dreams.

Here’s what I’ve observed about those who realize their dreams.

1. Their dreams are feasible for them

This does not mean that they will find it easy to realize their dreams. It just means their dreams are possible for them, that these people have figured out what they’re good at and passionate about and have a dream at the intersection of the two.

This seems obvious, but it’s not to everyone. I think of people who dream of being teachers without recognising their impatient personalities make working with children impossible, or those who dream of success on Broadway without facing that they can’t really dance. These are dreams that aren’t feasible.

The best dreamers know themselves well so that their dreams line up with their passions, skills, experiences, and personality.

2. They are surrounded by others chasing their dreams…

Chasing your dreams can require single-minded focus, at times to the exclusion of other aspects of your life. I’ve found it to be much easier to lock myself away to work on a project when others around me have understood why I would choose studying/blogging/working on a Saturday night over going to a wine and cheese soirée.

The people who truly understand those kinds of things are the ones also sacrificing things for their dreams. They understand, and they encourage and support you as you pursue your dreams.

3. … but they’re not afraid to go it alone

I was recently reminded of a quote from composer Jean Sibelius: “Pay no attention to what critics say. No statue has ever been put up to a critic.”

Well, I may one day put up a statue to William Easterly, but for the most part Sibelius is correct. The best dreamers understand this, as they inevitably face some robust criticism.

In a post on dreams, this may be the time to invoke Martin Luther King Jr. Thank goodness he didn’t abandon his dream when faced with opposition.

4. They learn from others smarter than themselves

It requires humility to learn from others when pursuing a dream, and it’s not always easy to open yourself up to suggestions from others for something as personal as a dream. But it’s worth it.

I’m never so excited about my dreams as when I have the chance to discuss them with other like-minded people who are smarter than me. They make me think about achieving my dreams in creative ways I never would have considered, and that’s exciting.

5. Their dreams are dynamic

There’s a poignant passage in the book “The Alchemist” where a merchant describes his dream to visit Mecca. For years, he’s watched people pass through his shop on their pilgrimage to Mecca, and now he can finally afford to go himself.

Yet he doesn’t. Instead he confesses, “I’m afraid that if my dream is realized, I’ll have no reason to go on living.”

I can’t imagine anything sadder or more untrue. I’m continuously amazed by the dynamism of those who dream big, how their dreams expand and evolve and lead to new dreams. For these people, the realisation of one dream often leads to another.

This gives me incredible hope. When I’ve achieved a dream, it doesn’t mean I’ve reached the end of dreaming. And if one dream doesn’t come true, another dream will find me.

***

I feel blessed to be chasing my dreams, and there have been many times that I’ve turned to a friend and said, “We’re living the dream!” Indeed, as I was mid-way through writing this post, a good friend called to excitedly share how she’s getting closer to realising a dream she’s had for a while. Dreams are all around me.

Often I’ve said it facetiously, but here I’ll say it seriously: I’m living the dream, and I’m fortunate to be learning from others who are too.

What have you observed about those who realize their dreams? Are you living your dream in aid and development?

An article this week in the Times of Swaziland – “Corporal punishment to be phased out soon” – first filled me with encouragement regarding the progress Swaziland has made in its development issues in comparison to other countries. Then it whisked me down memory lane, making a pit stop at one of the mini crises I had dealt with in Ghana as Project Coordinator for an international volunteer organisation. It was the classic nightmare case: a 19-year-old boy from higher income country (HIC)-X imposed his beliefs and culture on another’s after two weeks on his project.

Even with several hours of rigorous discussion courses specifically implemented to prevent circumstances such as this, he managed to do exactly what we instructed him to refrain from doing.

Our organization placed him in a teaching assistant role with a primary school. This school, along with nearly every other primary school in Ghana, uses corporal punishment as its principle form of discipline. Each of our volunteers at this school was derailed by the apathetic teachers, the swift crack of the canes across little knuckles; their winces, their tears, their shame. All for what? Jumping out of their seats in excitement to answer a question, not leaving enough space between their letters, even answering a question incorrectly.

It’s an injustice, yes, but what can one person do about it in three weeks? Or three years? A system established by colonialists, embedded into their culture to the point of irrevocability as perceived by the country’s majority, is not going to crumble easily.

Unless you are the United Nations, and corporal punishment abolishment is at the top of the agenda.

This Times article stated that the UN requested countries using corporal punishment in schools (Swaziland included) to sign a pact promising to phase it out. I’d like to find out how the UN plans to execute and monitor this, as it’s not something likely to happen in one or even three stages. “Soon,” as assured in the article, might mean a decade or longer.

But oh, to see the grin on this boy’s face when he thought he’d rid corporal punishment from this school. (Next step, the rest of Africa!) After his project work one day during the middle of his second week, he strode gallantly into our volunteer house with a teacher’s cane in hand, arm raised over head, and exclaimed, “One down, ten more to go!”

The mess was cleaned up as best as possible, and we made a big lesson out of it for the other volunteers there as well as volunteers to come.

We all want to help people – Brendan Rigby’s post on his professional identity in development expounds on this theory. But why do people want to volunteer abroad? What’s at the core of this? Is the desire to “Make A Difference” this generation’s culture? We know the desire is coming from idealism – is it too much idealism, not enough education on sustainable development? Misinformation from the media? Or is it coming from a more personal level – have we as humans progressed into individuals who act on blind determination?

I know I can’t fix this (insert HIV/AIDS, poverty, human trafficking, etc.) overnight, but I want to give it a go anyway for the fun of it.

In this context, it sounds like self-interest, arrogance, impatience and possibly even need for recognition. …

Considering my interests in aid monitoring, sustainable development and cultures different from my own, working with volunteers and occasionally defending this industry to the skeptics can be challenging. Depending on the organization, the volunteers either come from all over the world or a specific continent. The range in age depends on what the organization’s programs offer, but the majority is between 18 and 24 years old, either on a gap year or still at university – therefore, usually they have not yet acquired a technical skill. Critics may hone in on this point, condemning organizations for allowing non-experts to do work they are not qualified to do and use the world’s poor people as guinea pigs. A volunteer with no technical skill to share will not necessarily have nothing to contribute to his or her project; though, this does not mean we (my previous and current employers, and hopefully most other similar organizations) would place someone at a medical project solely because he hopes to become a doctor one day. At least for certain volunteer placement organizations, extensive scrutiny goes into matching volunteers with projects.

Some volunteers are more focused on the project; others are in it for the thrill of traveling. They have different priorities and different views. Most are only able to join the four-week programs because of lack of time or money or both; very rarely do people stay longer than three months. A few are curious about how their program funds are used, which are perhaps some of my prouder moments while at work.

How is short-term volunteering sustainable? I ask this question every day – it forces me to balance my cynicism meter.

Short-term international volunteerism is not sustainable for community members. In a twisted way I take pleasure in watching volunteers realize this – it’s practically a wasted experience if they don’t learn this lesson. I do believe these community members are positively affected by the volunteers’ interest in them and their communities, which is arguably equally important as creating sustainable change. Both parties enjoy the personal exchange, be it a specific skill, hope, enlightenment or ambition.

If a volunteer is motivated and has easily transferable skills, it is possible to “Make A Difference” by practicing capacity building and developing or improving organizational aspects of a grassroots nonprofit. The question is, will the work achieved be/remain sustainable? To ensure sustainability, the progress made by the volunteer will need monitoring. Is long-term monitoring feasible for such projects? Due to lack of funds, among other factors, it’s usually not.

People apply for international volunteer programs in order to learn. To see and experience things they haven’t before. And if after their volunteer abroad experience, their ideas and thoughts are changed for the better – their ideas more practical and thoughts more open – the volunteers are the ones who have been developed sustainably.

The other day, my husband announced that he’s become a nihilist.

Nihilism (as I rushed to wiki) is actually not as menacing as it sounds. It is simply “the negation of one or more putatively meaningful aspects of life.” In this case, the “putatively meaningful aspect of life” is the neoliberal economic model that we were raised on. He believed in it, and now, to quote the father of nihilism, “God is dead.”

Once I started to think about the disaffection with our current economic system and the lack of alternatives, I saw it everywhere. In public: Occupy Wall Street, the walk out of an entire Harvard class on a neoclassical economics lecture, NYTimes’ recent piece aptly titled “Young People Tire of Old Economic Models.” In private: my friends, well-educated and talented, dropping out of the game. Leaving good jobs to travel, to write, to think. We are adrift in a nihilist crisis.

I am of the generation that does not remember the Cold War, but remembers the aftermath. I am both young enough and old enough to have been assigned Fukuyama’s The End of History and Friedman’s The Lexus and the Olive Tree several times in university, reiterating in my mind that we won the Cold War because we were right. Liberal free market democracy is the future path, and eventually, once we get a McDonald’s everywhere, world peace will be achieved. Even after 9/11, we did not waver in our core belief that history is on our side.

Then came the Global Financial Crisis and increasingly loud alarm bells about population, food security and climate change. Two things became obvious: current levels of consumption in the rich world are too high and unsustainable, and marginal increases of consumption in the developing world, something we should be celebrating, are already straining the world’s resources. For young people and semi-young people like myself, the world is increasingly becoming a daunting place. Worse, the values and ideals we were raised on have been badly shaken. Free markets are bringing the prosperity they promised to some people, but they are doing a terrible job of solving the world’s biggest challenges. Indeed, in many cases they are making them worse.

Nihilism in a new age. Image courtesy of xkcd.

There are no obvious alternatives to the current economic system – the Cold War put that to rest. We can argue about where we should be on the spectrum of liberal democracies, but at the end of the day, even the most socialist of them embrace the fundamentals of free market capitalism. Yet, free market capitalism is failing us, not just because of Wall Streeters, but because the relentless pursuit of growth cannot be sustained at current levels. We are in a Catch-22: if continued as is, we will deplete the world’s resources alarmingly soon, but if we stopped consuming, the world economy will stall out, and many more people will suffer.

Can sustainable development principles come to the rescue?

Sustainable development, commonly defined, is “development that meets our needs without compromising future generations to meet their own needs.” Sustainable development is still about development, and it still puts humans at the center of it. In that sense, it’s not that different from what we already believed. But it adds a caveat: development must be long-term. The bottom line is not about this quarter or this year, it’s about 20, 50, 100 years from now. And what we can do now to make sure we get there.

In order to achieve this, sustainable development principles tell us that we must balance classic economic growth with social progress and environmental protection. That we must work to end extreme poverty, and use our natural resources wisely. That we should exercise precaution when undertaking acts that may damage society or the environment. And that all our actions should be integrated, with full consideration of the impacts that they have on each aspect of development.

This is not neat or simple. There is no corollary to the “invisible hand” in sustainable development; it will be decades before we fully understand what balancing and integrating development entails. It will also have fierce opposition. There are many people who still adhere, passionately, to the neoliberal faith, and those people have a lot of political power.

But the momentum grows for a new economic paradigm. The next step will be to take real action. Policies to address the world’s development problems have shown disturbingly little innovation so far. How can we harness free market forces to account for externalities – 100 years into the future? (One possibility: full cost accounting, to be discussed in a future post.) How do we make corporations abide by the precautionary principle without stymieing all growth? How do we meet everyone’s basic needs, without sending them on the path to the high-debt, status-driven lives that plague so many in the rich world? What is the fair way to tax emissions and resources? We disillusioned youth could do worse than to work on these issues, for our and future generations. Otherwise, I could be living with a nihilist for a while to come.

One of the common themes in recent development discourse has been the dichotomy between natural resource extraction and human and environmental rights. Mining is ubiquitous in the developing world, boosting foreign direct investment and creating jobs, but bringing with it a series of social and environmental problems that have often torn communities apart and fermented social unrest. The connection between mining and international development is an important one, but the antagonism between the two sides of the debate has allowed for certain sectors to be neglected. One such sector is that of artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM).

Artisanal and small-scale mining, particularly gold mining (ASGM), has always represented an important development opportunity. Today, with the price of gold hovering around US$1600 per ounce, ASGM has seen a huge resurgence. Current estimates place the amount of direct artisanal gold miners at up to 15 million people globally. The secondary economy that stems from this sector represents employment for up to 50 million people. ASGM is unique in that miners on the ground receive near “spot” or market price for the gold that they produce, creating thriving local economies and making the trade one of the most economically fair and equitable for the rural poor. However, the sector is plagued with problems, and the typical policy response has only served to worsen things.

The Peruvian government’s recent incorporation of informal mining into the criminal code, which created sentencing guidelines of up to 10 years’ imprisonment for those involved in the activity, caused massive protests in the Madre de Dios region of the country. These uprisings consisted of some 10,000 artisanal gold miners, caused three deaths and 30 injuries, and brought the importance of ASGM into the public spotlight, both in Peru and abroad. The protests represent another example of why the formalisation of ASGM is a complicated process that is unlikely to succeed without innovative measures that do more than simply criminalise activities.

Peru is one of the largest gold producing countries in the world, with the informal sector representing at least 50,000 ASGM miners, thousands more indirect jobs, and an estimated production of 30 metric tonnes of gold annually. The problem, the government rightly claims, is that a large number of these miners are using methods that wreak havoc on the environment and the health of local populations – mercury use being a major issue. The miners also illegally occupy land, evade taxes, and in some cases employ children. Although such problems pose great challenges, criminalising informal gold mining without taking the needs of such a substantial sector into consideration is not the solution. Not only does this create social unrest, criminalisation and marginalisation, but also provokes an employment crisis while deepening poverty.

Artisanal and small-scale gold mining is largely unheard of outside of the developing world, despite the fact that such mining represents unique histories in the expansion and modernisation of many countries. More than a century ago artisanal gold miners were involved in their own struggles with the authorities in Canada, the United States and Australia during the gold rush era. The ability of governments at the time to carefully navigate the complex situation resulted in a give and take process where the informal social contracts and extralegal arrangements already established by the miners themselves were eventually incorporated into law.* Legal impositions would only have served to stifle the sector and to create burgeoning black markets. Instead, governments were able to incorporate artisanal gold mining into the formal economy, enabling it to become a vital part of the growth of modern societies and a foundation for many of our existing land rights and laws today.

What happened a century ago is happening now in many countries like Peru. A new gold rush is underway and it is largely driven by poverty, with millions of people relying on it for a living. It is now the task of Peru and other countries to take the measured steps necessary to engage artisanal gold miners and to work with them to develop regulations that are achievable and context-driven. Prohibitive laws need to be accompanied by reasonable time-frames and support to avoid pushing artisanal gold miners further towards the informal market. Educational activities and technical interventions addressing better and safer mining practices must be utilised alongside market-based incentives. Sustainable artisanal gold mining could become a reality with the political will and resources to make it happen.

The first step towards achieving formalisation of the sector, however, is for governments to recognise the importance that ASGM plays in people’s economic and social well-being. A representative of the protesters in Peru said that the government was prioritising and favouring large-scale mining companies over artisanal gold miners. This favouritism is commonplace and it presents a unique challenge to which there is no precedent – large-scale mining was non-existent during the gold rushes of a century ago. Although large-scale mining today remains an important source of foreign direct investment, it is essential that governments recognise that, particularly in regards to gold, artisanal mining represents a much larger employment sector with real economic opportunities.

The social unrest in Peru illustrates the dangers of sweeping regulations that criminalise large sectors of the informal economy without taking specific needs and complexities into consideration. The problems that ASGM present are not insurmountable and solutions can be achieved with focused activities and a willingness to engage miners. With high prices of gold and millions of artisanal gold miners, an incredible economic and social opportunity has presented itself. Governments can choose to either reject it and likely worsen the problem, or they can embrace it and allow for artisanal and small-scale gold mining to fulfill its development potential.

*For further reading on the impact of gold mining on North American and Australian society see Hernando de Soto’s “The Mystery of Capital” and Douglas Featherling’s “The Gold Crusades: A Social History of Gold Rushes, 1849-1929”

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We are undergoing a transformation in the global economy. The financial crisis which has plagued the United States and Europe since 2008 is still holding back growth in those nations. In the meantime many developing countries continue to register positive economic growth. This is partly because developing countries are less dependent than they once were on developed countries as a source of growth. Research carried out by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2008 found that the business cycles of rich and emerging nations were diverging. Further to that, the IMF is forecasting that next year the developing world will out-produce the developed world for the first time. This signifies a key turning point and a monumental opportunity.

At the same time the importance of maintaining aid to developing countries is coming under the spotlight. Recently, the Canadian government made deep cuts to their foreign aid budget. Whilst the foreign aid budget has so far escaped such cuts in the United States, Greece and Spain have also slashed their aid budgets, as have Austria and Belgium.

The debate around the effectiveness of aid also rages on in many forums, including here on whydev (such as in this post). But, in light of the improved economic performance of developing countries, should there be a shift in the debate to be more focused on how the global community achieves the end of aid? And if so, how would we bring about the end of aid?

Although I don’t generally enjoy quoting Tony Blair, I’ll make an exception this time. In a recent op-ed in the Huffington Post, he argued that Africa can be free of dependence on aid in a generation. To achieve such independence he wrote that Africa needs economies that generate wealth and improved living standards for all. Similarly, the Nigerian finance minister, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, highlighted that aid to save lives is only part of the story. She explained that, “saving lives turns those people into productive contributors to the economy. Of course the social and humanitarian reasoning makes sense but add to that the economic”. She raised the question, “after lives are saved what is the next step?”

The next step is economic growth through trade. Today’s aid needs to enable tomorrow’s trade. Whilst economic growth figures in developing nations in recent years have been impressive, they can still be improved. Sub-Saharan African growth averaged 5% in the years 2000-2008 and we’re all familiar with the approximately 10% growth rates in emerging Asian nations in the same period. Although the economic turmoil in the US and Europe dented those growth rates, both regions rebounded in 2011. But, a recent World Bank report on the Light Manufacturing Industry in Africa highlighted the impact of poor trade logistics, which increases cost and reduces competitiveness, the holy grail of trade. Improved trade competitiveness is essential for developing countries to continue their growth trajectory and ultimately cut aid dependence.

In order to build a “trade enabling environment” an essential element of foreign aid spending needs to be investment in infrastructure such as roads, railways, ports, and systems. This is especially important on an intra-regional basis. In the African example, transport from landlocked nations to ports in the coastal nations adds significant cost and extends transit times, again reducing competitiveness. Also intra-regional trade is in itself a key component to increasing trade and economic growth. The OECD reported in 2010 that “South–South” linkages had intensified and trade is growing rapidly as part of the global production networks and also to serve the growing middle class in many emerging nations. The World Bank’s report “Connecting to Compete: Trade Logistics in the Global Economy” emphasises that efficient trade logistics is strongly associated with trade expansion, export diversification, the ability to attract foreign direct investment and economic growth. The basis of that report is the Logistics Performance Index, which assessed the reliability and effectiveness of import and export supply chains in 155 countries and ranked countries from best to worst. The countries in the bottom 10 in the rankings are low and lower-middle income countries and eight out of 10 countries are in Sub-Saharan Africa. China has the highest position of any developing country at number 27. It is quite clear that in order for autonomous economic growth to replace aid, investment in and improvement of transport infrastructure is an essential prerequisite.

In countries such as Malaysia, India and China, trade driven growth has been shown to be successful. In order for other developing countries to replicate such growth, rich countries can also ‘aid’ developing countries by allowing access to their markets and indeed providing a more level playing field. I won’t go into all the details of the failings of the Doha round, the so-called ‘Development Round’ of trade talks, but it’s clear that the lack of agreement is a key threat to increased global trade and that it is causing developing countries to lose out on significant opportunities. The current economic environment has also led to an increase in protectionist sentiment and hence creates less potential for a resolution of the round.

In a world where more than a billion people still live in poverty, it’s important to highlight that the end of aid dependence can be the goal only after development foundations have been laid, such as achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Aid is still an essential pillar of the “first step” in development that is to save lives. But Dr Okonjo-Iweala is right to ask, “what is the next step?”

The next step is becoming clear – it is economic growth through trade. Today’s aid needs to better facilitate this next step, by supporting better infrastructure and access to high-income countries’ markets.

Back in February, we announced a new initiative of ours – Peer Coaching. In a nutshell, we are partnering with Shana Montesol Johnson of Development Crossroads, to develop a peer coaching matching service. Since asking for expressions over interest, we have had over 300 people from across the globe contact us to say that they want to be part of our pilot program.

Why do we think that peer coaching is so important? We know that there are many people working in the field of aid and development across the globe with minimal support and guidance. We are aware that resources are limited in the humanitarian field. However, we also know that through support networks, and specifically, peer coaching, we can increase the return on investment for these workers and enable them to be more effective in helping the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people.

We want to provide a service that matches them up, so that they are able to support and learn from each other via Skype, email or other methods. This service therefore does not require more resources to be added to the sector (in the form of professional mentors, coaches or counselors), but rather, builds on existing resources that are not connected.

We’re doing this because we think that the need is out there. And because of comments from people like this:

“I feel isolated, uncertain and a little forlorn about finding my way into development-related work, and would like to have someone to share my experience with, who is perhaps also experiencing the same thing.” – E, 18-25 year old male, Honduras.

However, in order to get this project up off the ground in a reasonable amount of time, and with good quality, we’re going to need your help.

We reckon we need at least $3000 in seed funding to dedicate a solid amount of time to building the platform, providing the right guidelines for peer coaching, and matching people together in the most effective way. Building the platform will involve spending time on infrastructure – website redesign, functioning and creating a space so that matching can occur. We’ll also need to build the database of peer coaches from the ground up and create the resources to support peer coaches as the program continues.

If we reach our funding target, we think that we could get the peer coaching service up and running within a month.

What will happen if we don’t hit our tipping point and don’t get funding? We’ll still do the program of course as we originally planned, but it might take a bit longer and may not be as comprehensive and professional as we would have liked.

So, this is where we need your help. We’ve launched a crowdfunding campaign over on StartSomeGood where people can chip in amounts of money, small or large, to help us get this project going. If you are reading this post, chances are you’re either working, studying or are at least interested in aid and development. Therefore, chances are, you’re the right demographic to understand the difficulties that aid workers can face across the globe.

You might also be wondering about how sustainable your funding is? Good question! Once the platform is built, we think that we can keep the service running by adding in a tiered system of participation, so that it is self-sustainable. But first, we need to get the service started and that’s where the seed funding comes in.

We’d appreciate it if you would consider donating whatever you can to our StartSomeGood campaign here, and spreading the word far and wide about what we’re trying to achieve.

http://startsomegood.com/Venture/whydev/Campaign

If you have any questions at all about our campaign, please do not hesitate to contact either Brendan or myself. We’d be more than happy to answer any questions.

For the final word on the topic, here is Brendan, speaking from Ghana:

You can donate to our campaign on StartSomeGood here.

In February 2012, the Ugandan government’s reintroduction of the controversial bill that would create stricter punishments for homosexuality (which is already illegal) got me thinking. Not just about how heinous I think the bill is, but about the power struggle that the Ugandan government is engaging in with the US and the UK, both formidable sparring partners. In recent months, leaders in both the US and the UK have made public statements regarding the importance of respect for homosexuality and demanded that this priority be expressed in their nations’ aid packages. In essence, rather than simply (or not so simply) tying aid to the fiscal and economic priorities of “developed countries,” (terminology is a discussion for another day) aid may also be tied to their policies regarding gender and sexual orientation, as well.

Now here is my disclaimer: I am unabashedly, strongly, march-on-the-streets pro-gay rights and am proud to work on a team that researches how best to address gender inequalities across Africa. I also lived in Uganda, outside the small town of Mbale, for about 18 months, during which time I fell head over heels in love with the country – with the enormous, glaring hole of the climate of loathing for homosexuality.

With that said, one might assume that I am rejoicing that the US and UK have made protection of gay rights abroad a priority. To be honest, a part of me really has been celebrating this. But there’s another part, the overly contemplative, trying-to-hide-from-the-ugly-side-of-aid-but-can’t development worker part. The fact is, the US and UK may not be discussing legalizing the death penalty for homosexuality in their own legal codes, but there are still very significant and meaningful gaps in their treatment of hetero vs. homosexual citizens.

For example, in the US, sexual acts between persons of the same sex were only legalized at the federal level with the Supreme Court’s decision in Lawrence v. Texas in 2003 –just nine years ago! Before that, fourteen states had sodomy laws on the books, including Idaho, which punished “offenders” with “imprisonment in the state prison not less than five years” and theoretically up to a life sentence. Furthermore, there is currently no federal prohibition against employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and it is, in fact, legal in the majority of states (29). Though the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) was first introduced in the US Congress in 1994 and has been reintroduced in every Congress except the 109th, it has never been passed. This is not to say that the US has not made strides against anti-homosexual discrimination, but there is still a long way to go. Of course, with an election looming, Obama may have a vested interest in showing his pro-gay rights constituents that making progress on the issue is a priority, though he lacks the political capital to pass the ENDA or a federal marriage equality act. Enter foreign policy.

In the global arena, governments and citizens of developed countries can identify problems that exist in their own countries, such as poverty, economic inequality, and female empowerment, and quickly turn their –and their electorate’s — gaze outward. Problems in one’s own country may appear complex, historically rooted, and challenging (perhaps nearly impossible) to tackle. But in other countries, where one can adopt a sufficiently distant and simplistic perspective, it can all seem so easy. For example, racism in the US – well, now, that’s a tricky issue, embedded in a sad and guilty history of slavery and oppression, and entrenched in a complex cultural and socio-economic context. But tribalism? Well, that’s just stupid. Get it together, Africa! Stop the needless discrimination and fighting! Surely it’s that easy… isn’t it?

By adopting this attitude, it allows those living in developed countries to avoid acknowledging or addressing the imperfections, contradictions, and inequality existing in their own societies, while still feeling like crusaders for global justice. Then, of course, it becomes possible to demonstrate their dedication to “the cause” by flexing a little muscle since, after all, aid is a gift, right? And what’s a little manipulation nudge between friends?

In the US, Obama would need to find a way to pass legislation through Congress. However, in Uganda, a little tug on the purse strings requires no such dance. Before than attempting to control legislative outcomes in developing nations, though, it may be worthwhile to consider why and how proposals, such as Uganda’s anti-homosexuality bill, managed to get popular support in the first place.

I am not suggesting that the US or the UK should stop pursuing a rights-based agenda abroad, nor am I attempting to comment on Uganda’s legislative priorities. Rather, I suggest that these countries take a long, hard look inward and ponder their own selves – their values, motivations, and the actions that result – before deciding what other nations should or should not do.

Promoting education has always interested me. The potential of education to transform individuals into self-sufficient, lifelong learners is something I fully believe in. Having considered the idea of promoting education in developing countries, where there are significant needs, I could not resist the call of Timor-Leste and an offer to work on developing capacity within an education system so far from the goal of universal literacy.

I came into Timor-Leste mentally prepared, with the notion that education’s impact is slow to be seen. I knew of course that it would be difficult to garner overnight success for education-development projects, but assumed that the people of Timor-Leste must be aware of education’s potential in opening opportunities. That itself would be a good place to start.

So I went about planning and facilitating training workshops with the expectation that people would be hungry to develop their abilities. Surely, they would jump on the opportunity to learn new and better ways of doing things while expanding their network.

I was in for a surprise! Participants were in fact mostly looking forward to snacks and lunch, the pens and certificates they were given, and the daily subsistence allowance disbursed at the very end of the workshop. They weren’t as excited about the learning, as I had initially hoped. Confronted with the reality of differing expectations and worldviews, I tried to make sense of my place to affect some change, even minimally, in a country not my own.

The old way approaches development planning from the top down. Despite much talk in favor of participatory approaches, this method is probably still a reality at times. Education is about changing minds and changing lives. However, changing minds is a difficult endeavor, let alone changing behaviour. It is not easy to understand why people from another culture think and do things differently.

Often, in an effort to achieve quick consensus and to produce an outcome with the time, money, and resources we’ve poured in, we succumb to the paternalistic tendency of imposing our values on others. Sometimes even unconsciously! For instance, we think about education as an activity conducted within the four walls of a classroom building. As a result, we build more schools to address the issue of low access to education. However, perhaps what is most needed is a lengthier process of engaging the local community to truly understand parents’ constraints in sending their children to school. It is critical to understand local nuances and contexts, as we often oversimplify our approaches to relieve problems of the poor with an outside-in approach.

So, what can be done? Here are a few ideas.

Make a conscious effort to understand cultural differences and our reactionary responses.

We place ourselves in the danger of developing rigid ideas of what is right, what is wrong, how things should work, or should not, and developing stereotypes which can then lead to prejudice. It is hypocritical to only expect others to change according to our value system. Instead, we should also continuously make the adjustment to be considerate.

In the context of my work, training can be something removed from participants’ daily lives. Even a simple concept to us, such as affixing signatures to mark down attendance, is novel and foreign to some folks I have interacted with. If differences can stem from the small things, how much more there can also be differences in more complex concepts which we often take for granted. Our cultural origins and past exposure to different thinking, ideas, people, and places can affect the way we perceive information. It alters our values and openness to opportunities. Thus, it should come as no surprise that I often wrestle with discomfort given the varying levels of receptivity, openness, agreeability, or aggressiveness in daily conduct.

Respect the culture and build trust.

Ultimately, it is a balancing act. While I am experiencing uneasiness, it must also be difficult for the local community with stark contrast to my culture to comprehend me and my way of doing things. To be able to work effectively, respect towards the array of different cultures and languages must be built upon understanding. I have seen the impatient tendency of international volunteers with a preference to come in armed with an idea which they can just introduce and implement, only looking to deliver the kinds of returns they had hoped for, rather than what people genuinely need. Often, implementing what people need is perceived as too time consuming.

Education’s impact in the short term is perhaps limited. However, it can be a catalyst for change in opening pathways if we set our sights further. Education can give people a different worldview and a lens to clearly see, appreciate the options, and to question the current status quo. It can motivate people to be interested in opportunities for a brighter side of life they didn’t know they were interested in.

To accomplish such purposes, it is insufficient to ask for compliance; rather, we must be sensitive towards others’ real needs and genuinely listen. We need to be prepared to learn a lot more from the people we are trying to help. As the famous 13^th century Persian poet Rumi so aptly puts it:

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself”.

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are strictly the author’s and do not represent those of the organisation she works for.

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By Allison Smith, Brendan Rigby & Weh Yeoh

In the romance stakes, aid workers often get a bad rap. In fact, recently over at On Motherhood and Sanity, we heard about 52 reasons why you shouldn’t date an aid worker. We love that site, but respectfully, we disagree (yep, clearly not breaking any of the stereotypes outlined). Here’s why:

1. You will never have to suffer through a song by Bono or Madonna in their presence. After all, irrespective of their successful hits, “what do they know about development?”

2. They’re good at bargaining, and always pay close to local price.

3. They know how to fix a bicycle, using only a toothpick, some dental floss and a few small twigs.

4. They’ll be able to tell you the exchange rate in any country, down to the nearest cent.

5. In a crisis, they are seemingly unflappable, even if they’re melting down inside.

6. Impressive gut bacterial flora.

7. They’ll have an plentiful supply of cassava, chia seeds or any other obscure super-foods that you can tap into.

8. They’ll never complain about a hard mattress, a non-fluffy pillow or a cold shower (though you might have to suffer through a story about a harder mattress, less fluffy pillow or a positively arctic shower from years ago).

9. They know how much it should cost to take a taxi from the airport, even if they haven’t been to that country before.

10. They can quote lines from Hotel Rwanda.

11. They’re okay with using squat toilets – in fact, they may even tell you how it’s better for you because it elongates your bowel.

12. They make good +1′s to weddings, birthdays and open house parties. Impress your friends.

13. You will not have to indulge your own sense of guilt at social injustice and global inequalities, as they will take the whole burden on their own shoulders.

14. Smugness doesn’t come easier than when dating an aid worker.

15. Use ‘Moral Credits’ gained from dating an aid worker to offset the morally hazardous aspects of your life.

16. No, you do not have to give a beggar change. Although, there is evidence demonstrating the positive effects of non-conditional cash transfers, it may not have any robust effect on long-term earnings or savings.

17. Never feel like you need to donate clothing to charity again!

18. You’ll have reason to visit all kinds of exotic destinations around the world, places you would have never visited (and perhaps never wanted to…).

19. Get perspective on your cold/sprained ankle/other injury or ailment – hey, it’s not malaria!

20. Your mother will love the fact that you’re dating someone so caring.

21. They will be able to pack a suitcase or backpack as effectively as Mary Poppins.

22. They will be perfectly content if you skimp out on their birthday and take them to the local hole-in-the-wall place, because it serves “real Pho”.

23. They’ll know how to stream obscure interstate cricket matches/American football games/curling bonspiels via your PC.

24. If they are male (and sometimes even if it isn’t), they’ll have an uncanny knack for growing impressive beards. As the band “The Beards” suggests, You Should Consider Having Sex With a Bearded Man

25. They won’t know who Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry or any others on the Billboard charts are, being so out of touch with pop culture “back home”.

26. They know how to use Seatguru to find the safest and best seat on any plane, in case of an emergency.

27. They actually enjoy candle-lit homes, although this is double-edged, as it may take away the romance aspect of candles.

28. Your belief in democracy will be restored, as you will come to appreciate the significance of being able to vote for one of two parties.

29. They’ll know the one spot in any airport where you can find unlocked wifi.

30. Spending too much time on social media and blogs is better than spending nights at some club with that work colleague (“She’s just a friend!”).

31. They’ll have done yoga at some stage – flexibility is good, right?

32. They’ll have a camera on them at all times.

33. They’ll be the first to know about breaking news around the world. “Hmmm, I hope those folk in Galle, Sri Lanka, will be okay after that tsunami..”.

34. They won’t be easily sold by Fair Trade, Carbon Neutral businesses, or any other seemingly quick-fix solutions.

35. They know how to troubleshoot your SMTP settings on Outlook, so you can actually send emails from outside your home network.

36. She’ll know how to wax her legs using candlewax and foolscap paper (although more likely is that she doesn’t wax at all).

37. They’ll be able to track down Vegemite, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, or any other geo-centric snacks, no matter where you are in the world.

38. As they view material possessions as unnecessary and nothing more than a nuisance when moving, you will never have to give them any kind of gifts.

39. You’ll feel better about what you earn in your job.

40. Your son/daughter will become their school’s Model UN President (and work to bring about democratic changes to the Model UN from a bottom-up approach).

41. Have you ever wanted to see bureaucracy at a household level? Yes? Date an aid worker and see that everything is accounted for.

42. Your children will be empowered through a Family Micro-loans and Savings scheme, rather than the orthodox Weekly Allowance scheme, which creates dependency and has shown to only promote sugar highs.

43. Your friends will think you’re going out with someone with the flair and mystery of Indiana Jones, when in actual fact you’re going out with someone closer to Michael Cera.

Michael Cera and Indiana Jones

44. They will never, under any circumstances, inflict Kony 2012 on you.

45. They will be able to seduce you with that most romantic of languages, Bahasa Indonesia. “Saya cinta kamu”. Ah. It warms the heart.

46. You’ll never have to worry about what they look like when they’re not “dolled up”, because chances are, they looked their roughest when you first met them.

47. They are able to use the phrase “I’m going to a networking event” with a straight face.

48. You will get to participate in your first “tweetup” w/ #globaldev wonks in NYC. #smartaid #1milliontshirts #whatonearthisatweetup?

49. You will beat out celebrities to the next batch of exotic and trending baby names.

50. They wouldn’t be caught dead in Crocs.

51. They’ll know how to speak English to anyone, regardless of where they’re from. For example, they’ll say “seeya this arvo” to an Aussie, “Oh! Master, I beg you. I want to doze small small” to a Ghanaian and “why the hell do you call that hat a toque, eh?” to a Canadian.

52. If you end up getting married and your wedding is being paid for by either of your parents….well, let’s just say that aid workers know how to schmooze donors.

And, if you ever need to break up with an aid worker, just remember, there are 50 ways to leave your lover.

Over to you now – can you think of any more reasons why aid workers are date-worthy? Please let us know in the comments.

You can also follow Allison Smith, Brendan Rigby and Weh Yeoh on Twitter for more dating advice.

Invisible Children released what they are calling the second part to Kony 2012. Made in response to criticisms leveled at the first video, Kony 2012 serves two purposes. First, it is to give more information to the audience of the first video in regards to the LRA and how end the group’s atrocities.

This time, IC discusses a bit about the history Kony and the LRA, includes further videos of survivors and communities and lays out a clear play for how to defeat him. This all ties it back to action, as seen in the first video, with the urging of IC to contact political leaders and participate in their ‘Cover the Night’ event in a few weeks.

I may be a bit hasty in saying this, but the video is a failure. Little of it has to do with the content. It succeeds in terms of providing more information and history about the LRA. IC deserve credit for taking this concern seriously and putting it into a video. I still find disagreement with the way that solutions are presented as coming from outsiders, but that is more of a fundamental disagreement with IC. This time around, they do a much better job of explicitly saying they want to support local solutions, but the overall message of the video and the tone of IC trends towards what can be done to save the people of Central Africa from the LRA.

Kony 2012 Part II is failure because of its low reach. The first video has 87 million views on YouTube compared to 1.3 million for the second. Including the views from Vimeo, part 1 views rise to 105 million while part 2 stays at 1.3 million. That means that the second part of Kony 2012 retained 1% of its audience.

There is time for more to view the video, but the numbers are not racing at anywhere near the rate of the first video. A series of videos for the “Cover the Night” rally have been released during the same time. The highest audience of the group is currently at 59,000. While none of these numbers can quantify the reach that IC has in terms of social media and its local chapters, it does go to show the importance of Kony 2012.

The problems of the first video are what inform the majority of people who are not active in the Stop Kony campaign. Some may have seen the responses by the likes of Teju Cole or watch the screening of the film in Uganda as reported by Al Jazeera, but the views seem to show that the appetite is low for more. The backlash and the unfortunate public breakdown of Jason Russell may have something to do with the lower numbers, but one cannot be for sure.

What I believe to be likely is that the first video was so well done and powerful to many that it did not encourage further want to learn more. By orienting itself towards action, people became focused on how to support the work of IC and bring Kony to justice.

All of this is to say that the first video mattered a lot. Though casually dismissed as “armchair critics” by Nick Kristof, the concerns expressed were done so because of an understanding that such a large audience was a big deal. IC did something remarkable in reaching over 100 million people with a video about a Ugandan rebel who is committing atrocities in Central Africa. The first impressions do in fact matter in the end, for better and for worse.

Part II addressed some of these concerns and was much better than the first in terms of the facts and focus. However, it pales in comparison to reach.  It was never going to reach the heights of the first video and that is why it is a failure. Some people still hold the story told in the first video to be true.

Bloggers pointed to Chimamanda Adichie’s TED talk on the danger of a single story when discussing the first video. They were right on in doing so given the lack of audience in the second video. Advocacy uses the metaphor of a ladder where people are engaged in steps upward from rung to rung. Losing 99% of your audience is a massive gap if that is the theory of engagement. The failure of Kony 2012: Part II is due in part to the success of the first video which left little room for further learning or engagement. NGO communicators can learn that storytelling is a powerful tool to reach people, but it can shut down discussions and learning as easily as it can open engagement. IC’s step forward is welcome as it may slowly reach more people and possibly prove me wrong. Yet, we live in a post-Kony 2012 world so to speak. Hopefully the same mistakes can be avoided while learning the lessons of what made the video so wildly successful.The next benchmark will be the success of ‘Cover the Night’ on April 20. I have kept an eye out for Kony 2012 posters and listings wherever I travel. I spotted a poster when I was at the College of the Holy Cross a few weeks ago, but have yet to see anything else. If anyone sees any posters, art, etc please share it and ping me @viewfromthecave on twitter. I want to get a sense of the reach of the campaign. While the number of people viewing the videos is easy to measure, the action-oriented part becomes a bit tricky.

This is a cross-post with A View From The Cave.

________________________________________

Josephine Namirimu, from Uganda's Young Voices program.

Even though whydev brings a younger voice to issues and discussion around aid and development, it is rare that we have a chance to hear from a young person from Uganda. I recently had the pleasure of interviewing one of the most articulate and inspiring people I have ever met, Josephine Namirimu, who is a representative of Leonard Cheshire Disability’s Young Voices program. This program trains and brings together youth campaigners with disabilities from over 20 countries who have direct experience of having a disability and living in a poor country. It is unique in that it enables some of the most marginalised people in the world to have a voice and a direct influence over events and policy.

Although it was not my intention to interview anyone for whydev while at the conference, I was blown away by how well Josephine spoke about the topic of being young, female, and having a disability in Uganda. So impressed was I, that I simply had to hear more.

We talked about the difficulties that girls with disabilities face in Uganda, how being given the chance to have a voice has helped Josephine, and the importance of the Internet and Facebook for young people with disabilities. Our ten-minute interview can be found below, and the transcript below that. Thanks to Leonard Cheshire Disability and UNESCAP for hosting the conference.

If the audio below isn’t working, you can listen to the interview here.

Transcript

Weh: I’m here in Bangkok here at the moment at the Leonard Cheshire Disability and UNESCAP-hosted conference and I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Josephine Namirimu from Uganda’s Young Voices Program. Josephine I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about yourself and also the Young Voices program that you’re a part of.

Josephine: Thank you so much. I’m Josephine Namirimu, from Uganda, Young Voices, acting as the vice chairperson, Young Voices, Uganda. Young Voices Uganda is a part of the global Young Voices and Young Voices is part of Leonard Cheshire Disability International. It started in Uganda in 2009. We are 39 members and we are divided into 2 groups. One group is in the central and another is in the east. Young Voices is big and widely spread, especially in Asia-Pacific, Africa and other parts of the world.

Weh: So I’ve just heard a really fascinating presentation by yourself here in Bangkok. You were talking about the perspective of a younger person with a disability living in Uganda and being female. Can you tell us a little more about some of the challenges specifically young people with disabilities face and particularly girls?

Josephine:  Young Voices and women with disabilities, especially youth, are really facing a lot of trauma, in most of the developing countries. I don’t know how much it is in other areas, but in the developing countries, it’s really worse. When it comes to gender, it’s a double discrimination. First of all, we are marginalised as female, and secondly due to our disability identity, it has become really difficult. We’ve been affected in different ways. There is risk of sexual harassment, exploitation, and really there is no voice and positive response to that. Actually, due to UNCRPD (United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities) there is a kind of response and most of the countries have adopted, for instance, in Uganda, they’ve ratified it and governments are just beginning to adapt to the UNCRPD. However, if some of the issues are being worked upon, the greater part is still remaining in Uganda.

It is really, really difficult, especially to make it to school, lack of appliances, the ramps – ramps are in place but they are not in good condition. It’s like they’ve been put for formality. However, as Young Voices it is our role to keep on reminding the concerned parties to make it proper.

I still need to enlighten you more about the challenges faced by the ladies, young girls with disabilities. It happens that since we are so vulnerable, and because of that we can easily by affected and fall victims of so many circumstances. We’ve been misused, we’ve been abused, raped. For instance in Botswana, there is a story that’s been pointed out by Young Voices member in Botswana. A girl who is visually impaired. She forced in love, she was raped actually and she conceived accidentally. However, there was no kind of response or care towards this girl and it happens that this girl, her times of giving birth, no one was there. She struggled so much and after the baby was out, unfortunately, the kid passed away. This is the girl who spent almost a week in a coma, and after that, she also died. So it has been seen that there is not much concern towards women with disabilities, and young people as well. And because of that, we’ve been found to fall victims and we miss our chance to our future life. We would like to get the kind of life that we do want, just like other people. Because I do believe that there is no difference from us and other people. The fact that we cannot maybe walk from one place to another. However, we can perform in other areas. As Young Voices, we can just say that “hold me by hand and then I’ll reach to wherever I want me to go. If you hold us, if you help us, we can really perform it and we can forget all about other issues”.

Weh: And of course Young Voices gives young women and men opportunities to talk about their particular issues and lives. Can you tell me how you think Young Voices can help young people with disabilities improve their own situation?

Josephine: Young Voices has really, really done great. Has helped us and is still helping us. The limited age within the group is 16 to 25 and during that period we are trained on how to talk, how to advocate, how to present ourselves, we’ve been given trainings on ourselves. Their plan towards people with disabilities has been great and it is the reason I am able to talk to you frankly. Before, I was so shy, I could not even talk to people just because I’m disabled and I think everyone could be under-looking me. However, when Young Voices came out, they trained us, we have potential and I’m proud of Young Voices.

Weh:  It’s amazing to think that you thought previously you wouldn’t be able to communicate well, because you communicate so well now, so it’s an amazing transformation if that’s true. You also talked a lot in your presentation about technology, the internet, mobile phones and you mentioned Facebook as well. Can you explain a little more about why you think these sorts of technologies are important for young people with disabilities?

Josephine: This source of information, especially the internet is so important simply because it reaches out to us, to so many people. Especially in developing countries. Right now, most of the people they get access to internet. They read information, and since people are so busy, we are living a busy world, people have limited time. However with internet it is precise, so if we put information on the internet we are able and fully assured that it will reach out to many people. However it is slightly different from most of the countries in Africa, because most of the children and people with disabilities, I’m sure they don’t know how to use the internet. The reason being it is inaccessible in their countries, it is costly and above all, we don’t know how to use the internet. So we are missing a lot in that area. We would like to know more and more about the internet to reach the same level as others.

Weh: In order for you be able to access technology such as the internet, what sort of things do you think need to happen, what sort of role does government need to play or NGOS for young people with disabilities to access the internet more in places like Uganda?

Josephine: First of all is to avail the facilities and to make such places for internet and other sources accessible for all people including people with a disability. We need trainings. We need to know how to use the internet, how to use all the updated sources of communication. So I do believe when such sources are in place they are available to everyone, it will be easy for us to catch up.

Weh: Young people with disabilities need to be able to access internet and use sites like Facebook to communicate. How do you tell people who are from an older generation, who are often the ones in control of funding and resources, how do you explain to them that technology like Facebook is really important, when perhaps they are not so familiar with it as young people are? What would you say to these funders to convince them that it is important?

Josephine: I would really convince them, persuade them, by telling them the role of the internet today. Clearly, showing them that internet is worldwide and everyone gets access to it. It’s precise and we really also need to be on the same pace worldwide.

Weh: That’s excellent. Thank you very much for your time with us Josephine and we hope to be in touch with you in the future.

Josephine: You’re welcome. Thank you so much for your time too and the opportunity.

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I sit writing this post at my small desk, in the rapidly changing city of Tamale, northern Ghana (living in this city is like watching development occur). It is a simple room, furnished with both local and foreign amenities. A simple cupboard, a bed with mosquito net unused, a floral bed sheet for a curtain, an air conditioner used sparingly, a tea set, hauled from Beijing, China – my sanity and saving grace. A book on “Reading & Writing Chinese: Simplified Character Edition”. The Second Edition of David Barton’s “Literacy: an introduction to the ecology of written language”. A small statue of Buddha, which has accompanied me for the past five years. A small novelty Minnesota Vikings helmet, given by a visiting consultant who is based in Minneapolis/St. Paul. A six-picture photo frame given by my girlfriend when she visited over Christmas. My identity, at least how I perceive myself, is largely captured in this simple room. I draw comfort from it.

Yet, my professional identity is another matter, found elsewhere and not so clear. It has been a rough two weeks. A depression. I look upon my professional life as an archaeologist would the cross-section of a trench, with each layer quite distinct, representing certain periods of time, settlement and abandonment. However, the cross-sections are anything but clear. Artefacts from seemingly different time periods are to be found in the same layer. There are visible signs of destruction. But, most of all, there is a entire landscape of unanswered (and sometimes, unanswerable) questions. I have found it hard to keep my role in focus here. I am in a long-distance relationship. My professional future is uncertain. My current professional life is uncertain, ill-conceived. My role is largely determined by how I perceive myself as a professional and a worker. But, I am unsure how I see my professional self. It is perhaps a result of looking into the future, of trying to determine where I will be or want to be next. What do I want my role to be? Who do I want to work for? How can I get there? This focus on the future, I think, is leading away from what I am doing now.

I am tempted to use the “we” in writing this reflection, to have the arrogance to speak for all aid and development workers. Rather, I want to reflect on my personal experience, and allow you to respond and speak for yourself. A kind of group therapy, because although I may feel alone in having this swirling uncertainty of professional identity, I know I am not alone.

I try to separate my online identity from my professional one and keep my work quite separate from my engagement with issues and people online. I don’t want either to define me. Part of it is self-interest. I believe that my contribution to this site, and my connections with others, will support my professional career either indirectly or directly. However, I don’t believe that my online engagement will change how I professionally work. I do not want to get caught in the rhetoric and polemic. This is probably why I decided to collect and collate posts on #Kony2012, rather than write about it.

I enjoy the intellectual stimulation of online engagement, but think it naive to believe my perspectives will change people, prejudices, paradigms. Is Dr. Kim a good choice for the World Bank Presidency? What should a post-2015 agenda look like? How are the BRICs reshaping the aid system? I enjoy reading about such, and occasionally add my own or engage others online (and off), but to what effect? Social media and blogging is more of a way for me to socially and intellectually connect with others. Social media allows for this; power does reside within it, in the people who use it. Sometimes, I want to display my intellectual prowess and cunning, or try to be humourous. But, ultimately, I am engaging in these activities to connect with others (and probably, more often than not, to put others in their place).

To think that social media will give me the power to challenge orthodoxy is arrogant. To believe that I can challenge in my professional life is also foolhardy. I am not an Amartya Sen or Ester Duflo, nor a Scott Gilmore or William Easterly. I enjoy research and see my career heading down this pathway, with a hope to make my research applicable and participatory, and not purely academic or esoteric. I believe I have the smarts for it, without being brilliant; I have a good education, a critical mind with technical knowledge and expertise, some modest publications and a variety of foundational employment experiences. My moral and ethical compass points due justice, but gets knocked around by the magnetic forces of universalism and utilitarianism. I find snark and cynicism easy bed companions that feed off each other, but unhelpful in trying to develop my professional identity. I think they would corrode it. I try to practice being mindful, and believe this can support and shape my professional work. Reflexivity can be learned, is of undiscovered value, but is perhaps the hardest to practice.

I think these online engagements distract from trying to define my professional identity. I lose concentration from constantly checking Facebook, Twitter, updating statuses, sending tweets, trying to achieve enlightenment in 140 characters or less. Rather, I am beginning to understand that my professional identity will be defined in the work I do each day. In my application of concentration and discipline. In the conversations I have face-to-face with colleagues, friends, family, neighbours and those we work with – call them partners, beneficiaries, locals, nationals, participants. Society in humanity has, and will, always be defined by social connections and interactions, the most important being face-to-face, person-to-person. This is not a ground-breaking insight, but it is significant for me to remember. Without it, I have no professional identity.

I know that if I can define the limits of my professional identity, about what I can achieve, then I will be satisfied, productive. It is not a case of balancing idealism with realism and vice versa. It is about understanding who I am, what I am capable of, and how I can be. Idealism and realism are just concepts that others attach to my professional identity. They too are distracting. In writing this reflection, this is the list of things I uncovered about my professional identity, a real-time archaeology of my professional identity:

I want to create.

I want to share knowledge and enable others to uncover it.

I don’t want to save the world, but I do want to support the people within it.

I want to contribute, not necessarily in a way that is quantifiable, but in a way that is satisfactory to my own standards and which is at least tangible.

It is ok to look towards my own professional and personal self-interests. I want a family, I want a home, and can look towards securing such.

But, perhaps the most significant realisation I am coming to is this: that professionally, I am no more special, unique or necessary than any one person. My contribution, my role, is just as important as that of an electrician, plumber, taxi driver, janitor, lawyer, nurse, radio host, small business owner. We are all providing a service in some way, under the pretense of different reasons. Although I may believe my service to be more selfless, noble and even of a higher calling, this is just not true. We all provide these services for the same reasons: livelihood, security, and need.

And I’ve also realised that if I truly want to make a difference, then I should be a teacher again, for there is no other profession in which you can have a more direct effect on the lives of children and families than in teaching.

By Eva Vivalt*

Say you are considering which of three aid programs to support. As Weh Yeoh has explained, an NGO’s overhead costs don’t actually tell you much about how good its programs are, so you need more information.

Meta-analyses are the best way to develop general principles about which types of interventions are effective when data are available. Meta-analyses take the results of studies evaluating the impact of a type of intervention and combine these results.

Combining studies to make a meta-analysis is an effective way to measure impact.

An individual evaluation of the effectiveness of an aid program does not tell you as much as you’d like. Multiple studies are needed to reassure you the results were not just a fluke. Ideally, you would also like to see how an intervention performs in different contexts.

Once a few studies have been done, a meta-analysis is the best way to combine them to get an estimate of the program’s typical effects, its effects in particular settings, and its effects on particular groups of people. Some effects might also have been too weak to have been picked up in a small study; a meta-analysis is more likely to catch these.

A meta-analysis is different from a summary that simply counts how many studies say one thing and how many studies say another thing; it goes to the data and combines the results in a statistically sound way.

You can’t always do a meta-analysis. Some types of programs do not have good enough data. But there are plenty of data on many common interventions, such as the provision of insecticide-treated bed nets, water treatment, cash transfers, etc.

So meta-analyses are good, but why do we need more of them?

The market for meta-analyses is broken. Academics typically don’t want to do them because they get better publications from writing the first article on a subject than from synthesizing existing studies. NGOs don’t typically have the expertise or incentive to do them. Donors often aren’t aware that they can be helpful.

The result is that for many types of aid programs we have plenty of data but don’t have a good meta-analysis of that data. There are also many other areas in which the last meta-analysis was 10 years ago, and we have twice the number of individual studies today, but nobody has incorporated the new studies to ask under which conditions the programs work.

What you can do about it

A team of students from Georgetown and George Washington University is working on systematically going through aid programs and writing up meta-analyses of them, to prepare a book of 10 meta-analyses of common aid programs.

While I’m coordinating the effort, this project is student-driven and done on a volunteer basis. As you can appreciate, it’s hard to sustain such a large project with no budget. At the end of the day, it simply can’t be done without you.

If you’re interested in the subject and want to support this work, you can do so by buying a copy of the results, which will be discussed in plain English, through our Kickstarter page.

I hope you’ll consider supporting this project and being part of this work to further our understanding of aid and the effectiveness of aid programs. If you are at all interested, please check out the link here.

To learn more about the topic and how you can get involved, don’t hesitate to e-mail me.

Eva works at a large international organization and has an Economics Ph.D. and Mathematics M.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, as well as a Master’s in Development Studies from Oxford University. She has previously worked in the World Bank’s Development Economics Research Group and volunteered with the UN Development Program, and she has some first-hand experience with international aid projects through assorted charities including Oxford Development Abroad.

In the wake of the Department for International Development’s (DfiD) review of multilateral partners in the UK, Australia has just released its own report, the “Australian Multilateral Assessment (AMA)“. This assessment was recommended in the independent review of Australia’s aid program last year. It also comes as the Australian Government is rumoured to be considering putting a promised increase in foreign aid on the backburner by 3-5 years. Multilateral allocation represented around 37% ($1.6 billion) of Australia’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) in 2010-11 . This process is designed to assess multilateral institutions by ranking them against a fixed set of criteria. The AMA is modeled on DfiD’s “Multilateral Aid Review” that was published in March 2011. The UK review assessed 43 agencies against ten criteria. The AMA assessed 42 agencies and development banks across seven components, which were broken into 24 criteria.

Seven Components

Results and relevance
1. Delivering results on poverty and sustainable development in line with mandate
2. Alignment with Australia’s aid priorities and national interests
3. Contribution to the wider multilateral development system

Organisational behaviour
4. Strategic management and performance
5. Cost and value consciousness
6. Partnership behaviour
7. Transparency and accountability

The Winners

Thirteen agencies and development banks were rated as very strong or strong across most (at least six) of the seven AMA components and not rated as weak against any component. “With these organisations, the Australian Government can have a high degree of confidence that increases in core funding will deliver tangible development benefits in line with Australia’s development objectives, and that the investment will represent good value for money”. These are:

• Asian Development Bank
• Climate Investment Funds
• GAVI Alliance
• Global Crop Diversity Trust
• Global Environment Facility
• Global Partnership for Education (GPE)
• International Committee of the Red Cross
• International Finance Corporation
• Multilateral Fund for the Implementation of the Montreal Protocol
• Private Infrastructure Development Group
• UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
• World Bank
• World Food Programme (WFP)

What is critical to note, though, is that the World Bank received $505 million or about 1/3 of Australia’s total ODA to multilateral agencies in 2010-11. The next four largest are the Asian Development Bank, UNICEF, WFP, and UNDP. Funding to these five totaled over $1 billion (of a total of $1.6 billion allocated to multilaterals in 2010-11). Most of the allocations are tagged as ‘Non-core funding’, which means that the money is earmarked (tied) for a particular purpose, usually arranged by managers of country and sector programmes.

The Biggest Losers

Five agencies are rated as weak on at least one component and according to the assessment, “further analysis is required before decisions are made on core funding levels”. These are:

• Commonwealth Secretariat Development Programmes
• Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
• UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
• UN Human Settlements Programme
• UN Mine Action Service

Some interesting snapshots from the assessment: what else you need to know

• The Global Fund was only rated at least satisfactory on every one of the seven components, but well behind 29 other agencies, which were rated higher.
• There will be an annual assessment of Australia’s multilateral partners, with a scorecard released every August, including a focus on effectiveness at the country-level.
• There is considerable variation in the effectiveness of many multilateral agencies at the country-level. That is, some perform well in some countries but poorly in others.
• ‘Value for money’ is key priority for AusAID, as it is for DfiD. Although, exactly what ‘value’ means and who the ‘value’ is for, are uncertain.

Recent research has found that foreign aid has failed to reduce inequalities in some recipient countries, and it is significant to note that equity is not a strategic goal of AusAID. However, “saving lives” and “promoting opportunities for all” (vague, in the vaguest sense of the word) are. As the global aid system shifts, particularly around the presence of Brazil, Russia, India and China, and as issues increasingly become complex and interconnected (or rather, our recognition of such becomes more apparent), it will be interesting to watch how national aid agencies such as AusAID define, measure and justify such goals. “Saving lives” lends itself to quantifiable data, and is good marketing for the Australian public, but “effective governance” and “sustainable economic development” are a little more murky. This is made more acute by the nature of multilateral agencies and the challenges of effective performance and results-based management (value for money) across myriad different countries and contexts. Add another layer of “in national interests”, and it would appear very difficult for national aid agencies to respond adequately to global, national and community-level challenges.

AID/WATCH, an independent membership-based watchdog on Australian aid, trade and debt, has released an alternate multilateral assessment of four agencies. The organisation looked at four holistic indicators that speak to their ability to end global poverty and take actions of relevance to the global poor. According to AID/WATCH, their review assessed:

1. Human Development – what is the agencies development approach and how relevant is their mandate to human development?
2. Ecological Impact – ecology is the long overlooked development challenge whilst at the same time “greenwashing” is on the increase. Does the agency commit to conservation or just talk about it?
3. Working with the Poor – too often, agencies work on behalf of the poor, without ever asking them. Does this agency genuinely work with poor people and their organisations on issues of importance to them?
4. Development Politics – Where does the agency stand on fundamental issues such as the trickle-down effect, neoliberalism and the politics of development?

You can access and download AID/WATCH’s assessment below. The World Bank and Asian Development Bank represent the single largest channel for Australian aid, some 17% of total ODA. In contrast, the ILO and FAO both received heavy criticism from DfiD in its own multilateral review last year.

• Asian Development Bank (.pdf)
• Food and Agricultural Organization (.pdf)
• International Labor Organization (.pdf)
• World Bank (.pdf)

“The purpose of these frameworks is not to recommend one multilateral agency over another, but to illustrate the complexities of rigid ranking systems and the variety of factors that influence multilateral agencies. AusAID must consider each multilateral agency on its own merits”. (AID/WATCH)

Given the recent rumours of the government’s plans to renege on Australia’s promise to boost the aid budget to 0.5% of GDP by 2015, it is quite peculiar that it comes during the same week as the release of this assessment. Organisations such as Global Poverty Project, World Vision Australia and others are are expressing caution and concern, but are perhaps missing an opportunity. This assessment and rumour present an opportunity to demonstrate and leverage the effectiveness of Australian aid. The conversation should not focus solely on the volume of aid, but its effective allocation, through multilateral agencies or otherwise, in achieving development objectives and goals.

Parts one and two recap: Literacy is not a universal skill gained through schooling with culture and home practices as irrelevant, especially in a minority language community. Nor is literacy an automatic catalyst for economic development. But a lot of development policy assumes so. This is a particularly complicated (but interesting) concern in China.

This week, the world’s first World Literacy Summit is being held at Oxford, and making a convincing economic argument for investment in literacy is high on the agenda. However, what may not be on is how we measure literacy and design appropriate interventions. Literacy rates are one such measurement, but do they tell us what we think they tell us?

Do literacy rates measure what we think they do?

Literacy measures often use school attendance as a proxy, i.e. they measure things like how many community members completed primary school. This is because reading and writing at a grade 6 level (for example) is seen as “being literate”. This misses what sociolinguists call “subaltern literacies”, which are those ways of engaging with text that happen outside the classroom. These often go very much under the radar because the people involved are the poorest of the poor and the most excluded. In particular, these “illiterates” are excluded from Culture with a capital “C”: they don’t glow with learning and literature and refinement. They speak dialects, they do manual work, they are adults without much education. So what these people do with text isn’t valuable to those deciding on the standards and collecting the data. In fact, schooling measurements don’t acknowledge that these Others engage with text at all.

Nevertheless, in many countries, many people like this are actually more literate than their “betters” assume. They are the “literate poor”, but if they are not visible in measurements, development policies are unlikely to be directed to them.

Schooling-centred monitoring also fails to explain the shared practices between literate and illiterate community members which determine when literacy skills will be made available to others. Such monitoring is therefore deficient as a basis for designing programs to harness literacy’s instrumentality, because the data doesn’t clearly reveal all those for whom literacy is an instrument. And such monitoring fails to tap into home and community practices and attitudes which might stymie children’s acquisition of schooled literacy: does everyone completing primary school have the same literacy? And why are some communities’ children less likely than others to even get to that point?

How can you maximise the use of literacy for development if you don’t actually understand how it is used by people together?

There is discussion amongst scholars – some of whom are also practitioners – about how improving the understanding and measuring of literacy could improve economists’ policies for development. It’s an interesting strand within broader debates about the quantification of development. (I know many whydev readers have an interest in those debates; please share your thoughts below.)

Here’s the difficulty: how can we get the quantitative data development agencies want if we accept that we have to start looking outside the neat boundaries of formal schooling to harness important literacy practices? Bryan Maddox, of the University of East Anglia, suggests moving to a statistical methodology using a transparent, multiple thresholds in a “set of valued literacy functionings”, which would  index the varied literacies in a person’s life to his or her development.  This thresholds approach sits more comfortably with Sen’s influential Capabilities Approach to development, which

“argues that illiteracy is a ‘focal feature’ of capability deprivation and human insecurity. Illiteracy is viewed as a pervasive feature of capability deprivation and inequality, and literacy (particularly women’s literacy) as a source of agency, autonomy and socio-economic mobility” (Bryan Maddox and Lucio Esposito)

That is, it provides a more nuanced measure of the range of deprivation but also agency one person can have in different parts of their life.

However, for the moment, the bulk of monitoring still treads lead-footed through governments’ literacy/illiteracy rates, themselves built upon the outdated ideas of autonomous skills and school attendance. One example of this is UNESCO’s monitoring of whether we reach the Millennium Development Goal of halving adult illiteracy by 2015. This happens because evaluating situated literacy is more complicated, but this approach loses a lot by prioritising simplicity.

And does anyone care if your parent can?

Anna Robinson-Pant, also of the University of East Anglia, suggests this approach to monitoring leads to perceptions that literacy and schooling are the same, and therefore that adult literacy should be about acquiring the formal literacy missed through lack of childhood school opportunities, without giving weight to many other important literacy practices in adults’ lives. She suggests this results in smaller development grants for adult literacy programs. To me, that brings home a problematic, real-world outcome of the datedness of the literacy thinking which informs development policy.

More nuanced views on literacy, and more nuanced data, require effort.  Monitoring methodology can be seen as the dull, back-office side of development work. But the room for methodological improvement is real, just as real as the changes such improvements could precipitate in the world beyond the stats.

Weh: Brendan and I have a very exciting announcement to make. We’ve been on the whydev journey for 2 years now, and the time has come to expand the team. When whydev was started in May 2010, we weren’t really sure about the direction in which the site would go. Fortunately, whydev has grown immensely, and we need the help and guidance of talented individuals to help move whydev in an even better direction.

And, that talented individual is Allison Smith. Allison has only written one post for whydev so far, but it was a cracker. Moreover, she has shown us privately, and will show you publicly, that she is more than capable of helping guide the direction of whydev to where we want to be. Allison has a background in communications, so it seems only natural that she take over much of the work in that area. You’ll be hearing a lot more from Allison in the future, and we are ecstatic to have her on board.

Allison:

After two years as a collaborative and participatory platform for those interested in global issues, it became clear to both Brendan and Weh that there was an unfortunate lack of Canadian and female presence on the whydev team. So I was asked to join, and begin today as Sub Editor and Communications Manager for whydev.

Okay, so perhaps Brendan and Weh thought I’d bring more to the table than an extra X chromosome and a different accent (you can read more about my professional background here). A major part of my role will be managing the blog (help me out by pitching your ideas to me at allison@whydev.org, but I’ll also be helping out with various other things going on around the site.

As Brendan, Weh and I discussed joining the team, there were a few things from our conversations that stuck out to me and made me want to come on board. I’m sharing them with you in the hopes that they’ll make you want to get involved, too.

• Experience not necessary. The first sentence under “about dev” reads “whydev.org is a platform for everyone interested in discussing a diverse range of topics from international development and foreign aid to career advice and morality.” Note my emphasis on “everyone” – it’s not for those just who have years of experience in development. It’s for everyone with an interest in these issues, and I’m a perfect example of that.
• Tone not judgmental. The whydev team affirms that you can be critical without being cynical or judgmental, and that approach resonates with me. There are many (hilarious) snarky aid blogs out there; it’s good to have a space that is more accessible.
• Censorship not practiced. This clinched it for me. Whydev is committed to discussing ideas from a wide range of perspectives, regardless of personal opinions of those on the team, because it’s the discussion that’s important, and not the promotion of a whydev agenda. This is unique from many sites and blogs, which by nature are often run by one person or a particular organisation with a particular perspective, and in my view this distinguishes whydev.

So there you have it. Those are some of the whydev values that made me want to be involved; I hope you feel the same way, because there are certainly lots of things to be involved in. Here are a few things on the horizon:

• Peer coaching. If you’re working in aid and development and have ever felt isolated, you should take a look at this initiative.
• Face-to-face networking events. These face-to-face networking opportunities serve as a physical whydev presence and are a chance to discuss development with others.
• Rethinking development studies. We’ve been approached by a university to help rethink what development studies is all about, and will be getting the whydev community’s input on this.
• Diversifying content. We’re looking at partnering with folk and organisations who specialise in visual and audio content, so that our content is more diverse.
• Website and logo redesign. To reflect all these changes that are going on, we’re going to have a new website and logo up and running in the near future. More on this soon.

In a nutshell: lots is going on, and we want you to be a part of it. If you have ideas for whydev to pass on, or any good vegetarian recipes, drop me a line at allison@whydev.org. You can also say ‘hi’ on Twitter at @asmithb.

By Janet Newbury, Sharon Ede and Joshua Nelson

As members of the Post Growth Institute, we have been having some animated conversations regarding the topic of carbon offsetting (aka ‘carbon neutrality’).

On the one hand, we aim to be as transparent as possible about our successes and shortcomings when it comes to our own consumption patterns.  Some individuals and organizations are using the calculation and offsetting of carbon usage as a way of doing that.

On the other hand, we see offsetting as deeply nested within the growth model.  As such, not only do some of us believe the popularity of offsetting will not bring us closer to post growth realities – there seems to be plenty of evidence so far that it will in fact move us farther from them.

Before getting into the details, how about a few stories?

Image credit: kumaravel

Once upon a time …

1. … there was a guy who was becoming increasingly conscious of his impact on the world that sustains him.  He began to think more deeply about the things he does that damage the delicate balances required for that world to thrive.  He started riding his bike to work.  He chose to holiday closer to home.  He enjoyed growing and preparing local food.  One day, his friend invited him to go on a back-country adventure in a 4×4.  He thought about it, and asked some very deliberate questions about how much fuel might be consumed on such a trip.  He decided to look into ways to offset it, so that he could enjoy the 4×4 trip, knowing he was simultaneously contributing to a good cause.
2. … there was a vending company that  supplied schools all across the country with sugar- and chemical-laden beverages that come in single use containers.  This company decided to become ‘carbon neutral’ as an innovative way to market itself.  Brilliant!  From that point forward, all of the delivery trucks could proudly display signs that this was a ‘socially responsible’ company.  Business flourished, and all the kids in all the schools still got their sugary drinks.
3. … there was a transport company, one of the largest in the land, which wanted to be a good role model for other ‘corporate citizens’.  Along came BP’s Global Choice fuel emissions offsetting scheme, and the opportunity just seemed perfect.  Once the transport company signed up for the challenge, its managing director publicly exclaimed: “The more kilometers we travel, the more we help Australia’s environment.”

What does offsetting actually do?

The most common understanding of the answer to this question goes something like this: By purchasing carbon credits, we are investing in activities (such as the planting of trees or adding of renewable energy instead of carbon-energy) which restore the balance of the ecosystem by facilitating the reintegration of the carbon that has been used in the burning of fossil fuels or by removing carbon-emitting that would have be placed without the offset.  So, for instance, if I take a flight (which burns fossil fuels) I can buy carbon credits (which contribute to the planting of trees) to negate the damage that otherwise would have taken place because of my flight.

However, that’s not actually how it works.

We are, in fact, dealing with two carbon pools: the active carbon pool (which moves among forests, atmosphere, and oceans, and rarely increases or decreases), and the fossil carbon pool (which is locked away in coal, oil, and gas deposits – until extracted, that is).  When fossil fuels are used, carbon is being irreversibly shifted from the fossil to the active carbon pool.

Trees don’t store carbon in the lock-tight manner of the fossil carbon pool: forest fires, timber harvesting, disease, decay, and other processes keep this carbon active. And planting trees is not a benign activity either – not at this rate.  The demand that is now emerging for large-scale tree plantations is being resisted by many who are most effected by the trend.  Indigenous peoples and other communities that rely on forests in areas where these plantations are being developed are facing loss of land, and increased violence and disputes.

Similarly, the ocean, which also acts as carbon sink, can only absorb so much before its ability to keep absorbing increasing amounts of CO2 diminishes. Offset or not, the use of fossil fuels permanently adds otherwise inert carbon into the active pool. To further complicate the issue, the warming-climate fuelled melting of permafrost and release of previously locked up carbon will release yet more significant amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, creating a vicious circle.

Add to this fact the likelihood, as demonstrated in the three stories above, that carbon offsetting may actually increase the consumption of fossil fuels, and it becomes clear that rather than being a solution, offsetting is a potential contributor to climate change as well. Take, for example, the fact that several large airlines are now making claims of carbon neutrality, and promoting themselves on that basis. Our carbon emissions continue to raise with increasing speed, regardless of efforts in offsetting.

It is often the communities that are most reliant on the land which are the first to experience the devastating effects of climate change. If these communities suffer from the loss of land that comes with tree plantations used for offsetting and from the emissions that come with the still increasing levels of consumption of fossil fuels, then that means these communities are doubly impacted (while others profit from it, often none the wiser to the reality).

We must also pay attention to the phenomenon that has become known as Jevon’s Paradox: History has shown us that with each technological advance that improves efficiency, consumptions rates have actually increased, not decreased, over time.  From wood, to coal, to fossil fuels, this has proven to be the case.  So for us to suddenly believe that a technological fix such as carbon offsetting will solve the issue of consumption (carbon or otherwise) once and for all, we may be naively turning a blind eye to a fairly predictable truth about ourselves.  And as the stories above indicate, increased consumption on the basis of offsetting is certainly not out of the realm of possibility.

The familiar language – and practices – of reduction

Of course, we don’t need much imagination to think outside the box of offsetting.  Rather than asking how we can offset what we consume, we can go back to the tried and true practices of reducing our consumption and emissions, and eliminating what we can.

On a systemic level there are some really easy wins if there is the will to pursue them.  For example, what if we no longer permitted or facilitated boomerang trade: the exporting and importing of like goods?

Imagine if this were not longer happening:

• 5,000 tons of toilet paper exported from the UK to Germany, but then the UK imports over 4,000 tons back again from Germany
• 22,000 tons of potatoes imported from Egypt to UK and then the UK exports 27,000 tons back to Egypt
• 4,400 tons of ice cream gets exported from the UK to Italy, and 4,200 tons is then imported back
• 116 tons of ‘sweet biscuits, waffles and wafers, gingerbread and the like’ goes into the UK, rumbling past 106 tons headed in the opposite direction

And what about altering the food production and distribution processes that contribute to the hideous waste of food that is an accepted feature of globalisation?  Or doing away with the rise in disposable plastic products in the name of efficiency and convenience?

These shifts do not require complicated systems of design and distribution, or new technologies yet to be discovered.  They simply require political will which is at the moment directed elsewhere, because of our collective obsession with growth and the belief that it is worth the damages caused by these and other practices.

On a personal level, we can also make deliberate choices about what carbon usage is responsible, and what we might be better off doing without.  Sounds easy, right?

It’s not.

This means, of course, that we can’t appease our guilt by offsetting on Sunday morning and consuming again for the rest of the week.  It means we will all face charges of hypocrisy while we fumble towards more gentle ways of living.  And it means being gentle with ourselves and each other as well, knowing that we live in the very conditions we are striving to transcend, and we are all going about it imperfectly.

But with that in mind, it means we can start from wherever we are.  We don’t need a mathematical formula in order to participate in this collective transition.  We just need to try, share our mistakes and successes, and support one another along the way.

This is a cross-post from the Post Growth Institute Blog.

By Tanya Cothran, Executive Administrator at Spirit in Action.

It used to be common sense that micro-loans were the only way to ensure the sustainability of a micro-finance program and that the act of paying back the loan would instill the sense of “ownership” in the grant recipients. How could a micro-grant – labeled a “hand out” – do anything but create a sense of entitlement on the part of the grantee? We’ve thought that loans were better than grants because they promoted long-term, individual responsibility; but in some markets, loans wreak havoc with indebtedness, hostile payment collectors and inflexible repayment schedules. Grants, unlike loans, can create independence and cultivate sustainable development in a community.

In 2006, just as the Grameen Bank and Kiva were becoming household names, there was a rush to start new micro-finance organisations and benevolently provide money to the poor. Unfortunately, those funds come at a great cost and with inconclusive effects. Interest rates of 40-100% of the loan principle and travel costs to get to and from the bank mean that people are stuck from the moment they get the money.

Why grants?

A loan is just a financial arrangement in the business of making money for a bank, but a grant creates space for positive relationships and an empowered individual. Spirit in Action provides $150 micro-grants to groups of 3-5 people throughout communities on the African continent. Instead of a debt-collector, we have local coordinators who train grant recipients in business planning, marketing, and basic accounting. The grant cohort also forms a support group.

Receiving a $150 grant – rather than a loan – means that the first $150 in profit from their successful enterprise can help group members go to school, improve their house, or pay for medical care, and is not used to pay back donors. And through our program, some of the additional profits are gifted to others in the community, generating goodwill and further development on the local level.

We are Grant Recipients

Our model for micro-grant sustainability reflects our home-office organisational practices. We recognise that since Spirit in Action relies purely on donations from individuals for our funding, we also are grant recipients. Our supporters don’t ask us to pay them back – they ask us to pay the gift forward to help people as defined in our mission and programmatic plans. By asking our Small Business Fund grant recipients to pay it forward to a neighbor or community member rather than paying the organisation back, we are asking them to do only what we ourselves do. Paying it forward starts with our donors and passes on to many more throughout the world.

Becoming a Giver

Our paying it forward program, Sharing the Gift, suggests to grant recipients that they have received the gift of a grant from Spirit in Action and asks them, “How can you share this gift with others?” The actual form of sharing varies among groups, with input from the local coordinators. Some tithe a percentage of profits toward future groups, others contribute seeds or baby animals to a new group, and sometimes business groups come together to support a project that benefits the whole community.

After receiving a grant, people are empowered to be givers in their communities. Fundraisers know that people receive genuine happiness from giving to others; the Small Business Fund and Sharing the Gift enable people who have grown up with very little to have more to share with others and to be respected for their gifts to neighbors.

Unlike loans, which create an immediate indebtedness in the community, grants and a “paying it forward” mentality make development sustainable in the communities where we have funded small businesses. Even without additional grants, local growth comes from small business owners themselves. The development of their community originates with their desire to pay forward what they have received. Grants are not a hand out; they enable people to invest in their communities in a grassroots manner.

Tanya Cothran is Executive Administrator at Spirit in Action, an international micro-grant organisation working in eastern Africa. To learn more about Spirit in Action’s work, you can contact Tanya at admin AT godsspiritinaction DOT org. You can also follow her on the SIA blog.

Outside of China, people are agape at the prospect of learning to write Chinese: “So hard! Too hard.” Back in Australia, I know first generation migrants who speak Chinese at home but have never learnt to write, they gape along with everyone else. But for all the jaw-dropping, these people can read and write another major language: English. What about the people inside China for whom ‘Chinese’ is a foreign language? They are a significant minority, and, on the Chinese scale, a minority still means millions of people. ‘Chinese’ is usually loosely used when we should say ‘Mandarin’, which is just one of more than 50 distinct languages of the different ethnic groups in China. Mandarin is based on the language of Beijing, has official status, and is the language of the dominant ethnicity, the Han. But it’s by no means the first language of the rural poor in China’s vast and less-developed western and southern provinces. For many of these people, writing Mandarin characters is just as daunting as it is for us, as many of these other Chinese languages are not written in characters, or not written at all.

The widespread assumption is that people need to be literate for development to progress, and that getting kids to attend school is the way to deliver literacy to a community. But the more I looked into this issue within China, the more I found literacy, schooling, development and ethnic identity to be uneasily and unsuccessfully linked.

In a cross-post series with the China Beat, I’m discussing the benefit to development work which can come from understanding that literacy is not a set of skills independently learnt regardless of context. In Part 1, I explain what literacy means to linguists and make the point that, unless the linguistic understanding informs literacy campaigns they may have limited success or perpetuate development as a form of dominance. This post brings that argument into the Middle Kingdom.

China is the world’s second largest economy yet sees itself as developing (as fellow whydev writer Pip Brandt noted). This seems fair enough when you’re here: there is a serious and obvious disparity in development between China’s East and West regions. It’s very clear to the Chinese government, so redressing the development imbalance is a government priority.

For the non-Sinophile reader, some necessary background facts:

• Language and education policies are centrally controlled in China. putonghua (literally, ‘common language’), known in English as Mandarin, has been the national language since the 1950s. It’s also called han yu (‘Han Language’).
• Han Chinese comprise 92 percent of the population. But, China has 55 other officially recognised ethnic minority groups, who occupy about 50 percent of the Chinese territory, which are the country’s least-developed areas.
• Education is a development focus as illiteracy rates for most minority-language children are significantly higher than their Han counterparts.
• Officially, Mandarin is the language of instruction only from Grade 3 in minority regions but discrimination against both minority cultures and their languages exists, in classrooms, in school administration, and beyond. Plus, there’s a strong centripetal force in China: ‘harmonious’ nation-building is an inescapable urge prevailing against ethnic diversity.

A New York Times map of China’s ethnic minorities

Despite international evidence  of a positive correlation between progress in first language literacy and in second language literacy, many minority children in China do not get to develop first-language  literacy. Many academics report that bilingual education in China is falling short in practice, despite legal requirements for bilingual primary schooling in minority areas. Practical constraints including shortages of minority language teaching resources and bilingual teachers are key reasons, though there is often an undertow of unhelpful opinions on the worthlessness of minority languages. This is affecting children’s individual  progression -  most have to pass written exams in Mandarin to enter university, and cannot do so, which limits employment and social mobility – but lack of either minority language or Mandarin literacy is also affecting their community’s human capital and development overall. This also affects the literacy and attitude to schooling of younger generations, as is becoming apparent in the current crop of youngsters: illiteracy is increasing in many areas.

It helps to break down China’s minority-language communities into three categories (following University of Maryland’s Minglang Zhou):

• Category 1 – those that had functional writing systems broadly used before 1949 and have had regular bilingual education since: I call these the Bi-Literate, Bi-Schooled group;
• Category 2 – those that had functional writing systems narrowly used before 1949 but have had only occasional bilingual education since: Kind of Bi-Literate, Kind of Bi-Schooled;
• Category 3 – those that had no fully functional writing systems before 1949 and have been educated almost entirely in Mandarin since: the Mando-Only group.

Case studies from all three categories illustrate how cultural identity factors can work against literacy.

 “Literacy cannot require that the reading of the word be done in the colonizer’s language”

So wrote Paulo Freire, a radical educator from Brazil, the proponent of  a global movement called Emancipatory Literacy.  It appears that Freirian ideas on colonisation through language have not impacted on Chinese literacy policy. Studies of the Bi-Literate, Bi-Schooled group and the Kind of Bi group reveal interplays between literacy and development that suggest literacy is not an autonomous, functional instrument (backing up linguistic theory). For instance, Zhou’s 2000 data shows Tibetans (Bi-Literate, Bi-Schooled) have very high Mandarin illiteracy rates (69.39%:). In contrast, in other Bi-Literate, Bi-Schooled areas, illiteracy rates are below or on par with the Han (at 21.53%). What is different for Tibetans? Bilingual schooling has not been as consistent in Tibet, and the ability of the minority to use its language in official settings or to assert its culture has been comparatively restricted. Many Tibetans now speak English as their second language (but not as many read and write it). This enables them to trade with tourists and promote political causes to a wider audience than Mandarin Chinese would. They also continue to speak and write Tibetan because it is unique and special to them.

The academics Wang and Phillion report that

“few texts [in schools in Chinese minority-language regions] discuss minority experiences or concerns; none addresses struggles with poverty or economic and education inequalities”.

They give an example of a learn-to-read book whose story is about the Tibetan minority being thankful for the support of the Han, who are responsible for them.  Wang and Phillion’s criticism of such learn-to-read materials probably strikes a chord (a pretty clanging one at that) for readers coming from or working with minority communities:

“The dominant ideology, as a result, is reproduced and instilled in minority students. Han knowledge, Han culture, and Mandarin Chinese represent advancement, science, and truth; minority knowledge, culture, and language, on the other hand, are represented as backward, unscientific, and not worth learning”.

I suggest literacy in both Tibetan and English is a conscious act of maintaining non-Han culture, which explaisn this minority language community’s comparatively low Mandarin literacy rates, and the broader school attrition rates in the region, as schooling, with its Mandarin instruction, is associated with the Central Government.

The Kind of Bi category has the highest census-reported Mandarin illiteracy rates. Why, given that schooling is in Mandarin in these communities? Many of these communities have a traditional script and a missionary-introduced alphabet script, using the former in cultural rituals and elite circles, and the latter in religious activities. For instance, in Muslim North-West China, written Arabic is used for religious practices. These scripts are not associated with the school domain. My analysis is that, when bilingual schooling doesn’t happen in practice this causes students to learn in their second language without the advantage of first language-to-second language transfer years, and second language literacy is hindered (along with other basic skills which are the content of those early years’ classes, classes not fully comprehensible to Mandarin learners). In these Kind of Bi-Literate communities, schooling isn’t building upon pre-existing literacy at all. It is analogous to the lower-class students in the developed world, whose formal literacy is often below average: poverty itself doesn’t make children unable to learn to read and write.  Instead, the issue is the lack of correspondence between their home life and school literacy practices.

In contrast to the groups above, the data on most Mando-Only  communities shows a reduction in Mandarin illiteracy, supporting my hypothesis that those for whom literacy in another language or script is not a feature of their cultural identity are more receptive to Mandarin literacy, because literacy does not play as strongly into identity.

As I noted with the Tibetan example, focusing on schooled literacy to deliver development outcomes may run into troubles problem when school itself  is perceived as culture-imposing, and this  is an issue not only in areas of obvious cultural clash like Tibet. Singapore recently reformed the teaching of Mandarin reading and writing skills. In this context, the Singaporean Minister for Chinese Language said,

“We started the wrong way…We had teachers who were teaching in completely-Chinese schools. And they did not want to use any English to teach English-speaking children Chinese and that turned them off completely”.

This is a dramatic testimony to the negative effects on literacy when schooling ignores home languages. In rural China, the home language is not prestigious, unlike English in Singapore. In more stable but under-developed areas of China, discrimination against minority-language groups may be felt in small doses but on many fronts. One can imagine that students taught in government-sanctioned Mandarin being turned off literacy even more quickly than the Singaporeans. Further, poor experiences with Mandarin literacy can cause students to generalise and reject all literacy, even in their community’s language, as literacy is so closely associated with school, and school with unwelcome authority and suppression of identity.  Not learning becomes  passive resistance against the powerful, though it is self-defeating as those without literacy, or education, will struggle to achieve their own power and voice in China.

Conclusions 

Through the lens of China, we can see more clearly how literacy can affirm or undermine cultural identity for minorities. Many of China’s least-developed communities understand literacy as a social practice and in terms of identity construction, however, national policy is underpinned by an understanding of literacy as functional and autonomous of context and community. If literacy is being used as a key instrument of development, but social realities are not integrated into education policy, development is less successful and the benefits of development less equally shared. Perhaps more support for minority language in China will help even up the development, as the Government wants, rather than entrench diversity, as the Government fears.

[This is an  edited version of a cross-post. The full piece is on The China Beat]

Barnardo's UK makes an active point of describing how low their overheads are.

Whether it’s spending money on groceries, mobile phones or charities, we all want bang for our buck. Telling the public that a large percentage of their donations goes to the program is an easy way for an NGO to look like they’re doing the right thing. However, in 2009, a joint press release from 8 charity-watchdog organisations stated that in trying to determine whether a charity is worth supporting, focusing on a low overhead ratio is meaningless. So why do so many NGO’s still talk about it when communicating to the public?

My guess is that it comes down to the perennial struggle between doing good development work and raising funds to support that work. Often, the former is a lot more complicated than the latter. And unfortunately, when it comes to conveying that information to the public from a quick glance at a website, or a short grab on TV, the complexities of it all often get lost.

The myth that organisations with low overheads are ones worth supporting has been actively propagated by the marketing departments of many large NGOs. Well, now there is a 20 page resource that well and truly blows this myth out of the water. Over at Good Intentions are Not Enough, Saundra Schimmelpfennig has written an excellent little eBook that will not only take just 10 to 20 minutes to read, but details exactly why stating that an organisation has low overheads is bad publicity, and also bad practice.

Possibly the easiest way to dispel this myth is by using the example that she does in her opening paragraphs. Imagine walking into a fast food chain and insisting that you will only pay for whatever costs make up the hamburger. You will only pay them a few cents for the cost of the bun, the hamburger patty, the tomato sauce and the pickles. What kind of a product do you think they would be able to produce then? Would such a business survive?

Similarly, NGOs need to be able to spend money on a variety of things if they are going to be viable organisations. They need to pay for qualified and professional staff, offices, office supplies, communications, innovation and yes, even marketing to get more funds.

Saundra goes on to tell us that not only are overheads necessary, but an organisation that claims that it has low overheads is likely to be doing this in a rather devious way – by simply fiddling with its accounting practices. An excellent and rather topical example of this is through the use of “Gifts In Kind”, where organisations take donated items such as clothing and pass them onto the recipients in their programs. As Saundra quite rightly points out, this is an example of the “tail wagging the dog”, where a type of program is chosen simply because the overheads are low, and not because it is actually needed or helpful.

As discussion continues around World Vision USA’s continued insistence on sending unwanted NFL T-shirts to African nations, Saundra states that “the mass donation of clothing has contributed to the destruction of local garment industries and high rates of unemployment”. Here is one pressing statistic that shows how destructive this practice is:

Used-clothing imports are found to have a negative impact on apparel production in Africa, explaining roughly 40% of the decline in production and 50% of the decline in employment over the period 1981-2000.

If, as Saundra states, the need to keep overheads low is pushing organisations such as World Vision USA to do bad development work, then the priority for those who care about good development is clear. We must actively dispel the myth of low overheads as an indicator of good development work. Once this irrelevant pressure is removed, we can instead start focusing on doing good development work.

So, what can donors and NGOs do to further dispel this myth? Here, at whydev, we love action points, so here we go again:

1) Download and read “Lies, White Lies, and Accounting Practices: Why nonprofit overhead doesn’t mean what you think it means” by Saundra Schimmelpfennig. Saundra has even made the price of the eBook determinable by the reader – which means you can pay nothing for it if you like (though I strongly suggest you throw even a few dollars in to compensate her for her time).

2) Get informed about which NGOs propagate this myth. This can be as easy as Googling key words such as “percent of money donated oxfam”, and then simply replacing “oxfam” with the name of another NGO. As a general rule, if an NGO is actively promoting a high percentage of money donated going to the program, you need to be sceptical about whether or not they are worth supporting. There are also a whole host of initiatives that Saundra mentions in her eBook, that aim to improve transparency, and bodies that you can complain to about NGOs that are creating this false standard.

3) Work to inform people about how meaningless this indicator is. Using low overheads as an indicator of good development work is tempting, but misinformed. This probably means that through a simple example, such as the fast food joint, we can get people thinking about how meaningless it really is. Whether it’s a dinner time conversation, or an aid forum, there is always an appropriate time to dispel such a harmful myth.

4) Instead of propagating a myth that is easy to market, NGOs should spend energy educating the public on what good development is. This sounds so ridiculously obvious when it is spelt out, but it’s often ignored rather than heeded. It’s far too tempting when people ask about percentages and overheads to simply answer with a number that they are expecting to hear. However, this only makes programs that are more meaningful increasingly difficult to run in the future, for fear of increasing overheads. In communicating with the public, NGOs shouldn’t use figures such as “for every $1 donated, $0.85 of your donated dollar goes directly to field programs that serve beneficiaries on the ground,” as has been done here.

In a class called “Ethics in Physiotherapy”, I recall learning about an old hypothetical that is highly relevant here. A patient comes to see you with chronic back pain that has lasted more than 2 years. You know that massage and other hands-on treatments are unlikely to do anything to fix this person’s problems, but rather, you need to start them on a combination of education and exercise. However, since the person has been told before that massage will fix it, they are insistent that you try that method on them. There’s also this old problem of the placebo effect – that if you do perform massage, their symptoms may be alleviated because their mind is so set on this being the correct treatment. Do you give them what they want, because you know that it may relieve them of symptoms, and therefore set up good return business? Or, do you spend the time educating them on which treatment actually has scientific evidence for solving their underlying problems?

Similarly, do NGO’s keep propagating this myth about low overheads, simply because that is now what the public wants to hear? Or do we spend our marketing dollars dispelling this myth once and for all?

You can download a copy of Saundra Schimmelpfennig’s eBook Lies, White Lies, and Accounting Practices via her site Good Intentions are Not Enough here.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

By Tom Dawkins, co-founder of Startsomegood.com.

A lot of social change, especially when it came to the development sector, used to rely on outside forces coming to the aid of local communities. Sometimes these interventions are well-designed and increase the capacity and resilience of the community. Other times they serve instead to increase dependency and disrupt local approaches to progress.  But what they have in common is the permission required from existing institutions to get started, whether given by governments, corporations or big NGOs, and these institutions often bring their own assumptions, impose their own ideas of what constitutes “best practice” and send their own staff to oversee and instruct.

If you are a local changemaker with an idea to benefit your community, what could you do? To raise outside funds you would need to register as a charity, not only in your home country but in the United States, in order to access platforms like Causes, Razoo or Crowdrise that are restricted to US-registered 501c3 organizations (501c3 refers to the section of the tax code that allows charitable deductions). To apply for 501c3 status costs $800 and can take up to two years for approval, time and money many don’t have. Or you could convince one of these big institutions to back your idea, but now you’re waiting for permission from others to pursue your idea, looking for a “big yes” capable of funding your idea.

If you wish to found a for-profit social enterprise to drive sustainable social change you will find it no easier. Impact-investing venture capital is still extremely nascent, very few angel investors will take risks on social enterprises and foundations have yet to understand how to handle for-profit structures. Once again, you risk being left hoping for a rare big yes to give you the funding you need to launch.

What if, instead of relying on a single big yes you could fuel your project by aggregating lots of little yeses from people who believe in you and your idea, building a movement that will drive a more sustainable form of social impact, regardless of whether your venture is a non-profit, for-profit or unincorporated?

This is the opportunity StartSomeGood.com exists to provide.

Trek to Teach were able to place teachers in Nepal thanks for funds raised through Startsomegood.

StartSomeGood is an example of a fundraising approach usually labeled “crowdfunding”, of which Kickstarter and the Australian-based Pozible are other examples. Crowdfunding brings a game-like dynamic to fundraising, giving you the chance to share your vision and rally support in the form of numerous smaller donations, which are conditional on you reaching your project funding goal by the deadline you selected.

Kickstarter have proven how successful this model can be, supporting thousands of projects over the past two years. But whereas Kickstarter and Pozible are exclusive to creative ventures, StartSomeGood was founded by social entrepreneurs explicitly to support other social entrepreneurs.

Our platform allows change-makers with great ideas to raise the support they need directly from their community. Unlike the traditional fundraising sites we are legal structure-agnostic. In other words, we don’t care if you are for profit, non-profit or just a bunch of friends working on a project, so long as you have an idea to change the world we want to provide you with the tools you need to make it happen.

Since launching in March last year we have supported 38 social ventures to raise up to $101,000 in seed funds to launch. Let me tell you about a few of them:

When Brad Hurvitz of Trek to Teach wanted to raise funds before they had 501(c)3 status, he previously would have had few options. Through StartSomeGood, he raised $2,910 to take action and expand Trek to Teach’s educational offerings to many more students in Nepal with a goal of placing 10 teachers into schools in the Himalayas this year.

Mikey Leung aims to combating poverty and create jobs in Bangladesh through tourism. As a filmmaker and storyteller Mikey is determined to show the positive face of Bangladesh to the world, encouraging more people to learn about and visit the country. Thanks to the $15,000 contributed by 57 supporters, Mikey is publishing “Positive Light”, a crowdsourced photography book, and developing online content to promote the country he loves.

Mikey Leung was able to show the positive side of Bangladesh thanks to funds from supporters.

Ehon Chan is a young Australian changemaker who wanted to do something to reduce the tragic level of youth suicide in his country. He felt that the way to get through to young men most at risk was through a radical new communications strategy, but was unable to convince the main mental health charities to take on his approach. Undeterred Ehon built a team of supporters and raised $2,500 on StartSomeGood to launch the Soften The Fck Up Campaign late last year.

Having spent years receiving speech therapy for stuttering, Jack McDermott looked for ways to support the speech therapy community with technology. He raised $3,246 on StartSomeGood to launch Speech 4 Good, an iPhone app which makes speech therapy accessible and affordable. Jack had this to say about the experience:

“Not only did our StartSomeGood campaign provide us with seed funding for the development of our first product, Speech4Good, but it also united us with an entire cast of like-minded supporters. This resulting community, I would argue, is equally valuable to the future success of our social venture.”

What’s especially inspiring about these young social entrepreneurs is that they didn’t wait for permission, they didn’t rely on a big yes and they didn’t accept the status quo. They rallied their communities behind their vision for change and found that they already had the support they needed.

You can see more success stories in our eBook: What’s Next for 2012: Let’s Start Some Good.

So, what good will you start?

You can check out some great initiatives at StartSomeGood here and follow this author on Twitter here.

The rate at which the video ‘Kony 2012′ went viral on 7th March 2012 is quite astonishing, but unsurprising and perhaps predictable. Just as the comments and responses to the video, and the organisation that produced it (Invisible Children), are also quite astonishing, unsurprising and predictable. If you have not already, you can watch the video below.

According to Vimeo, the video had a respectable 58,000 plays of March 5th. On March 6th, 2.7 million. On March 7th, another 2.7 million for a three day total of 5.4 million. Truly remarkable.

 (Update on the 12th March GMT: According to The Visible Measures Blog, ” As of this morning, the Kony campaign has generated well over 100 million views, 112 million to be exact. The views come from over 750 clips across the web, most coming from video responses to the campaign. There are even translated and subtitled versions of the documentary popping up in Spanish, Italian, French, and Chinese. There are over 860,000 comments for the campaign”. Topping 100 million views in six days makes it the most viral video in history, beating out Susan Boyle, Lady Gaga and ‘Laughing Baby’).

There are a growing number of critical responses to both the video and the organisation. Both Chris Blattman and the team at Wrong Rights made a number of cutting observations in 2009 (this particularly video is the 12th installment of a long-running series, to which Invisible Children allocate a majority of their funding). We will update this list with new posts, articles and tweets that seek to take on this latest phenomenon in fundraising and advocacy, to make sure you get a balanced diet of KONY 2012. It is unfortunate timing, as the 8th of March is International Women’s Day, and this will surely detract (and this post is not helping, I know).

2004

International Justice, Local Injustice (Dissent Magazine) by Adam Branch

2005

Joseph Kony Of Lord’s Liberation Army indicted by ICC (Owen Barder)

2007

What to Do About Joseph Kony (John Prendergast – Center for American Progress)

2008

How Joseph Kony is keeping his options open (The Guardian)

2009

Visible children (Chris Blattman)

Worst idea ever? (Wronging Rights)

2010

How do you solve a problem like Joseph Kony? (The Guardian)

‘All People Are the Same to God’: An Insider’s Portrait of Joseph Kony (NY Times)

Bizarre Marketing: Invisible Children (A view from the cave)

2011

‘Why is the US sending its troops to finish off a fractured band of bush fighters in the middle of Africa?’ (Africa is a Country) This was written in response to President Obama’s announcement to send 100 ‘special forces’ into Uganda to flush out Kony and his fighters. Read for some much needed context and Ugandan views.

6th March, 2012

Invisible Children and Joseph Kony (Wanderings)

7th March, 2012

Selling Old Newspapers Shouldn’t Be Profitable: Invisible Children and Kony 2012 (Travelling While Black)

Stop Kony, yes. But don’t stop asking questions (The Independent - Blogs)

You don’t have my vote (Unmuted)

Let’s talk about kony (Securing rights)

We got trouble (Visible Children)

Bad guys, good guys, and the people in between (How Matters)

Taking ‘Kony 2012′ Down A Notch (Justice in Conflict)

Joseph Kony and Crowdsourced Intervention (Kings of War)

On Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 Campaign (Siena Anstis)

The Definitive ‘Kony 2012′ Drinking Game (Wronging Rights)

Invisible Children: Saviors or Sensationalists? (UN Dispatch) Alanna Shaikh & Mark Goldberg

Invisible Children – Pretty Dang Visible (The Duck of Minerva)

ON DONATING TO KONY 2012. (Dear Coquette)

A cautionary tale: Kony 2012 – The backlash (Under The Banyan)

#Kony2012 and its critics (Aljazeera)

I like Jimmy Choos, and I Hate Cheap Beer. Otherwise Know as The Reasons Why #Kony2012 is Being Criticized. (Voy’em)

Think Twice Before Donating to Kony 2012, the Charitable Meme du Jour (Jezebel)

Catching Joseph Kony (Blackslash Scott Thoughts)

Guest post: Joseph Kony is not in Uganda (and other complicated things) (Foreign Policy)

Acholi Street. Stop #Kony2012. Invisible Children’s campaign of infamy (ANGELO OPI-AIYA IZAMA)

Invisible Children responds to criticism about ‘Stop Kony’ campaign (Washington Post)

The #Kony2012 show (Africa is a Country)

8th March 2012

The Problem With Invisible Children’s “Kony 2012″ (Huffington Post)

KONY2012 – Why their success is bad for Uganda (mike clay)

On Kony2012 & the Role of Advocates (whereever you go, there you are)

5 questions for a post-Kony 2012 debate (Aidnography)

Invisible Children and its Kony 2012 campaign in the spotlight (The Globe and Mail)

Machiavelli and Cause Marketing (Holstee)

Critiques (the Invisible Children Inc.) A response from the organisation itself

A Peace of my mind: Respect my agency 2012! (Project Diaspora)

One girl’s guide to Kony 2012 (Wait…What?)

Why #Kony2012 Deserves More of your Time Than a 30 Minute Video (A View From The Cave)

Uganda: Can a Viral Video Really #StopKony? (Global Voices)

Unpacking Kony 2012 (…My heart’s in Accra)

Solving War Crimes With Wristbands: The Arrogance of ‘Kony 2012′ (The Atlantic) By crew at Wronging Rights

The Soft Bigotry of Kony 2012 (The Atlantic)

Why You Should Not Donate To Invisible Children/Kony 2012 (Hugo O’Doherty)

#StopKony2012: For most Ugandans Kony’s crimes are from a bygone era (African Arguments)

Joseph Kony 2012: growing outrage in Uganda over film (The Telegraph)

KONY2012 – a story in one flavour (KM on a dollar a day)

Joseph Kony 2012: It’s fine to ‘Stop Kony’ and the LRA. But Learn to Respect Africans. (CS Monitor) Written by @semhar

Kony2012; My response to Invisible Children’s campaign. (Rosebell’s Blog) aka @Rosebellk

Massive viral video campaign against African warlord hits and misses (Humanosphere)

Stopping Kony, or stopping video activism? (dochasnetwork’s blog)

Care about Joseph Kony? Care about Uganda? For a bit of lighthearted, but poignant, humour

Kony 2012: history, nuance, and advocacy’s Golden Rule (Find What Works)

Joseph Kony and the White Man’s Burden (okayafrica)

9th March 2012

African Reactions to the Kony 2012 Campaign (afriPOP!)

African voices respond to hyper-popular Kony 2012 viral campaign (boingboing)

The women who survived Kony’s war (ethnic supplies)

VIEWPOINT: A Partial Defense Of Invisible Children’s Kony2012 Campaign (Thinkprogress)

Child abductee featured in Kony 2012 defends film’s maker against criticism (The Guardian)

Kony 2012 campaign: Oprah and bracelets won’t solve problem (The Guardian)

Joseph Kony Is Infamous — But Will He Be Caught? (NPR)

Kony 2012 director says it’s not about money while campaign makes millions (Jezebel)

‘Kony 2012′ creator makes the rounds as Uganda campaign goes viral (TVNewser)

Capturing Kony (Human Rights Watch)

Kony 2012: A View from Northern Uganda (National Geographic)

African Critics of Kony Campaign See a ‘White Man’s Burden’ for the Facebook Generation (NY Times)

Joseph Kony springs into infamy (Amnesty International Australia)

the Invisible Children debate – my 2 cents worth (Bethany Duffield)

Before you give, think! (Unmuted)

Lives of Facebook users given meaning simply by watching Kony video (The Daily Autocrat)

Kony’s victims and the Kony 2012 video (The Guardian)

How the Kony video went viral (The Guardian)

Kony 2012: Video campaign more like a fashion thing, says Ugandans (thestar.com)

Kony 2012 may be flawed, but slacktivism isn’t the enemy (Mashable)

The Kony 2012 video phenomenon (Evan Lieberman)

‘KONY 2012′, and a military solution to the LRA crisis (The Africanist)

Kony 2012 Won’t Change the Lives of Ugandans (Dissent Magazine) by Adam Branch

The Value of a Global Discussion (NY Times: Room for Debate)

#KONY2012 – The good, the bad, and the media (Daniela Papi in Lessons I Learned)

10th March

The only interesting question on Kony 2012 – why did it get 60 million hits? (From Poverty to Power)

Kony 2012 gets 70m hits in a week (The Guardian)

Kony 2012: US state department – we have no intention of leaving Uganda (The Guardian)

3 factors that made the world pay attention to #KONY2012 (Richenda G)

My thoughts on KONY 2012 (and a defense of Invisible Children?) (Chris Blattman)

A Ugandan Reflection on Kony 2012 (Peace Direct)

How Kony2012 gets it wrong (Jackee Budesta Batanda)

White Man Carries His New Burden in #Kony Tote Bag (The Grumpy Owl)

The Worst Killer of Invisible Children is Not Joseph Kony (Give Well)

In whose interests do NGO’s work? -Invisible Children #Kony (Birds on the Blog)

Don’t Elevate Kony (World Peace Foundation)

‘Kony 2012′: How not to change the world (CNN)

11th March

Guest post: Kony 2012 and a look inside the Invisible Children organization (Find What Works)

While the world is stopping Kony, there’s lots more to do in Africa (The Globe and Mail)

Central Africa: Don’t Elevate Joseph Kony (African Arguments)

Open letter to Jason Russell CEO of Invisible Children Inc on KONY2012 (Acholi Times)

7 Africa stories you missed while Facebooking KONY2012 (CS Monitor)

Invisible Children, Joseph Kony And The Ugandan Dictatorship (Government in the lab)

Kony 2012 Hoax Exposed (Infowars.com)

12th March

#StopKONY Now!!! (NY Times)

#Ugandans 2012 (Canadian International Council)

Opinion: Why Kony 2012 created the wrong buzz (CNN)

Forget Kony, Ugandans Are Being Slaughtered By Their Own Western-Backed Government (Prison Planet)

#Kony2012 is ‘magical’ (Africa is a Country)

The Untold Truth Behind Kony 2012 and Invisible Children (blogtalkradio)

Not a Click Away: Joseph Kony in the Real World (Warscapes)

Searching for Closure: A Kony2012 Postscript (How Matters) w/ Solome Lemma (@InnovateAfrica)

14th March

The Road to Hell Is Paved with Viral Videos (Foreign Policy)

15th March

Revealed! Kony 2012′s sinister Musical Comedy roots (boingboing)

16th March

An Open Letter to Invisible Children Supporters (Uncultured)

17th March

Kony 2012 campaigner Jason Russell detained for public rampage (Guardian)

Sharing Public Breakdowns: What We Can Learn From Jason Russell (The Atlantic)

20th March

Kony 2012: Former Porn Actress Bree Olson Films ‘Naked For Kony 2012′ (NSFW, Huffington Post)

21st March

Guest Post: I’ve met Joseph Kony and Kony 2012 isn’t that bad (Foreign Policy)

The White Savior Industrial Complex (The Atlantic)

23rd March

No Longer Invisible (Foreign Policy)

28th March

Learning from Kony 2012 (4-part series) (CIHA blog)

4th April

7th April

Kony Part II: Accountability, not awareness

19th April

New Photos Show a Reality the ‘Kony 2012′ Video Misses (Wired)

20th April

Beyond Kony2012 Atrocity, Awareness, & Activism in the Internet Age (Amanda Taub) an ebook feat. Teddy Ruge, Alanna Shaikh and more.

A life without Kony (UgandaSpeaks)

Making Sense of Kony (A diverse group of scholars and activists) feat. Carol Jean Gallo, Chris Blattman and more.

Ugandan bloggers speak out about Kony2012 (Aljazeera)

_________________________________

Video

Ugandan journalist Rosebell Kagumire responds to the campaign video.

School children in the UK voice their responses after watching the campaign video.

Northern Ugandans react after watching the campaign video for the first time.

_________________________________

Tweets

“The central thesis of #Kony2012 is that social media can be exploited to place great crimes in a bright spotlight. Hard to criticise that.” (Tim Minchin)

“Interesting video on Joseph Kony. Can someone give me the uncensored answer on why we takeover other countries but won’t stop Mr. Kony?” (Chad Ochocinco)

“PLEASE go to http://www.Invisiblechildren.com Even if its 10 minutes… Trust me, you NEED to know about this! #1LOVE” (Rihanna)

“#StopKony2012 is targeting privileged,educated,mostly white youth to care abt Africa by fighting LRA.I expect a more nuanced formula by now” (Semhar)

“My basic premise is that the awareness of American college students is NOT a necessary condition for conflict resolution in Africa.” (Laura Seay)

“We don’t need to give Africans a voice. We need to give everyone else ears” (Solar Sister)

_________________________________

The filmmakers posing with members of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (Credit: Glenna Gordon)

On this photo

Invisible Children, the next chapter (Scarlett Lion)

Why Invisible Children can’t explain away this photo (Scarlett Lion)

Many tips of the hat to friends and colleagues who shared links on Facebook and Twitter. Of note, Tom Murphy and @seenfromafar

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Intuitively, lots of policy-makers assume literacy is crucial for development, but it’s an increasingly interesting site of convergence between two major disciplines underpinning development work: economics and ethnographic social science, because the inadequacy of a simplistic understanding of literacy is more and more apparent.

The topic piqued my interest during some recent academic research, and I’d like to give people a window into the debate. I’ll follow up with an analysis of how literacy is under-utilised in development policy, using China as a case study, in a second post in this series (that one’s more punchy, less scholarly, trust me). We’d love your case studies or comments on literacy-related development work too.

Education, and particularly literacy, is a central preoccupation in domestic governments’ approaches to poverty and regional development, in international relations and for the international agencies like UNESCO and UNDP. But the place of literacy within development is under-theorised. Let’s review the central goals and principles of development and what is meant by literacy in this context (chances are, your definition of literacy can be expanded).

A narrow, conventional understanding of literacy sees it as skills of reading and writing existing “autonomously”, to be taught independently of learners’ lives. However, more recent scholars question whether “literacy is a ‘universal’ skill that is devoid of class specificity” (Maddox 2001:144) and, as Bryan Maddox points out, this ”has implications for understanding the role of literacy in economic and social development”.

These scholars are part of the ‘New Literacy’ school. They criticise functional literacy because literacy is not “an independent variable that can be separated from social context” (Street 1999:35). Their understanding of literacy sees it as a set of social practices inferred from events mediated by written texts i.e. much more than just the standard reading and writing skills on the school syllabus. It is important to New Literacy scholars to note the different forms of power which affect what counts as ‘literacy’, who uses literacy, and for what purposes. This analysis of power is highly relevant when understand literacy’s role in development, as a major concern of development is redressing power inequalities.

As the DEV Blog noted on 2011’s World Literacy Day,

“UNESCO statistics tell us that there are some 796 million adults who cannot read and write.  These figures are an important reminder of global literacy inequalities…[however] They are imprecise, and tell us little about what it means to be literate, or to have ‘enough’ literacy.”

There is not yet any great accord between linguists and development policy-makers on the meaning and purposes of literacy.  Anna Robinson-Pant (2008: 779-796) gives an interesting first-hand account of the tensions that arose when she was part of the team writing a recent UNESCO Global Monitoring Report on literacy, and how this tension undermines development work:

“The starting point – and undisputed assumption – for many policy discussions is that literacy (or schooling) is a ‘good thing’ and the terms are often used synonymously with ‘education’. By problematising ‘literacy’ and presenting evidence that literacy (and schooling) interventions do not always lead to greater equality or positive social change, the researcher can be seen as the opposing voice in a policy debate that is polarised around evidence ‘for’ (or against) literacy.” (Robinson-Pant 2008:781)

Narrow and broad development

And now to ‘development’: there is a division between seeing development narrowly as the economic advancement of a people towards the market economies characteristic of the developed world, and broad progress towards empowered lives for people, including affirmation of their culture, political voice, and economic progress that can be sustained over generations. The dominant view in development policy-making is an “instrumental view of policy as rational problem solving” (Robinson-Pant 2008:780) and this favours policy using literacy (narrowly understood) as an instrument.

In contrast, the “critical view [of development] sees policy as a rationalising discourse concealing hidden purposes of bureaucratic power or dominance, in which the true political intent of development hidden behind a cloak of rational planning” (Robinson-Pant 2008:780). Power dynamics of decision-making in development and the need for increasingly empowered grassroots communities has been discussed from other angles on whydev before (+here, here). From this perspective, policies about literacy have to have a broader base, taking into account the social practices of literacy.

There is an increasing reclamation of development policy and practice by developing countries’ governments and grassroots organisations, so that development does not continue as another form of exploitation or paternalism. Formal, schooled literacy is an ill-fit with this view. Rather, literacy is developed as a community resource and to amplify political voice. The role of literacy in creating, affirming, or denying cultural identity comes into play here. In many countries, this is particularly relevant to minority-language communities.

Drawing together two literatures

An ‘ethnographic perspective’ on literacy has not sat comfortably with the largely economics-centred discipline of development studies because linguists document literacies rather than evaluating or participating in social change (Basu et al 2008:770,772). From a development modelling perspective, however, the social practices of literacy are externalities and the full value of these externalities is not often tapped.

To illustrate, consider this typical example: a scholar called Minglang Zhou (2000) notes adults’ formal illiteracy has had a negative impact on formal literacy across the whole Lahu minority-language community in South China. It’s this kind of scenario economists describe as a vicious cycle:

“Illiteracy in one generation means poverty for that generation, which in turn means an inability to educate the children, thereby giving rise to another generation of illiterate adults and the cycle is ready to be repeated, trapping a whole dynasty in low human capital” (Basu et al 2008:773).

Linguists, in contrast, are likely to document the scenario and comment that the Lahu have social practices which do not involve many literacy events.

Zhou contrasts the Lahu to the neighbouring Naxi, who have above-average formal literacy. He suggests this is due to successful adult literacy campaigns in the 1950s, but his doesn’t analyse how adult literacy differently affected younger generations in these two communities. That is exactly the insight an ethnographic account could give. That insight could be key to working out how to improve literacy campaigns or analysing what is stopping development policy achieving its goals in Lahu communities.

Naxi written script

Despite the tension over what literacy means, in recent years Robinson-Pant and others have laid good ground work to integrate literacy studies into the development studies discipline: she, Bryan Maddox and Kaushik Basu edited a special issue of the prominent Journal of Development Studies in 2008 (vol.44 no.6). Maddox’s earlier work is an engaging read about his involvement with literacy and development projects in Bangladeshi villages.

The LETTER Project (Learning for Empowerment Through Training in Ethnographic Research), which began in India, is a good example of this cross-over scholarship being put into practice. It’s

“a training programme that brings together ethnographic approaches to researching local literacies and educational approaches to learning and curriculum development…such an approach is more effective, for the gap between what is learned in the classroom and what is practised at home is now being used as a tool of learning, not an obstacle to learning.”  (Rogers and Street, 2011).

What is important is that development work supports people who are formally illiterate to increase their capability to live more fulfilling and self-directed lives. This involves not only improving literacy, but just as importantly, breaking down the perceptions amongst both the ‘illiterate’ and ‘literate’ that illiteracy is a sign of stupidity, that illiteracy in a national language is a sign of the innate backwardness of a minority group, or that the lack of a script in a minority language is a sign of a minority group’s inherent inability to become literate. These perceptions often pervade minority group members’ self-image as strongly as they pervade the views of the dominant culture. Revealing and affirming existing micro-literacies beyond the classroom is a great place to start changing opinions. But even if the goal of development is not as broad as cultural affirmation, reading and writing classes should take into account the students’ various cultural purposes for literacy, simply in order that teaching be more relevant, and therefore more successful.

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References and Suggestions (+links to author bios)

This list of publications of the University of East Anglia’s Literacy and Development Group

Barton, David and Hamilton, Mary (1998). ‘Understanding literacy as social practice’ in Local literacies: Reading and writing in one community. London: Routledge.

Barton, David (2007). Literacy. An Introduction to the Ecology of Written Language (2^nd edition), Malden, MA: Blackwell

Basu, Kaushik, Maddox, Bryan & Robinson-Pant, Anna (2008). ‘Literacies, Identities and Social Change: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Literacy and Development’, Journal of Development Studies, 44:6, 769-778.

Freire, Paulo & Macedo, Donaldo (1987). Literacy: Reading the Word and the World, London GB: Routlege and Kegan Paul Ltd.

Grant, Rachel A & Wong, Shelley D (2003). ‘Barriers to literacy for language-minority learners: An argument for change in the literacy education profession’ Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 46:5 pp386–394.

Gray, W.S. (1956). The Teaching of Reading and Writing: an International Survey. Paris: UNESCO.

Iversen, Vegard & Palmer-Jones, Richard (2008). ‘Literacy Sharing, Assortative Mating, or What? Labour Market Advantages and Proximate Illiteracy Revisited’ Journal of Development Studies, 44:6, pp 797–838.

Maddox, Bryan & Esposito, Lucio (2011). ‘Sufficiency Re-examined: A Capabilities Perspective on the Assessment of Functional Adult Literacy’, Journal of Development Studies, 47:9, pp1315-1331.

Maddox, Bryan (2001). ‘Literacy and the market: The economic uses of literacy among the peasantry in north-west Bangladesh’. In Brian Street (ed.) Literacy and development: Ethnographic perspectives. London: Routledge, pp137-51.

Robinson-Pant, Anna (2008). ‘ “Why Literacy Matters”: Exploring A Policy Perspective on Literacies, Identities and Social Change’, Journal of Development Studies, 44:6, pp779-796.

Rogers, Alan & Street, Brian (2011). ‘Using Ethnographic Approaches to Understanding and Teaching Literacy: Perspectives from both Developing and Western Contexts’, Viden om Læsning (Knowledge About Reading) special issue ,World Literacy Day 8 Sept 2011: ‘Jorden læser (Literacy Around the World)’.

Sen, Amartya K (1985). Commodities and Capabilities, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Street, Brian (1999). ‘The meanings of literacy’ in D Wagner, R Venezky and B Street (eds.) Literacy: An International Handbook, Colorado: Westview Press, pp34–42.

Tong, Ho Kin & Cheung, Lin Hong (2011). ‘Cultural identity and language: a proposed framework for cultural globalisation and glocalisation’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 32:1, pp55-69.

Wang, Yuxiang & Phillion, JoAnn (2009). ‘Minority Language Policy and Practice in China: The Need for Multicultural Education’ International Journal of Multicultural Education, 11:1, pp1-14.

Zhou, Minglang (2000). ‘Language Policy and Illiteracy in Ethnic Minority Communities in China’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 21:2, 129-148.

Zhou, Minglang (2001). ‘The Politics of Bilingual Education and Educational Levels in Ethnic Minority Communities in China’, International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 4:2, 125-149

Recently, I learnt something about myself that I had never known. I truly have a face made for radio. Last week, I was featured on Sydney’s 2SER Radio Station, as part of their Aidworks program. This program runs every Wednesday night at 7pm (AEDT) and can be found at 107.3FM locally or streamed live here. Aidworks discusses the finer points of aid and development in a way that mainstream media doesn’t. We’re really proud to support Aidworks and 2SER in any way that we can.

On the program, I discussed the realities of working in development in China, the limitations of a rights-based approach, working in isolation and how whydev.org‘s new peer coach matching scheme, set up to support isolated aid and development workers across the globe, could help. The interview, which lasts about ten minutes, can be found below. If the audio below isn’t working, you can listen to it here.

Big thanks to Aidworks’ host, Albion Harrison-Naish!

By Nikola Balvin

At 89 per cent urban and with four of its cities making The Economist’s top ten most liveable list (Melbourne at no. 1, Sydney at no. 4, Perth at no. 8, and Adelaide at no. 9), Australia seems to “do” urbanisation exceptionally well.

Infrastructure and transportation systems are generally good, there are plenty of hospitals, schools and libraries, and children can interact safely in parks and other community settings. The challenges faced by countless urban centres around the world — such as children living on the street, urban gangs and informal settlements — are not common in Australia, with its most disadvantaged communities living in the outback of the Northern Territory.

Australian cities are home to people from a variety of socio-economic backgrounds and while the disparities between Melbourne’s Toorak and Broadmeadows, Sydney’s Vaucluse and Fairfield, and Perth’s Peppermint Grove and Karawara are apparent to any observer, the stark divides that exist between the favelas and new developments of São Paulo or the slums and mansions of Mumbai are rarely, if ever, present. Australian cities also seem to do well in terms of their child-friendliness, with standards such as safe water and sanitation, safe streets, and plenty of opportunities to play and participate in cultural and social events easily accessible to most children and young people in urban areas.

So, while there is always room for improvement, and decision-makers at all levels of government and members of civil society need to ensure that the rights of every child are fulfilled, some of the biggest opportunities for Australia to improve the lives of poor and marginalized urban children lie in assisting her neighbour Asia. The 2012 edition of UNICEF’s flagship publication The State of the World’s Children examines the lives of children growing up in urban settings and finds that denials of children’s rights to survival, health, nutrition, education and protection are widespread, particularly in middle-income and developing nations. The report has many interesting examples that describe the situation of children in the urban areas of Asia – currently home to 66 of the 100 fastest-growing urban areas (half of these in China) and to 50 per cent of the world’s urban population (3.5 billion). Projections indicate that by 2050 Asia will hold 54 per cent of the world’s urban population (6.3 billion).

Slums – in which children grow up often without secure tenure, registration, running water, adequate sanitation and surrounded by disease and poverty – are a notorious aspect of rapid urbanization. For example, in 2011 India’s slum population was projected to reach just over 93 million; that is over a quarter of its urban residents living in slums.

In Bangladesh, the under-five mortality rate for children in slums was found to be 79 per cent higher than the overall urban rate, and 44 per cent higher than the rural rate.

Similar disparities exist in children’s education. In 2004-2005, the primary school attendance rate of children living in the slums Delhi was a low 55 per cent, while the overall city average was 90 per cent. A more disparate pattern emerged in the rates of secondary school attendance for children living in the slums of Bangladesh, where in 2009 only 18 per cent attended secondary school, while the overall secondary school attendance in urban areas was 53 per cent.

Besides slums,The State of the World’s Children outlines many other challenges faced by children who are growing up urban. Motivated by the search for a better life, many children partake in migration to urban areas. In 2008, almost a tenth of China’s children migrated with their parents. Setting up a new home poses many difficulties, but when migrating without the company of an adult, a child is at particular risk of ending up on the streets, impoverished, in exploitative work or abused. Trafficking is another grave child exploitation connected to cities. Studies indicate that in the major Indian cities, most trafficked girls are forced into sex work, and in Bangladeshi cities large numbers of girls and boys are exploited in street sex markets and brothels. The list of challenges identified in the report goes on.

When researching this report, what stood out to me the most were not only the stark disparities between the lives of children from wealthy and poor homes, but also the many opportunities to address them. Because of the size and proximity of urban populations, children and young people in urban areas often have better access to education, health services, technology, social activities, quality food and water and so on. The problem is that too many children live next to these services and amenities, but cannot access them and do not benefit from them. The onus is on governments at all levels to place children’s rights at the centre of urban decision-making and ensure that those who are currently left out have equitable access to such services.

Editor’s note

Australia would do well to begin by asking our urban planners and policymakers to pay much greater attention to the rights and interests of children. This means bringing children’s voices into community and local government policy in the implementation and planning of cities.

All this needs to be within a child-focused policy framework. The unified call by Australian child rights organisations for a National Children’s Commissioner would go part of the way to address the shortfalls in oversight of policy, accountability, monitoring and participation.

Australia can also assist children in neighbouring countries through advocating for their rights, providing aid and through knowledge transfer on how to make urban life an equitable one. Because cities that are fit for children benefit everyone.

To view the report visit www.unicef.org.au

Nikola Balvin is an Australian living and working in New York as a Research Officer, in the Division of Communication, for UNICEF.

In the last three years, articles by Rowan Callick of the Australian and Steve Lewis of the News Limited tabloids, amongst others paint a pretty negative picture of AusAID. Apparently AusAID spends obscene amounts on individual consultants, diverts way too much of its budget to “feed fat profits for corporations”, is “plagued by fraud” and “filling corrupt coffers”, “wastes too much money on Kung Fu training for staff and furniture for their offices and homes, is a front for Kevin Rudd’s UN ambitions. Aid is a controversial rip-off, a fraudulent, corrupt debacle; a gravy train without a clear strategy; a scam with an undeserved virtuous aura.

As extreme as this seems, criticism of AusAID is not wholly misplaced. Previously I have expressed concerns about the neo-liberal paradigm which sees so much of the aid budget spent through corporations, the managerialist requirements which eat up time and resources of NGOs and public servants, the risk aversion and fear which discourages genuine relationships between aid workers. I’ve written submissions to Senate Inquiries, the AusAID Volunteer Program Review and the Independent Review of Aid Effectiveness with criticisms, praise and suggestions for positive change.

Yet, reading the news articles above left me feeling that Rowan and Steve weren’t on the same side as me – they weren’t interested in improving development assistance, merely reducing or eliminating it.

A few facts to start with:

• Australia’s aid, as a percentage of total federal budget is set to grow to 0.5% by 2015 (from about 0.3% in 2007).
• With presumed economic growth, the percentage target would see a doubling in dollar value of the aid budget.
• Yet, it would still fall short of the 0.7% target first pledged in 1970 and reaffirmed repeatedly since.
• This promise was made by the Labor Party, and matched by the Coalition, in the lead up to the 2007 election. It has since been reaffirmed by both major parties, with the Greens favouring 0.7%.

Obviously, a massive increase in funding must be managed carefully.  It would be foolish to think simply multiplying current programs would be the most effective use of the budget. It is not  inconceivable that some opportunists might want access (or more access) to this growing pile of moolah. And so, it is right to question the effectiveness of government programs, challenge what would be considered overspending, and ensure that the people the program intends to serve are better off as a result of the increased funding.

And taking care and asking questions appears to be what AusAID has done.  Aid effectiveness has been front and centre of AusAID’s priority under Stephen Smith and Kevin Rudd. The Office of Development Effectiveness, founded under Alexander Downer in 2006, has produced internal evaluations and published independent reports by the Brookings Institution.  The Independent Review of Aid Effectiveness, (which featured numerous submissions from whydev contributors/friends) was the first independent public review since 1996 and “will guide the growth of the aid program to 2015-2016”, the end target date for the MDGs.

Callick sometimes mentions the reviews, occasionally quoting senior AusAID staff or the Foreign Minister defending the program or vowing to keep focussing on aid effectiveness.  More evident though is a particular animosity towards AusAID and towards the current Labor government.  For example, in recent articles critical of the corporations receiving AusAID funds, there is no mention that this practice was the norm under Downer.  If there were articles critical of this practice during Downer’s 11 years, a quick search indicates they did not seem to directly target him. None of the articles mention that the amount contracted out has been halved under Labor.

The authors appear to be skeptical of development’s value at all, outside disaster relief, and make snide partisan attacks, drawing tenuous parallels between Kevin Rudd and Mao Zedong. Valid criticisms are given little context – “We should spend aid money in the Pacific (where, by the way, we can’t get it right), not Africa” but never mention the poverty in sub-saharan Africa (except when making emotive points about priorities). They imply AusAID’s growth is just another example of Labor’s wastefulness, rather than pointing out its bi-partisan support. When discussing FOI documents which “reveal the difficulties of trying to manage a $4.5billion budget while dealing with some of the most corrupt nations in the world”, they bury how admirably small fraud is as a percentage (0.017%) in this context towards the bottom of the article, instead highlighting seemingly high dollar amounts first. Another contributor’s whine that “an overseas consultant, who believes women are more vulnerable to climate change than men, was given almost $20,000 by AusAid last year” was comprehensively demolished by Archie Law of ActionAid. Of course, fewer people read the thoughtful blogs of experts than hysterical sensationalist tabloids.

Steve Lewis' articles - recommended by no one in three states.

What’s really going on here is that, in this one instance, the market fundamentalism which supports supply and demand and which demands that if the government must pay for a service it should tender it out, is being put aside because of a particular distaste for AusAID. It’s just a populist dog-whistle designed to use the “virtuous aura” of aid workers against them, by holding them to a loftier standard than other citizens.  It’s a classic culture war trick of turning your opponents against each other by selectively pointing out hypocrisy (never mind the sheer chutzpah of using emotive images of the suffering of refugees to score points against aid in papers which regularly stir up hysteria against asylum seekers). One wonders if AusAID’s funding of aid advocacy would even be necessary if it wasn’t for such disinformation campaigns by aid opponents.

Australians generally support our overseas aid expenditure, but few would think aid workers should earn $500,000 – a new house every year.   Personally, I don’t believe anyone really “earns” this amount, no matter what field they work in.  But this is where the criticism falls silent – there is not a single mention of the context in which other consultants get paid similarly huge amounts. As a society, perhaps we need to challenge all who earn such obscene amounts, not just aid consultants.  When I tried to make this point in response to an article in 2010, Callick selectively quoted me to support the anti-AusAID case being put by Barnaby Joyce (no relation).

Development may be the only field where you might regularly engage with people earning 100 times less than you but still be the lowest paid of your friends.  It sometimes feels strange, knowing that your income exists because people are donating (or having tax deducted) to reduce poverty.  But should we be more critical of an aid consultant than a military consultant on the same pay? Both are using tax-payer dollars. Should earning a below-average, but liveable, wage in any part of the social sector be considered ethically worse than earning more in a different, perhaps ethically dubious or simply ethically neutral, field?

The big question here is broader than aid. Partisan, anti-aid and small-government agendas aside, there are some valid questions about our priorities as a society.  I am all for recognising the flawed assumptions inherent in competitive tendering. We should end massive consultant salaries, occasionally dubious spending priorities and all undeserved virtuous auras across the entire public and private sectors. Let’s also be honest though that sometimes a thing we want – like the end of Malaria, education for girls, human rights for all – may cost us some money and that achieving it is worth the cost.  A just world is such a massive project that it would be foolish to think all in it will be saints.

And if you think aid workers should earn bugger all, Rowan and Steve, why not encourage your readers to live on 99% of their income to help us support those who do? It’s tax deductible, which will mean less for your nemeses at AusAID but more for development work overall.

It’s a great idea for a movie. A political drama. George Clooney or Matt Damon as male lead, and there’s a young, feisty, female journalist who gets caught up in it all. The opening scene spans a meeting room high up in skyscraper land, with a marble round table, iced water jugs and leaders of a big global development Bank.

Disability is not the only battle for kids like this. © 2011 CBM Australia, Photo: Christoph Ziegenhardt.

“Gentlemen, you should be proud,” says the silver fox, “This policy forges the path to education for the poorest of the poor.”

Clapping and shaking hands all around.

Cut to the brilliant green and brown of a remote village high up in Indonesia’s mountains. Children, gorgeous and laughing, walk kilometers of terrain to a tiny, one-teacher school. The camera pans back to the village, where a little girl stares wistfully after them. The shot widens to show that she has clubfoot; her feet twisted inwards. As opening credits scroll on, we know there is no way she could walk to school…

I haven’t worked out the complete script yet, but there are plenty of true stories to draw from. One billion people in the world have disabilities, and around 80% of them live in developing countries like Indonesia. In fact, in the world’s poorest places over one in five people have disabilities.  These people live with much more than just physical or mental impairments. As my “little Indonesian girl” character would portray, people with disabilities experience huge barriers in participating in education, employment and community life.

Barriers exist for people with disabilities in all societies, but are steepest in poorer communities where access to these activities is often limited anyway. A child born with clubfoot in Australia will generally get treatment at birth to straighten and strengthen her legs, and still go to school, socialise and work with her peers. The little Indonesian girl, however, presents the reality in many developing countries.

In these places, children born with clubfoot will never receive treatment for this. Walking, if possible, will always be painful, and she could never travel far. In many communities her impairment would also be seen as a curse. She would likely face a lifetime of stigma and exclusion from her community, who assume that because she has a disability, she has no potential.

If there was a movie, this little girl’s story would show us how poverty and disability create a vicious cycle: being poor generally limits access to health care, good nutrition and safe conditions – which increases the likelihood of acquiring a disability.  And having a disability generally limits access to education, employment and community – which increases the likelihood of being trapped in poverty.

Clearly this movie is a drama. It’s a dramatic fact that children with disabilities make up one-third of all children in developing countries who should be in school but are not. What isn’t so clear is how this dire situation can be developed into a Hollywood ending.

Cue for us to cut to the silver fox in the skyscraper.

Some of the big players in development are coming to recognise that people with disabilities are extremely vulnerable and excluded from their projects. How this recognition gets the little girl with clubfoot to school is more complicated. RESULTS International (Australia) recently released a report examining how the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and AusAID include girls and children with disabilities in education programs they fund in Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and the Philippines. The report finds that while all three agencies consider disability in their high-level development policies, “on the ground” many children with disabilities are still not getting to school.  Some progress has been made—particularly by AusAID–but children with disabilities continue to be profoundly excluded from education. And so the scene is set for the tale of the silver fox and the little village girl.

To be honest, I don’t think I’d like the movie. It would have a twee love plot and some expendable character I fancied would die. Then there would be the inevitable contrast between the skyscraper and village, reinforcing unhelpful paradigms of “us” and “them”, “benefactor” and “beneficiary”, “problem” and “solution”.

But I would still probably go to see it. Because when millions of the world’s children are facing such extreme discrimination and exclusion, you need to take what you can to get the message out there.

Which is why I’m asking you to think about this: Would you have gone to see the film? Would you get teary at the injustice that the little girl endures? Would you spend the trip home ranting about the laudable development banks writing toothless policies from their air-conditioned skyscrapers? Would you Google some combination of “disability poverty Indonesia education” when procrastinating at work the next day?

Or, even if you think the movie sounds like the worst thing since the Titanic, are you horrified by the fact that 70% of children with disabilities in Indonesia do not go to school?

If so, don’t let this storyline just be an overlooked opportunity for Matt Damon to get an Oscar. Movie or not, there are still millions of children in the world being denied their rights because they have a disability. So get teary, rant, Google, find out more about ending the cycle of poverty and disability.

Their stories may not make it to the big screen, but these children still deserve the chance to write their own happy ending.

This article first appeared in the Angry Cripple column of The Punch.

To find out more about the cycle of poverty and disability and what you can do about this, visit End the Cycle.

On July 8 last year, countries participating in the 2011 High-Level Segment of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) unanimously adopted a ministerial declaration, noting the importance of moving beyond MDG 2 of universal primary education in favour of a more holistic and inclusive vision of education systems. This high-level ministerial review meets once a year, but this is the first time that ECOSOC focused on education. Although this is a welcome and important acknowledgement, inclusive and holistic education is not a new or original idea, just a remixed one.

Everything is a remix is a 4-part series by Kirby Ferguson, whose basic premise is, well, that everything is a remix.

“Remixing is a folk art but the techniques are the same ones used at any level of creation: copy, transform, and combine. You could even say that everything is a remix”.

Part 1 looks at modern music, part 2 at film, part 3 at creativity. Do not watch part 1 if you are a Led Zeppelin fan. You can also get stuck into the conversation and let Kirby know what your favourite remixes are here. In the spirit of remixing, I want to take Kirby’s hypothesis and apply it to education.

It starts with one person. John Dewey. All progress in education philosophy, management, pedagogy, and curriculum can be traced back to this person. I (almost) guarantee that you can pick up an journal article or book on child-centred learning, on education in general, and Dewey will be the protagonist in the citations.

His 1903 article, ‘Democracy in education‘ in The Elementary School Teacher journal, is 13 pages long and has been cited well over 522 times according to Google Scholar. His 1916 book, Democracy and Education has been cited well over 12,000 times. By contrast, John Maynard Keynes’ 1936 treatise, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, which has shaped modern macroeconomics, has been cited over 17,000 times. Meanwhile, William Easterly’s 2006 The White Man’s Burden, which is shaping modern aid and development discourse, has been cited just over 1,483 times.

To keep in mind about the year 1903:

• Only two countries had given women the right to vote.
• Edward VII of England was proclaimed Emperor of India.
• The High Court of Australia sat for the first time.
• The first teddy bear and box of crayons were introduced and sold.
• The Russian Social Democratic Labor Party splits into two groups, one being the Bolsheviks.
• Tour de France was announced.
• The Wright Flyer became the first powered, heavier-than-air machine to achieve controlled flight.

Writing about the public education system in the U.S. in his 1903 article, he had this to say about the role of teachers in a democratic model of school management and education:

“The system which makes no great demands upon originality, upon invention, upon the continuous expression of individuality, works automatically to put and to keep the more incompetent teachers in the school” (p.198).

In one of his more powerful arguments, which still has great currency today, Dewey stated that any educational reform that is undemocratic and “repels” those who exhibit the above characteristics “are compromised at their source and postponed indefinitely for fruition (p.199)”. Research has shown that educational inputs – books, uniforms, desks – alone do not improve a child’s achievement, but that single most effective variable is the quality and training of the teacher.

Dewey goes on to make his most powerful statement, which still marks him as history’s most progressive and influential educational philosopher:

“The undemocratic suppression of the individuality of the teacher goes naturally with the improper restriction of the intelligence of the mind of the child”.

He argues that denying the intellectual freedom of a child, of self-direction in learning, is to deny the very principles of democracy. And, that giving free expression to a child’s intellectual freedom can be achieved through what we now as commonly know active and inquiry-based learning; through experiential and child-centred learning.

“What is primarily required for that direct inquiry which constitutes the essence of science is first-hand experience; an active and vital participation through the medium of all the bodily organs with the means and materials of building up first-hand experience” (p.200).

Dewey strongly believed that a public school can and should be the site for freedom of expression and cognitive development. Schools can be places of learning that are relevant to the child’s own life; a common theme in current educational literature and policy. Classrooms should encourage and provide for scientific experiments, “in the sense of trying things or to see what will happen is the most natural business of the child; it is, indeed, his chief concern” (p.202). A child’s freedom of expression and learning in school should also be found in art, music and story-telling. But, most of all, Dewey argues, schools and education in general, must be a site for a partnership between three motives – of affection, of social growth, and of scientific inquiry.

I first read Dewey’s philosophy when studying for a postgraduate degree in education. His writings are inspirational, and formed the basis for my own approach to teaching and learning. I remixed his Pedagogic Creed into my own.

“I believe that much of present education fails because it neglects this fundamental principle of the school as a form of community life. It conceives the school as a place where certain information is to be given, where certain lessons are to be learned, or where certain habits are to be formed. The value of these is conceived as lying largely in the remote future; the child must do these things for the sake of something else he is to do; they are mere preparation. As a result they do not become a part of the life experience of the child and so are not truly educative”.

It is easy to think that the above paragraph could have been written in 2011, when in fact it was written in 1897 in Volume 54 of School Journal. We take for granted the notion that education is largely a psychological and social process; both an individual and group experience. This idea is deeply embedded in modern curriculum development, teacher and learning pedagogy, classroom activities, lesson planning and teacher training around the world. Your own education is a remix of Dewey’s thinking: the field trip to the history museum; the science experiments with a Bunsen burner; the small group tasks where you pull the weight of one team member; and the reflective writing about how a certain book or character relates to your own experiences.

However, this remix is not the club jam that it should be, particularly in the global development agenda. We have essentially watered down education and the pragmatic, yet aspirational philosophy of Dewey. We have sentimentalised education, forgetting about the process and focusing excessively on the Goals of Education For All. Dewey believed that “next to deadness and dullness, formalism and routine, our education is threatened with no greater evil than sentimentalism”.

A recent post on the Lowy Institute’s Interpreter asks whether there is a misplaced emphasis on education in the development agenda. Danielle Romanes, glancing at education in Papua New Guinea (PNG), rightly points out that addressing supply-side constraints cannot be an isolated from demand driven considerations. Although, the provision and access of education is not black and white, it reminds us to keep in mind that there has to be reasons for education. Supply side interventions can be part of this same watered-down narrative. Books, desks, schools. Research has shown that the provision of books, desks, and even school infrastructure does not necessarily produce positive correlations with increased learning outcomes. Inputs are not educative in and of themselves, nor are they autonomous. They appeal to sentiment, reducing education to moveable parts without considering the more difficult challenges of relevance, quality, democracy, equity, inclusion, and participation, all of which can be considered demand driven considerations. It also ignores the social and culture practice of education, something Dewey recognised and emphasised, but which has since been lost in policy and application.

Access to primary schooling is rising globally, but retention and achievement rates are not showing the same improvements. This is especially the case for those children from rural, high poverty areas and particular for certain household and demographic profiles (based on number of children in a family, gender, disability, parent’s education, etc.).  It would not be surprising to see increasing drop out rates, given the lack of secondary schooling opportunities, the direct/indirect and opportunity costs of education, and poor quality and delivery of education. It is not that the emphasis on education is misplaced. It is right where it should be, if not deserving of more amplification. There is just so much other noise – background, static, white – which distracts from the proper emphasis of education.

“I believe that to set up any end outside of education, as furnishing its goal and standard, is to deprive the educational process of much of its meaning and tends to make us rely upon false and external stimuli in dealing with the child” (J. Dewey, 1897 My Pedagogic Creed).

White Paper Series by Alessandra Pigni

“The idea that psychological well-being is a luxury is right at the root of the problem. The mental health of field staff is every bit as important as their physical health. Proper preparation for the psychological stresses of field life should be taken as seriously as pre-mission medical assessments and associated measures to prevent/treat illness in the field.”

(Robyn Kerrison – human rights/protection advisor, currently working in Haiti) 

Over the last months I have been collecting stories, reflections and suggestions from humanitarian professionals on the importance of staff-care, pre-deployment psychological preparation, burnout prevention training, field support, coaching and mentoring and post-deployment care. HQ and field-staff have lent their voice to this white paper series, which provides an analysis of the needs in the field, as well as the types of interventions that could be of help, including mindfulness training.

Encouraged by my dear friend Jennifer Lentfer at how-matters.org the first chapter of the White Paper Series on the psychological health of the precious people who work in aid is now out! It provides the background and purpose of the whole series. I have chosen to release the twelve papers over several weeks, in order to give readers the time and space to process the material and reflect upon it.

Below is an overview of the series:

1. Provides the background and purpose of the white paper series.
2. Offers an overview of the issues in psychological health faced by aid workers before, during, and after field deployment.
3. Gives an overview of the concepts of mindfulness and how they may apply to aid work.
4. Focuses on the recruitment and hiring processes of aid workers.
5. Focuses on the pre-deployment phase, and the type of psychological preparation required.
6. Focuses on the importance of personal awareness in the field.
7. Explores the role of teams and team conflicts in staffʼs psychological well-being.
8. Examines the organisational culture that permeates humanitarian agencies.
9. Focuses on burnout and reaching ʻa breaking pointʼ.
10. Examines practices that support aid workers while in the field.
11. Provides an open conclusion with recommendations for action.
12. Offers a list of useful resources on staff care, psychological support and mindfulness-based interventions.

In each of the papers, the voices of aid workers in the field are included (always in italics), along with their personal stories. They discuss the staff-care needs that arise during a mission, often describing the predominantly tough “humanitarian culture” that permeates agencies. But these papers do not only collect, describe and analyse the evidence offered by frontline professionals and volunteers. Each paper also provides conclusions and suggested interventions: action points, priorities and policy changes, highlighting how the lack of training and staff-care in humanitarian programmes can turn into an occupational hazard for employees and their agencies.

In particular, the concepts and practices of mindfulness are introduced in their relevance to the problems that may arise in the field, highlighting the significant difference that they can make to standard NGO training, procedures and management. Recommendations for developing psychological awareness, better staff retention, care and support before, during and after the mission, as well as a list of useful resources can also be found in a separate section of the white paper series.

Donors and HQ staff may be particularly interested in following this white paper series. Frontline professionals who know all about burnout, stress, trauma, loneliness, isolation and depression in the field, and the urgent need of doing something about it, may recognise their voices in it. I am convinced that “changing the world starts from within”, and that successful projects on the ground derive not only from professionally competent, but also psychologically healthy staff. How we feel within ourselves has an impact on how we engage with the world. This is no small matter.

Much is to be discussed, changed and improved in our aid community around staff-care. Starting from ourselves I feel is a good place of enquiry. Feedback and comments are most welcome, and so is your participation in the Frontline Burnout Prevention Group on LinkedIn.

To download the first paper of the series please click below (the bibliography is available for download as well so you can refer back to the various sources)

#1 – Background and purpose of the white paper series.

Bibliography – A List of Useful Resources

The remainder of the series will be updated section by section and downloadable from Mindfulness for NGOs.

This is a reposting of an original post on Mindfulness for NGOs.

Co-written with Shana Montesol Johnson of Development Crossroads

Last week, we published a post on whydev about the importance of peer coaching as a means to overcome challenges that many aid and development workers face. In partnership with Shana Montesol Johnson of Development Crossroads, we are in the process of developing a peer coaching matching service. In our recent post, we asked people to complete a survey, letting us know if they would be interested in participating in such a program.

It is fair to say that Brendan, Shana and I are absolutely overwhelmed by the positive response we have received so far. In less than a week, we have had over 130 people pass their details to us, expressing interest in being matched with a peer coach. When we first hatched this idea, we had a feeling it would tap into a need in the aid and development community — and this amazing response is a gratifying confirmation of that hunch. We’re looking forward to integrating all the feedback that we have received into a relevant and useful service.

We are grateful that many other high profile bloggers have shown their support for our concept by publishing their own posts to promote our no-cost service. Thanks also to those of you who have passed on the good word via tweets and retweets.

The more people we have signed up for this service, the greater the chance that we can find a good match for you – so please encourage anybody in your networks to register their interest and complete our survey, through promoting it via Twitter, Facebook, email or any other method.

So what have we heard from these 130 people? Here are some highlights from our survey, including concerns and issues raised by respondents which we plan to take into account as we design the program.

Why would I want to do this? Perceived benefits of peer coaching

Here are some of the ways in which respondents to our survey framed peer coaching and its potential benefits:

“A mutual source of support and sounding board.”

“A great way to make contacts in the field.”

“The chance to…clarify issues and think of approaches I wouldn’t have thought of before.”

“I feel isolated, uncertain and a little forlorn about finding my way into development-related work, and would like to have someone to share my experience with, who is perhaps also experiencing the same thing.”

“My job has been stressful at times, and in isolated environments, there are rarely people to talk to.”

“There are an enormous amount of issues and questions that crop up as I make my way into international development – I’d love to a) get some answers and b) be reassured that it isn’t just me who doesn’t know these things!”

“…it would be nice to have a productive session that doesn’t involve leaning on my overworked bosses.”

From the above, it seems that some of the perceived benefits of peer coaching are: to overcome isolation, gain support, have a fresh perspective on work issues, relieve stress by debriefing, have a sounding board, discuss work issues with someone other than a boss (or colleague), experience the solidarity of knowing someone else is going through the same thing, and expand one’s network.

Am I the right demographic for peer coaching?

whydev.org tends to be targeted at young professionals and students in the field of development. However, it’s worth noting that this peer coaching service is relevant for anybody, regardless of experience or years under the belt. As Shana wrote recently on Development Crossroads, people at all levels of experience (and ages) can benefit from peer coaching.

Here are some concerns that people starting out in development had about their suitability for peer coaching:

“I’m not sure I have enough experience to be a worthwhile coach as yet, having only (sic) worked overseas for three months, but when I do (sic) I think it would be fantastic.”

“I would love to, but am not sure I’m qualified enough to serve as a coach as I’m not full-time in the field of development. I’m more interested in human rights law. I would love to learn from a peer, but as I’m starting my career I am not sure I can serve as the best resource.”

“I would, but I struggle a little right now to know how I might be helpful. All of my experience is from volunteering and at this moment I am not even certain whether I have a viable career in development.”

Shana, who is a certified professional coach and knows about these things, responds to these concerns this way, “The effectiveness of a peer coach is not based on one’s technical knowledge, life experiences, or number of years on the job. It has a lot more to do with the ability to listen without judgment, ask good questions, and be a sounding board.”

Survey respondents at the other end of the work experience spectrum expressed concerns such as:

“I would want to make sure that my peer was that, my peer in experience and in general, in the same age-range and professional level. Otherwise, if matching experienced professionals with junior professionals that would also benefit junior professionals a lot but more then might be needed for senior level professionals…” (from someone who has 10 years of experience in international development)

“…if the person had skills of relevance so I could get/give substantive support, that would be of interest — but a hard match!” (from someone who has 8 years of experience in international development – who was one of the few survey respondents who said they would not be interested in the program)

We agree that a critical success factor in any coaching relationship is a good match between the partners. The more people who sign up for the program — from all backgrounds and levels of experience and fields within development — the greater the chance that everyone will find a suitable peer coach. We are delighted to have received survey responses so far from people with all levels of experience, and we encourage more of our “seasoned professional” colleagues to sign up.

What all of these concerns reflect is that no matter what demographic participants come from, more than likely, there is always going to be someone else who is in a similar position. If you are hesitant at signing up because you are not sure you fit the correct demographic — we’re here to tell you that there is no “correct demographic,” it’s entirely defined by the demographic that signs up.

How much time is this going to take, anyway?

Some people expressed concerns about the format of the peer coaching and the amount of time they would be able to devote to it:

“I think there are benefits of working with someone in a structured way, and it opens your networks beyond your current colleagues and friends.  However, it does seem risky in that you would give more than you would get, or it would waste your time.”

“Time constraints may tempt me to say no, but I definitely think it’s a great opportunity and I’ve enjoyed that from colleagues in the past.”

Although whydev and Development Crossroads will help provide a structure and suggested guidelines for peer coaching, there is enough flexibility in it so that the details are entirely user-defined. You and your peer coach will decide how long your peer coaching sessions will be, and how frequent. Based upon an agreement with the correct peer, you can devote as little or as much time as you like.

If you are at all interested in peer coaching, or even if you are just a little hesitant, I recommend you head on over and fill out our survey.

Because, as one particularly astute participant wrote:

“…sometimes we need to get out of the bubble of our own thoughts and have someone else give us perspective.”

The survey to help us design the peer coaching matching service can be found here.

The problem: isolation

If you have worked in international development, you have probably experienced isolation. It seems to be a fact of life in this industry. Field-based expat staff may be the only person at their level in their local office, or the only expat on the team (or one of very few), separated from their local staff counterparts by cultural, language, and organisational barriers. Even people working in the home office may feel isolated. Perhaps they don’t feel comfortable sharing their struggles with their boss.  Or maybe the boss him/herself is the problem.

Many people working in aid and development tend to spend a lot of time talking about work with their spouses, partners, or close friends.  This can be a great source of support.  However, it can also put undue pressure on the person who is getting an earful.  Over time, they may tire of hearing the same complaints.  Someone who doesn’t work with you – or work in development – may not “get” your work context.  And a spouse will likely have a hard time remaining neutral and impartial because they have a stake in their partner’s career success.

In situations of isolation, it’s great to work one-on-one with a professional coach or mentor. However, this is not always possible, practical, or financially feasible.  An alternative that works well is peer coaching.

What is peer coaching?

A peer coach is someone who is at a similar level to you in your organisation (or even in another organisation).  He or she knows and/or understands your work context. While not trained as a coach, he or she is willing to coach you according to a simple (yet effective) peer coaching model. This involves actively listening without judgment, reflecting back what he/she is hearing, asking probing questions, and helping you generate concrete action steps to move you forward.

Peer coaching is different than mentoring or advising. It is not based on the premise that your peer coach knows better or is more experienced than you. A peer coach’s job is not to give you advice or tell you what they think you should do. A peer coach’s role is to listen, to provide a sounding board, and help you find the answers yourself.

Whether you are studying, beginning your career in aid and development, or a seasoned professional, it’s great to work one-on-one with a coach who can help you identify blind spots, gain clarity on your priorities, and help you design actions that will bring about desired changes. This what Cassie and Leanne have established:

Cassie and Leanne (names and details have been changed) both work as managers in an international development NGO. Cassie is based in Nepal, and Leanne is in Bangladesh. As expat staff, the only other non-local in their offices are their bosses — and sometimes they don’t feel comfortable sharing all their struggles with their supervisors. Cassie and Leanne  met at an internal training that brought together international staff from various country offices. Since their organisation does not offer executive coaching to staff at their level, Cassie and Leanne decided to team up to provide peer coaching to each other.

They conduct their coaching sessions via Skype. They take turns sharing what’s on their minds, and providing coaching/feedback. They cover a range of topics, whatever is pressing: tough decisions, managing a difficult relationship with a boss/staff member, tricky cross-cultural issues, musings about career moves.

Leanne reports that one of the main benefits of peer coaching is simply the opportunity to think out loud. By talking through a problem or challenge, she ends up coming up with a solution that hadn’t even occurred to her before the peer coaching session.

Cassie values the opportunity to vent, share, and trouble-shoot with someone who understands where she is coming from. Since they have similar roles in different parts of the same organisation, the two women don’t have to explain all the details of their respective situations.

They admit that they could benefit from scheduling their peer coaching calls more regularly. Sometimes their jam-packed work schedules mean that several weeks go by between peer coaching sessions. But they also know that if a crisis comes up, or a decision needs to be made, they can set up a last-minute call and have a thinking session when it’s most needed.

Find a peer coach

We are excited to announce that, through a collaboration between whydev and Development Crossroads, we are launching a peer coaching matching service. We believe that young professionals, graduate students, and others starting out in international development could benefit from peer coaching. We want to develop a service that best matches up with your needs, and supports your peer coaching relationship. We also want to know if you would actually use such a service!

We are still in the design phase, and would like to use this opportunity to get your thoughts through the online survey below. Would you want a peer coach? What would you like to get out of such a relationship? How often would you keep in touch? How much input and oversight would you want from us? These are the type of questions we would love to get your thoughts on.

Please take 2 minutes to complete the survey, and you are more than welcome to provide feedback in the comments below.

Peer coaching survey

Click HERE to complete the survey through GoogleDocs or simply complete the form below:

By Lexi Randall-L’Estrange and Nick Byrne*

Lexi’s “Collaboration moment”

I need help. I’m working on a project in a small town in the middle of the Viet Nam Mekong Delta and there is no public data on water quality, demographics, water rights structure… in fact, there is no public information on anything.

I’ve never been there.

I need to write a grant proposal in two weeks.

I log on to http://www.ngocentre.org.vn/, find the WASH working group, navigate my way to what I think is an “email group” function and ask the simple question

“Has anyone here worked in Long An Province?”

Out it goes into the abyss and I sit back in my chair, spin around on the cold tile floor and sigh. Well that was that. Back to work.

When you’re on the other side of the world it’s easy to ask for help and to realise how much you don’t know and what could be done better. You know that knowledge is out there and you want it to be shared with you. You know nothing will get done as an NGO worker unless you collaborate with government; learn from the experience of other NGO and aid projects; use education and knowledge to empower; seek opportunities to better enable enterprise and business; and learn about the language, culture, faith and traditions that create the social fabric you’re so carefully navigating through.

Within two days I was arranging a meeting with an Australian Vietnam-based researcher from AFAP, having coffee (cà phê sữa đá) with the project manager for one of AusAID’s flagship water supply and sanitation projects, skyping with a consultant based in Hanoi about a project he worked on with the Long An Provincial Government, being directed back to Australian based consultants for assistance, arranging a site visit for Ifte from the RMIT Climate Chance Adaptation Program…. and the list goes on.

Back in Melbourne I started looking for a way of bringing the collaboration into every day work. I found Sydney Development Circle, knew Nick Byrne who has driving the establishment of Brisbane Development Circle and then sent out another email into the abyss “Who wants to be involved as a Founding Member of Melbourne Development Circle?”.

Why The Development Circle? Who is involved?

Nick – Each sector working within development is starting to develop a unique set of strengths. But, due to a number of different factors (time, capacity, geography) development professionals’ work can become quite isolated. So the challenge is how can we realise a larger social return for our investment in development? If we can bring each sector together to share perspectives and experiences, perhaps we can build cross-sector development teams, raising positive social and development outcomes.

Lexi – We are a network of individuals who work in community development, international aid, social enterprise, government, business, faith, education, research or arts.

We self-identify as community development workers, even if it’s not in our job title, because we know the impact that our work has locally, nationally and internationally.

We are students. We are people wanting to get into the community development space and don’t know how.

We are community engagement professionals seeking to build genuine relationships with others to better enable our work.

What is The Development Circle?

Nick – The Development Circle believes that via innovation and collaborative effort, the development sector can continue to increase its impact as a positive change agent within communities in Australia and abroad.

The aim of The Development Circle is to create a platform for the development community to share ideas, explore potential collaboration, and discuss topical development issues. Membership of the group is open to anyone, across all fields within the development sector, as well as those who have a general interest in development issues.

We are facilitating this by supporting local groups foster opportunities for those working in the international aid and community development sector to come together for discussion and networking in a relaxed environment. We are exploring future ideas for development sector engagement.

What do we hope will come out of it? 

Nick – The Melbourne Development Circle is the third chapter in the Australian network. The Australian network originated in Sydney, grew to Brisbane in 2010, and we are very excited to see it expand to Melbourne in 2012. It looks likely that we’ll see a couple more groups startup in Australia before years end, as well as our first international group.

Each location is very unique in what it will ultimately look like as the development landscape can vary quite a bit. Canberra, as an example, would have a strong government focus, whereas Sydney & Brisbane have quite a balanced (NGO, government, private, academia) group.

In a broad sense, The Development Circle hopes to become synonymous with relevant and engaging opportunities to build the professions capacity to deliver positive social outcomes. In the short term, this will be through a familiar yet unique event series. In the medium to long term, this could evolve to include joint-venture facilitation, brokering and innovation workshopping.

What you can do.

Join our network, come along to events, sign up to our newsletter, tell us directly what you want to see come out of this group.

Sign up to our monthly newsletter to receive information about all upcoming events, news from our network partners: http://thedevelopmentcircle.com.au/

Give feedback through info@thedevelopmentcircle.com.au

For Melbourne Development Circle, email Lexi and share your vision with us and how you would like to be involved – lexi@thedevelopmentcircle.com.au

Come to the launch of Melbourne Development Circle February 7^th –: http://thedevelopmentcircle.com.au/?p=465

Go to the first Sydney Development Circle event for the year on February 6^th – http://sdc.groupsite.com/calendar/event/2012/2/6/303429

Connect with us on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/thedevelopmentcircle

*Lexi Randall-L’Estrange is part of the Melbourne Development Circle and Nick Byrne of The Development Circle

By Sarah Grant*

“Every complexity, we are told, is the process of evolution. Yet our development planners seem to think that they can do better…that they can create complex things at one throw by a process called planning.”

E.F Schumacher offered us these thoughts in 1975 through his book Small is Beautiful (I highly recommend this read). He continues to discuss the natural process of growth that all great phenomena take in the natural world; every creature, ecosystem and social construct has come into being through a gradual process of genetic mutations and adaptations. It therefore follows that any great change in the human condition or development towards a productive and sturdy society is also a process of slow change.

One primary mistake, perhaps, in our efforts at supporting development in poorer regions of the world is to forget that sustainable change is a slow (and I emphasize slow), deliberate process. Planning has its place, however the chances that everything will go according to plan and produce the desired results is quite low. Ultimate success of an effort aimed at helping another group of human beings then rests on one’s ability to constantly adapt to challenges and treat the plan as a fluid strategy that changes and grows with the circumstances.

Unfinished fish ponds dug by FAO

As an example on the value of patience and adaptation in development, I often think about a school that I was acquainted with in Zambia in 2007. The community school was initiated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. One year was spent on researching the perfect location for the school based on data gathered over several districts on households affected by HIV/AIDS and population of orphaned children. Five to six months was spent training community facilitators and organizing a network of local teachers from the closest town to help teach the children. Before working with the school I read close to 100 pages front and back outlining how lessons should be conducted and what the specific results should be after one year on the children, their families and the community. Needless to say I was thrilled to be working with such a well organized and well thought out program.

The problems started almost immediately. Half of the teachers from the town did not fulfill their committed roles, materials for building the school never arrived on time, income generating activities for the school were hindered by theft and there was a corrupt facilitator to deal with. If you have lived and worked in Africa on development for very long none of these issues would come as a surprise. Indeed (perhaps sadly enough) they should be expected. The real evil however came not in the fact that these barriers to the realization of the school came up, but that FAO and their representatives did not take the time to listen, learn and adapt the program. The result after one year was a disgruntled community who felt that they were not being listened to, students who were not engaged in nearly complete lessons, and an office of development workers who had no clue what was going on on the ground.

This school and their experience with FAO is one of the primary reasons I started Color Me In!. As Schumacher reminds us development and human growth is a gradual process that revolves around the adaptation to challenges and change rather than the avoidance of issues. All I feel we can ask for is the patience and courage to allow for realities on the ground to guide gradual growth rather than aspirations from a Board room. A strategic plan for any development effort should then be a fluid and changing creature of its own with the space to allow ourselves to be wrong, to recognize challenges, and adapt to them. As they say in Zambia all growth is “pangono, pangono” or “slowly slowly.”

It seems that the culture we are trying to help has long been aware of the nature of change. Maybe it’s our turn to listen.

*Sarah Grant served in the Peace Corps  from 2005-2007 in Zambia and specialized in forestry, conservation farming, gender, small business and community growth. This is a reposting of an article on Sarah’s blog for Color Me In!, an NGO she founded that supports entrepreneurs and environmental preservation in Zambia through micro-loans and planting trees.

We’ve all experienced it. The eyes soften. The lips purse in a gesture of understanding. The inner parts of the eyebrows curl upwards, as if a fast-acting, emergency shot of Botox has been delivered right between them. Sometimes, the head tilts. Even more rare is the slow, rhythmic nodding that may occur as you continue speaking. It’s as if moving the head up and down gently will somehow coax your words into their ears, swirl them through the auditory canals, and facilitate entrance into the brain, so that full comprehension can occur.

They say that development is such a complex game, that there is no rulebook. There is no guide, no Bible, no Wisden’s almanac. You just gotta get out there and play whatever comes at you, because you never know what’s heading your way. Thankfully though, as unpredictable as things can be while navigating through work, there is one thing that is always predictable. Non-development folk. Those who we shall now refer to as “citizens”.

So, keeping this in mind, here is a simple guide that takes the individual brain-work and spontaneity away (because we all know that they’re not sought after qualities in this industry), and does the thinking for you. What better way to respond to a predictable response, than with an equally predictable response that you read off some website?

First, some ground rules. Your mileage may vary. Maybe people that you meet don’t immediately assume you’re a nice person just because you work in a caring industry. Maybe there are other, more obvious aspects of your personality that dissuade them from this notion. For instance, maybe you think that wearing T-shirts that say “I’m with stupid” or “I may not be Santa but you can sit on my lap” are amusing. Maybe you’re the kind of person who, when excited, exclaims “squeee!”, or actually pronounces the word “LOL” when someone says something funny, instead of laughing. Or maybe you’re that kind of person who always has to outdo the other people you’re talking to, whether it be that extra dangerous stint you did in Mozambique that time, or that cab driver in Islamabad who drove 15 km/h faster than everyone else’s cab driver. In any case, your mileage may vary.

Second of all, there’s no accurate way to actually predict what people are thinking when they say the following things. Being able to do that would mean that we’d have some sort of Obi-Wan Kenobi-like ability to read people’s minds, and we all know that kind of scenario isn’t even slightly believable. Especially when George Lucas is behind the prequels.

Finally, whatever you do, do not – even for one second, take this advice seriously.

They say: “You must find your work so fulfilling.”

What they mean: “You’re poor.”

You should say: “Actually yes, I do. And that’s the reason why I can afford to live on two slices of stale bread a day, while all the time paying off two student loans from the time George W Bush’s dad was in power. And how about you? How do you find your second Ferrari in relation to your first? Drives well?”

They say: “Do you find it difficult to maintain a relationship when you’re moving around so much?”

What they mean: “You’re lucky that you have a good excuse to fall back on to explain why you’re still single. With the combination of your repulsive personality and Hobbit-like looks, I doubt you’d find anyone willing to look at your twice, even if you stayed in the same place for more than 12 months at a time.”

You should say: “Very difficult. But for me, relationships of a romantic nature come second. The only relationships I really care about, are those of the stakeholders that I seek to empower, through active participation in poverty reduction schemes. This is what I stress to the women/men that I meet on the two or three occasions I actually get to date every year. Funnily enough, they never seem to reply to my emails after.”

They say: “I wish I could be more like you, but I just don’t know if I have it in me.”

What they mean: “When I say have it in me, I mean, I’m not sure if I could give up my lifestyle of free boardroom drinks every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. Plus, our company gave us free iPads last year. Have you seen this amazing app which can help predict your wife’s mood based upon the timing of tidal waves? Amazing…”

You should say: “Sure, I had a promising career as an accountant/brain surgeon/plumber once too, but then I started to realize that this is where I wanted to be. How does that app work again?”

They say: “I help people too you know, I work in a hospital/help old ladies cross the road/help people choose worthwhile stocks/help increase the gap between rich and poor.”

What they mean: “OK, look, just because you hug orphans on a daily basis, it doesn’t make you any more of a nice person than me. After all, I even gave up a yoga mat last year for those poor folk in Haiti. That’s right, an entire used yoga mat.”

You should say: “It’s great that you doing your bit to help others. After all, we can’t all abandon our day jobs to work in poor countries. We still need doctors, lawyers, accountants and people to increase the gap between rich and poor to make the world go round. I’m not sure if you’ve ever heard this quote before, but Bono once said, “Be the change you want to be in the world”.  I think it was after they released Joshua Tree. It’s a good principle to live your life by.”

They say: “Wasn’t there some book written by some African lady who said that aid didn’t work anyway? What do you think about that?”

What they mean: “Please help me to confirm my long standing confirmation bias that donating to aid programs doesn’t actually have any long lasting effects. After all, the iPhone 5 is coming out and the idea of playing Words with Friends HD on a screen with pixels so small that they can be barely considered individual particles has me in ecstasy.”

You should say: “Personally, I don’t think we should gather all our information about a very complex topic from just one source. It’s far too simplistic a view to take and doing so would be a far too lazy response about a topic that deserves much more attention. You cannot try and pick up all the nuances of aid and development from just one person. Anyway, I just read Peter Singer’s The Life You Can Save, and he said the exact opposite, so there.”

So there you have it. A simple guide to answering questions about development from so-called citizens. One final tip. Sometimes, a particularly well-read citizen might ask you something a little more in depth about your work – for example, how exactly do you promote social inclusion in a society that does not value individual rights, or what does the evidence say about the relative benefits of micro-savings versus micro-finance, or what exactly does capacity building mean? In this scenario, there is only one sensible response. Run. As fast as is humanly possible. Nobody, and no guide, can possibly teach you to answer questions like that.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

“Don’t tell them you’re a healer!”. This is exactly what a very good friend of mine said after I told him that I was taking a step back from working inside the development sector, to working with the people who work inside the development sector… as a healer!

“Don’t tell them you’re a healer! They won’t respect you!” he said.

Really?

I thought about this for a while. At first I bought into it. Yes, I better not tell ANYONE I am a healer and that I help people to balance their sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems, that I work with energy, and that I can actually help people to figure out who they truly are so they don’t have to run around being who they aren’t in an attempt to get respect and social recognition.

Those hardcore development professionals and aid workers, they are not going to like it!

I was actually shocked that I had bought into this… shocked at my narrow view of the development sector. That I believe it to be a hardcore, rational sector with no space for the ‘softer’ issues such as personal development, healing and spirituality.

And perhaps I am right to a certain degree… but I had forgotten that the development sector is made up of human beings. And as long as there are human beings there will be diversity… and there definitely will be a need for and interest in healing and spirituality.

Healing for social change…

In my view, spirituality – stories about our experiences as more than just flesh-and-bone human beings, is at the crux of our human experience. It has been a key aspect in the way in which we ‘organise’ and explain our world, despite the fact that spirituality has not been given serious attention in the secular world of modernity and Enlightenment, which is what has created the foundation of most of development theory today.

However, Enlightenment thinking’s rationality as well as need for logic and reason has not been able to capture the essence and importance of spirituality, as well as the complexities of how people interact with and use spirituality and healing in their everyday lives.

Several academic scholars are, nevertheless, beginning to open up to the thought that spirituality and healing are in fact essential building blocks for social change (e.g. Jim Ife 2009 and Fran Gale, Natalie Bolzan & Dorothy McRae-McMahon 2007).

But is there space for healing and spirituality in today’s development discourse?

Jim Ife in his book Human Rights from Below (2009) suggests that we need an alternative to the traditional academic prose that is often the main form of communication in development talk, because healing and spirituality extends beyond the normal understanding of ‘rational’, ‘analytical’ or ‘logical’.

I guess what Ife is trying to say is that an LFA (Logical Framework: a widely used linear and ‘rational’ tool used to plan projects and programmes) is not always enough to capture the important aspects of healing and spiritual development necessary for social change.

‘Heal ourselves to heal the world’: Spirituality in practice…

A few days after my friend had told me not to tell anyone in the development sector that I work with healing and spirituality I actually met a woman who uses different methods of healing and spirituality to work with children who are orphaned by HIV/AIDS. This was a system of healing that she had learnt in Rwanda through an organisation called Capacitar (http://www.capacitar.org), whose vision is to ‘heal ourselves to heal the world’! They teach people to use different kinds of healing therapies from chakra healing to EFT (emotional freedom techniques) to acupuncture and other kinds of energy work, and they include methods and techniques from different indigenous healing practices too. I also met a woman who uses yoga and breathing techniques to help young people in Kibera to reduce stress.

Additionally, I came into contact with an organisation who works with ‘deep democracy’ (http://www.ddi-eastafrica.co.ke/), who focus on the importance of not only openness to other individuals, groups, and diverse views, but also an openness to internal experiences including feelings, dreams, body symptoms, and altered states of consciousness, and how awareness of oneself affects our reality, and therefore how we interact with and affect other people.

All of the above are, in my view, healers!

Are these people and organisations not to tell anyone that they are in fact healers? Have they already lost the respect of the development sector? They have nothing but gained mine for daring to look at the deep human aspects of social change!

Development and spirituality…

I do, however, understand the aversion towards incorporating spirituality into the development agenda. There is a danger, and unfortunately this is what has given it a bad name, when spirituality turns into exclusive fundamentalism in an attempt to explain the world from a standard set of rules, as opposed to promoting inclusivity and respect for diversity.

But does the fact that this danger exists mean that we cannot work with healing and spirituality within international development? It gives us reason to be careful, indeed… but if we neglect spirituality and people’s search to become whole beings, then, in my view, development becomes rather empty.

Arnold Mindell has described the inter-relationship between development, democracy and spirituality very beautifully in his description of his coined term ‘Deep Democracy’: “[It is] our sense that the world is here to help us become our entire selves, and we are here to help the world become whole.”

To me, this is the essence of development.

During my time as a programme coordinator working for a large global organisation – amongst all the LFAs, reports, keeping indicators measurable and simple, and ensuring ambitious income targets, I had lost track of the diversity of the development sector. I had forgotten that the development sector is as much about ‘healing the world’ as it is about building roads. I had forgotten that the development sector was as much about creating a space for people to experience themselves as whole spiritual beings as it is about measuring whether the money is spent ‘efficiently’.

And I guess my friend had too, when he told me: “Don’t tell them you’re a healer!”.

Stepping off the plane, Mohsen Soltany was confused – he didn’t think the weather in the United Kingdom would be this hot. Baffled, he questioned the immigration officer.

“UK?”. No – not the UK. He was in Perth. Perth, Australia.

Soltany arrived in Australia in 1999 via Malaysia – or Singapore, he’s not sure – on a journey which started in Iran and traced through Turkey. A people smuggling network arranged his flight to Perth, a city Soltany had no knowledge of before his arrival.

Not that he would get the opportunity to acquaint himself: after declaring himself a refugee, Soltany was transported directly to Perth Detention Centre. His next four years were spent behind the razor wire in various Australian immigration detention centres.

Staying in Iran wasn’t an option. Soltany loves his country, but firmly believes he faced certain death after trying to expose government corruption.

Through his work, Soltany – then a politically active man in his late twenties – was exposed to the corrupt dealings of the government, and was also privy to information about Iran’s infamous chain murders. After penning an anonymous letter to a newspaper condemning the government, Soltany’s house was searched by officials. Although not home at the time, he says “I knew I had to leave”.

While Soltany’s unplanned arrival in Australia is symbolic of the vulnerability of asylum seekers, it is perhaps also illustrative of how government policy – however strict – cannot deter people from fleeing danger and seeking refuge here. Most of those people, like Soltany, will arrive by plane. And many will spend months, even years, in detention centres.

Ian Rintoul first knew Soltany as a name in Villawood Detention Centre. Rintoul makes it his business to know who is behind the razor wire: he is spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition, the group at the epicentre of Sydney’s refugee campaign. His involvement in refugee issues stretches back to the early 1990s, but he pinpoints the Howard era and rise of Pauline Hanson as pivotal to his participation in the movement. When he claims that in recent years government policies on asylum seekers have both “improved and worsened”, his laugh reveals the irony is not lost on him.

“While superficial characteristics and administrative things have changed, the fundamental underpinnings of the refugee issues in Australia haven’t changed”, Rintoul declares. He believes that Gillard government strategies – such as mandatory detention, “stopping the boats”, and regional processing centres – mean “we’re back with all the essentials of the policies we had under the Howard government”.

Rintoul considers the “absolute punitive quality” of detention as one of the worst aspects of asylum seeker policy. Nearly 4,500 people are currently held in Australian immigration detention facilities, with a further 1,300 under residence determination in the community. Rintoul cites overcrowding, a lack of services, and social isolation as instrumental to the self-harm and mental health problems within the detention centres.

Amnesty International has also criticised the conditions in detention centres, deeming them “unacceptable”. The organisation inspected several Australian detention centres and reported that detainees are “at grave risk of self-harm and mental illness”. It claims that morale is deteriorating and attempted suicides are on the rise. Of particular concern are conditions at Christmas Island Immigration Detention Centre, where stays are lengthy and the incidence of self-harm is increasing.

28-year-old Rachel Connor* has been to Christmas Island. As a volunteer English teacher at the detention centre for six weeks in 2010, she witnessed the fragile mental state of many of the detainees.

“The truth is that almost all of the refugees suffered from some form of mental disturbance from being in the centres, as well as the complex history of trauma they carry from previous experience”, reports Connor. She outlines some of the restrictions placed on the detained asylum seekers, such as “timed and monitored” recreation time. She says that detainees are not free to come and go, and that parts of the facility seem “like a prison”.

Nevertheless, Connor believes her English classes had a direct benefit on the asylum seekers, as she says the routine task of practicing the language gave them a focus, “in a context where every day feels the same without progress. Myself and many of the other teachers knew that a lot of our students would not wake up in the morning if it weren’t for our classes”.

Connor’s students told her it was the only thing they looked forward to in the day.

Soltany’s four years in detention were spent divided between Perth, Port Hedland and Villawood detention centres. Sipping tea in his inner-city lounge room crammed with musical instruments, the now 40-year-old musician and poet contemplates the years he lost. Soltany wavers between calm reflection and palpable anger. At times his rage spills over and projects him off his seat. His brow furrows as his voice rises, and his gaze fixes on a point somewhere else – somewhere beyond the room.

“I went very mental”, he admits. “They’re not respecting very basic human rights in detention”. Contacting the media and attempting to speak out about the conditions became a constant undertaking for Soltany. “Any channel that we could get the numbers, I would tell them – this is happening, we are on hunger strike, people here stitched their lips. I told them what was happening”, he says.

He witnessed and experienced physical violence and was also placed in isolation. Released from detention in 2003, Soltany now possesses permanent residency. He is in regular contact with many detainees in the centres, and says the conditions are “still bad”. But Soltany is adamant that the worst feature of detention is the uncertainty.

“You don’t know what will happen, that is the worst part. And you don’t know any day they can come to deport you – that is when people get stressed”, he says. “All the people going to the top of the roof and doing all this stuff, because they think maybe tomorrow… That makes them stressed”.

Rintoul agrees that the indefinite aspect of detention deeply affects asylum seekers. And so does the terminology often used to refer to them.

According to those who work with refugees, and to refugees themselves, terms such as “boat people” and “illegals” are not only misleading but also have a directly harmful effect. Nevertheless, these terms are common in the public domain – despite the fact that over 95% of asylum seekers travel to Australia by plane, and as Connor points out, “there is nothing illegal about seeking asylum”.

Research shows that the terminology does have an effect on public opinion: most people believe that the majority of asylum seekers arrive via boat.

Gode Mfashingabo works at refugee support centre the NSW Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors (STARTTS). The refugee youth worker believes that these terms have become common as they are “much easier and more provocative to use than any other words”. Mfashingabo says that the media and politicians will use “whatever words necessary to destabilise and drive their point across”.

Soltany says that this terminology “absolutely” has a direct effect on refugees, and that it “hurts deeply – a lot”. He explains that as an asylum seeker he was variously referred to as an “illegal immigrant”, “queue jumper” and even a “terrorist”.

“Where is the queue? You run away for your life – hello, they wanna kill me! There is no queue”, Soltany says. He vigorously rejects the likelihood that the public accurately understands refugee issues. Soltany refers to his poem The Only Hope After God:

“We were the fan for the political fire, Now we find ourselves in the flames”. His poem describes being stuck in a “quagmire of prejudice”.

Mfashingabo, himself a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), agrees that the public perception of refugees is fundamentally flawed. “What they have is pretty much propaganda that is spun through the media”, he claims. “The public has been misinformed incredibly”. Mfashingabo lived in a refugee camp in Kenya for three years after his ethnic group was stripped of its citizenship rights. He cannot return to the DRC as he believes it would “amount to suicide”. He says that some people’s only option is to seek refuge in another country, but what drives that decision is rarely mentioned in the media.

“Nothing serious is being discussed. Out of sight, out of mind”, Mfashingabo says, lamenting an often trivial media which features stories about shopping addiction and skateboarding dogs.

Rintoul strongly believes the public perception is “coloured” by the way refugees and asylum seekers are presented by the media and politicians. He claims that the language is deliberate.

“It’s to create a picture, to create an attitude, to invite a particular way of looking at refugees”, Rintoul says. “When the media do it, it’s not an accident. I mean, there have been Press Council findings that asylum seekers are not illegal and the boats are not illegal and should not be referred to in that way. They are constantly referred to in that way”.

In Rintoul’s eyes, this language and the detention of asylum seekers are techniques of delegitimising them.

“Shame!” 

Soltany yells into the loudspeaker. His voice reverberates throughout Sydney’s Town Hall courtyard, and is then echoed by 150 protestors. Fijian man Josefa Rauluni died after jumping off a roof at Villawood Detention Centre a few days earlier, and the protest was organised hastily to condemn the government’s policy of mandatory detention. Two of Soltany’s years in detention were spent at Villawood, and he says he was stressed and shocked upon hearing the news of Rauluni’s death. He reveals that he witnessed several suicides during his years in detention.

The suicide of a young Afghan man at Curtin Detention Centre last March was the fifth suicide in Australian immigration detention within a seven-month period. Several months later, a Tamil refugee poisoned himself and died at Villawood Detention Centre. These deaths highlight an intensifying and pervading sense of hopelessness amongst detainees.

Soltany wrote poetry in detention to help express his feelings of despair – “as a companion to my mind”. His poems were dark, prompting his roommate to urge him, “Please write something about hope!”. But Soltany says he couldn’t: “I couldn’t find hope”. He kept writing throughout his time in detention, and in 2010 he released a book of his poetry, Inside Out. His poetry has received wide acclaim, and he has even collaborated on a book with writer Tom Keneally, whom he considers a good friend.

Post-detention, becoming a refugee advocate was a natural step for Soltany. He has also taken on a case worker role for many asylum seekers to assist with their claims. Despite his distressing experiences in detention, he loves Australia and has started to recover from his mental trauma. Music was central to Soltany’s healing process, and is something he is actively pursuing with his band. He hopes that his book of poetry will help people to understand the suffering of those in detention, a place he says crushed his spirit.

Rintoul is in it for the long haul – he always knew it would be a long-term campaign. He says that although the campaign “always” faces opposition from the government, he is boosted by the small successes. He retrieves a piece of paper from his desk – “a little list of unfinished business”. He counts and laughs: there are 16 points on the list, and he says “I think there are two of them that we’ve won”.

Rintoul believes the razor wire is emblematic: that it “cuts” Australian society by embedding a discrimination which impacts on the wider community.

“That razor wire also imprisons us, as long as we allow its existence”.

________________________________________________________

*Not her real name

Two years ago today, Haiti was struck by an earthquake leading to the deaths of tens of thousands of people and affecting an estimated three million people.

Unfortunately, it is far from the only natural disaster or crisis to strike within recent years. We’ve seen the outpouring of donations to disaster relief efforts in such places as Thailand and Japan (although the response has not always been consistent, as previously discussed in this whydev post on the Pakistan floods). The numbers are staggering: within ten days of the Haiti earthquake two years ago, $742 million had been committed to relief and a further $920 million pledged. The total eventually ballooned to over $3.5 billion.

The compassion and concern that people feel for strangers across the world is touching and even inspiring. Who could argue against such an outpouring of generosity?

A GOOD infographic shows the entities that had given $1 million or more to Haiti one week after the earthquake. The orange represents donations from individuals.

Well, I can, and I’m not the first. All too often, the well-intended donations to disaster relief, motivated by emotion, are not as helpful as some would have you believe. Here’s why.

Often, donations take too long to be processed to be of any use on the ground.

I can’t say it better than this excerpt from the Disease Control Priorities report on the GiveWell blog (in a post entitled “The case against disaster relief,” which is certainly worth a read):

The immediate lifesaving response time is much shorter than humanitarian organisations recognise. In a matter of weeks, if not days, the concerns of both the population and authorities shift from search and rescue and trauma care to the rehabilitation of infrastructure (temporary restoration of basic services and reconstruction). In Banda Aceh, Indonesia, after the December 2004 tsunami, victims were eager to return to normalcy while external medical relief workers were still arriving in large numbers.

So, if I donate my $20 to the Red Cross’ tsunami relief a few days after the tsunami occurred, and it takes a few weeks for the Red Cross to process this donation, my donation has arrived too late to meet the pressing need.

Disaster relief agencies can receive too much money to put to use.

Is your $20 really needed?

It’s a problem many other non-profits who are burned out from writing grant proposals would love to have, but it’s a problem nonetheless, and it raises questions of accountability to donors. If Red Cross is swimming in donations and cannot responsibly spend my $20 in Thailand, is it okay if it spends my money elsewhere.

In the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean, the Red Cross was not the only relief agency facing this problem, but some other charities would not publicly admit to being over-saturated with donations, for fear of propagating a belief that they would not need donations in the future, as discussed in this Times article.

This thinking gets us into a grey zone where transparency and accountability are not at the forefront of NGOs’ actions, and that leaves me feeling uneasy.

In-kind donations (such as blankets, clothing, etc.) can be unnecessary or even logistically harmful to recovery efforts.

While certainly not approaching the scale of devastation seen in other places we’ve discussed, a fire in my home country of Canada razed one-third of Slave Lake,  Alberta in 2011. This necessitated the evacuation of 95% of the town’s residents, and the events that followed illustrate perfectly the bother in-kind donations can be.

Well-intentioned donors collected things for the residents of Slave Lake with such enthusiasm that there was far more stuff than was necessary, and some of it ended up in a landfill. This caused a minor PR mess for the charities, always fun for us in non-profit communications to deal with.

This is a small and relatively harmless example of in-kind donations, but you can imagine the logistic, economic and political problems that could arise when, say, receiving donated food items in Somalia.

If I’ve made my case as well as I hope I have, you’ll concede there are many difficulties with the public’s overwhelming support for disaster relief. So, the next question is: what should disaster relief agencies do about it?

That’s not an easy question to answer, but here are some ideas for ways they can communicate with the public to minimise some of the above problems, and facilitate more sustainable and effective giving. They’re certainly not a panacea, but provide a place to start.

Facilitate structured giving, rather than one-offs.

Those who budget and plan their charitable giving donate about three times as much as those who don’t, at least in Canada. In other words, donors who give habitually give more.

This represents a fantastic opportunity for disaster relief agencies; if they could make regular giving a habit among those who give one-time donations after disasters, it would pay off.

There are many different ways of doing this. The easiest, and one that is becoming more and more common, is to make it possible for donors to give monthly donations of a set amount. For NGOs, receiving 12 monthly donations of $10 is usually better than receiving a one-time donation of $120, as it allows them to better plan their operations and ensures that when there is a disaster, there are already donations they can use. Explaining this to donors would be helpful.

Another is to make charitable giving a part of established events or traditions. World Vision’s gift catalogue takes advantage of people’s habit of buying gifts during the holiday season by encouraging donations to “purchase” a goat or other gifts for those in developing countries. Another example is Meal Exchange’s Halloween Trick or Eat campaign, where volunteers visit households in Canada to ask for donations to food banks. In both cases, the organisations take advantage of existing traditions to make giving to them part of the tradition.

A step further is for organisations to create their own regular events or traditions to facilitate donations. Movember stands out as the best example of this, as it has raised millions of dollars for men’s health initiatives while claiming November as the month for men to channel their inner P.I. Magnum/Ned Flanders/other moustachioed alter egos. Similarly, United Way does annual workplace campaigns to raise funds. In both cases, the organisations have made giving to them an annual event, and part of donors’ habits.

When necessary, decline donations.

Yes, you read that right. When relief agencies receive more donations than they need for a specific disaster, they should stop taking them. After the 2011 earthquake in Japan, the Japanese Red Cross clearly and admirably stated it did not need donations. (This went unheeded by the American Red Cross, which in the four days after the earthquake raised $34 million in the name of Japan’s earthquake victims.)

Similarly, less than a week after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)-France stopped accepting donations for tsunami relief. When they received 110 million Euros after this announcement, they asked donors’ permission to use these funds for other emergencies and forgotten crises. To the 1% of donors who did not grant their permission for their donations to be diverted to other crises, MSF-France refunded their money.

Sadly, MSF-France’s decision was viewed with dismay from other NGOs, many of whom either denounced it outright or demanded that it be explained very carefully, so the public would not misunderstand. When the gravy train of emotional giving begins, it’s not always popular to say it should stop. (See David Rieff’s excellent article for more on this particular case and what he calls “the humanitarian circus.”)

The public often perceive NGOs as wasting donations, spending too much on overheads, and being inefficient. There is no better way to perpetuate this attitude than by accepting donations for causes where donations aren’t needed. Disaster relief agencies need to be more responsible with donations, and at times that will mean declining them.

I recognise this is not an exhaustive list of solutions, and they aren’t easy solutions. Nevertheless, they provide a place to start improving our humanitarian aid, ultimately for the better of both NGOs working in disaster relief and the people they’re trying to help. Because disasters are emotional events and people are more generous when reacting emotionally, it is easy to capitalise on a disaster to solicit donations. But that doesn’t make it the best thing to do.

Nicholas Kristof recently wrote, of new research on pediatric health and poverty, that

“This new research addresses an uncomfortable truth: Poverty is difficult to overcome partly because of self-destructive behaviors. Children from poor homes often shine, but others may skip school, abuse narcotics, break the law, and have trouble settling down in a marriage and a job. Then their children may replicate this pattern”.

Besides questions around the differences between correlation and causation, a theme and assertion emerging from Kristof’s writing seems to be this: that ‘poor families’ simply do not love each other as much as non-poor. Whether this is a conscious assertion or not, I do not know. But, it seems to be quite visible. In a 2010 New York Times Op-ed on global poverty, he states

“that if the poorest families spent as much money educating their children as they do on wine, cigarettes and prostitutes, their children’s prospects would be transformed. Much suffering is caused not only by low incomes, but also by shortsighted private spending decisions by heads of households”.

Besides being an extremely broad and patronising generalisation, it is dismissive and unaware of the structural, geographical and local factors that can affect a family’s income, its allocation and access to education. Kristof’s assertion is based on his own experiences in the Republic of Congo, which only encompasses a passive viewing of poverty and not the actual experience of living in, and on an M.I.T study that examined spending patterns in 13 countries. The dates of data for 8 of the 13 countries falls within the range of 1988-1997. The most recent data used in the study was from 2005 (Hyderabad in India). How much can be extrapolated from data that is up to 23 years old? Are ‘poor families’ the only ones that make poor decisions regarding spending and consumption? Do they simply not love one another as much as non-poor families?

The title of the former Kristof article is ‘A Poverty Solution That Starts With a Hug’. The latter, ‘Moonshine or the Kids?’. Another, ‘She’s 10 and Now May Be Sold to a Brothel‘, opens with the following:

“M. is an ebullient girl, age 10, who ranks near the top of her fourth-grade class and dreams of being a doctor. Yet she, like all of India, is at a turning point, and it looks as if her family may instead sell her to a brothel”.

A meta study of Kristof’s writings would be revealing. I know a number of commentators in the development community (and elsewhere), most notably William Easterly, take issue with his writings. In particular, and which is very relevant to the aforementioned articles, is his tendency to ignore and examine the broader, socioeconomic contexts of his subjects. When Kristof does notice and attempt to examine context, he does so clumsily and stereotypically:

 ”The obsession with schooling is a legacy of Confucianism — a 2,500-year-old tradition of respect for teachers, scholarship and meritocratic exams. That’s one reason Confucian countries like China, South Korea and Vietnam are among the world’s star performers in the war on poverty…Granted, Asian schools don’t nurture creativity, and Vietnamese girls are sometimes treated as second-class citizens who must drop out of school to help at home. But education is generally a top priority in East Asia, for everyone from presidents to peasants”.

Saying that certain Asian countries’ obsession with schooling is a legacy of Confucianism is like saying that the Europe’s similar obsession with schooling is a legacy of Aristotle. Elliott Prasse-Freeman at The New Inquiry, perhaps provides this meta study, deconstructing his writing style and method:

“Broadly speaking, Kristof often employs clever journalistic and prose devices to weave personalized traumas into bite-sized morsels of digestible horror. By playing on his audience’s Orientalist, classist, and racist fantasies, Kristof fabricates legible narratives out of snapshots of distant worlds. He then crafts stunningly simplistic solutions to the seemingly irrevocable problems that plague those backwards places”.

Is the perception, that ‘poor people’ simply do not love each other as much as non-poor, held by Kristof and others? I have asked myself if I hold this hidden perception. I know it seems absurd, but I do not think it is too wildly suggestive. There are a plethora of stereotypes and perceptions of various groups of people that exist and perpetuate poor understandings and misunderstandings. But, it is perhaps hidden and even unconscious perceptions such as this that are the most harmful. What Kristof’s writings show is an indifference to account for human behaviour and decision making capabilities in the context of poverty, stress and difference.

It’s been an amazing year at whydev. We celebrated our one year birthday in July this year by highlighting Brendan and my favourite posts from the year before. As I look back and read over them now, I am amazed at the wonderful minds that we have managed to bring together on this site. Way back in May 2010, we would never have conceived that we would have huge international development heavyweights (and I mean that in the figurative sense!) such as Bonnie Koenig, Jennifer Lentfer and Greg Jericho with posts up on our site. Apart from big names, we’ve had some great posts from new up and comers to keep an eye on. These include, among others, those by the always insightful Emily D’Ath, the youthful Akhila Kolisetty and China aid specialist Philippa Brant. We’re exploring not just how aid and development should be done, but also what sort of characteristics people working in development need to cultivate, and we’ve had great ideas on that from Elie Calhoun of Expatbackup, Alessandra Pigni from Mindfulnessforngos and Steve Munroe of Satori Worldwide.

But 2011 hasn’t been about individual posts, or even about individuals. It’s been about collaboration, collective learning and most importantly, discussion. Much more than last year, I have seen people pushing each other to think and rethink concepts, and we’re now moving towards a site that has gone past simple head-nodding and onto provoking thought and asking questions.

On the note of collaboration, we have some very exciting things to look forward to for 2012. At some stage early in the year, we will be announcing a new peer coaching service, in collaboration with Shana Montesol Johnson from Development Crossroads. Using Shana’s advice as a career coach for people in international development, we will be trialling a service that aims to link up interested individuals from around the world with partners who are seeking like-minded individuals to talk about work issues with. We hope that this will be helpful to many people who are working in isolated conditions, and need somebody who isn’t necessarily in the same workplace, or senior or junior to them, to talk over experiences and difficulties encountered during work and life.

Moreover, we are looking forward to more of the same from you – our dedicated and lovely reader base, to keep inspiring us with your submissions, your comments and your reposts of our articles. Remember that whydev is not about Brendan and it’s not about me. It’s your site. We are always looking for more contributions and that is what keeps the site going. If you’ve thought about writing something in a public forum, but never got round to it, make it your 2012 resolution to check out our guidelines and get in touch with us at submissions[AT]whydev.org.

We wish you a happy holidays, however you are spending it, and a happy New Year, and we’ll see you again in 2012!

Weh Yeoh & Brendan Rigby

I admit it.  I love New Year’s Resolutions. I love making resolutions, hearing about the ones friends have made, and telling them about mine.  Yet, research shows that if I want to maximise my chances of accomplishing these goals, I’d better just shut up about them.

Check out why in this 3-minute video:

Conventional wisdom tells us that we should announce our goals from the rooftops, share them with our friends and colleagues, write about them on blogs.  Yet some researchers have found that when people talk about their goals with others, they’re less likely to achieve them. It’s because when we tell someone that we are going to do something big – say, move to a new country, land the dream job in international development, or start a non-profit to bring clean water to poor communities – the praise and positive reaction we get from our audience gives us a part of the experience of having already accomplished these things (Psychologists call this “social reality”). And, so we are less motivated to actually work toward these goals.

I have experienced this myself. Last year, I decided that it was time to end my years of hiding from the internet and launch a blog for international development professionals who want to have high-impact careers they love. Soon after I made this decision, I left Manila for a 5-week home leave in the US.  When I visited friends and relatives in the Midwest, California, and Washington, DC, they invariably asked what was new. I readily replied that I had decided to start a blog. To a person, everyone was supportive, excited, and positive.  “That’s great, Shana!” I heard numerous times. Apparently, the support was so nice, it was all I needed…and my blog remained a mere twinkle in my eye for the next 5 months!

Of course, as a career coach, I am not advising anyone to be silent about their goals. Yet, the way we talk about our goals can make a difference. Instead of simply announcing our plans and then basking in everyone’s support and advance admiration, we can:

• Ask others to hold us accountable for doing the work required,
• Ask people for specific assistance, and
• Celebrate actual accomplishments and emphasise what remains to be done.

Ask others to hold us accountable for doing the work required

I told everyone, “I’m going to start a blog for aid workers!” and then sat back and did nothing to make it happen for months on end. It may have been more productive for me to say, “I plan to start a blog this fall, which means I’ve got a lot of work to do.  Can you check in with me 2 weeks from now to ask if I’ve come up with a list of potential topics to write about?”

Ask people for specific assistance

In addition to holding us accountable for doing the nitty-gritty work required, there are other ways people can help us. If you plan to move to a new country, ask your friends or acquaintances who have lived there before for their tips, ideas, and information.  If you’d like to land a great new international development job, ask your network to introduce you to contacts in specific development organisations you’re interested in.  If you aspire to start a non-profit to bring clean water to poor communities, let your network know that you would like to meet experts in the field.

Celebrate actual accomplishments and emphasise what remains to be done

Celebrating your progress at key milestones can help you work toward and meet your goals. Just make sure that you celebrate after you’ve already accomplished something, rather than feeling good about your noble intentions in advance of actually doing anything about them. And, keep your eye on the ball – be clear about the tasks that remain to be done.

Have you made any New Year’s Resolutions for 2012?

Great!  Stop talking about them and get started working toward accomplishing them.  And, if you’re looking for accountability, specific assistance, or celebration of a milestone, please share in the comments below.

Mindfulness:

“A psychological quality of bringing one’s complete attention to the present experience on a moment-to-moment basis.”

- Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Several week ago, I was sitting on a train in China’s rural south, talking to an elderly Chinese couple who were traveling to Hong Kong to visit their son. Our carriage had been infiltrated by about 40 young people, all in their early twenties, who were on a team-bonding excursion with their workplace.

After about two or more hours of conversation, I had started to get pretty familiar with the lives of this elderly couple. Despite neither of them being able to speak English, and my less than fluent Mandarin, we had managed reasonably well thus far. The father had been a neurologist during his career days, while the mother had spent most of her time raising their children. Even though their son had moved to Hong Kong and raised a family more than twenty years ago, they were unable to move over there permanently, even though they both told me that the quality of life was immeasurably better there than on the mainland.

Perhaps because they feel more comfortable talking to foreigners about such topics, discussions with Chinese people often turn towards the ills of the Chinese government. This conversation also began to move in this direction. The elderly man started talking about how he didn’t trust what was written in the Chinese media, as it was too tightly controlled. He then lamented the state of censorship in China, in particular, that people could not get on Twitter, Facebook, or YouTube (without a VPN). And yes, he actually used the English words for those three services.

I started to realise that I was so engrossed in our conversation that I hadn’t noticed what was going on around me. Virtually every one of the young twenty-somethings was tapped into some sort of electronic device. If they were not playing Angry Birds on their smartphones, they were instead playing Angry Birds on their tablets, or, even rarer, reading on their e-book readers. I started to realise how much more I had in common with this elderly couple, deep in conversation, than I had with any of the other younger people who were closer to my age.

Being this engrossed in conversation, and being able to cope with a long conversation that was not in my mother tongue, I owe completely to mindfulness.

I first heard about mindfulness from a close friend when perhaps I was in the worst position to practice it, even if at that time I needed it more than ever. I was in the midst of completing a Masters part time, while also working full time, and training for a 210 km bike ride, which often involved spending Saturdays riding around my hometown for ten-hour stretches. I was a busy boy.

Often when I was at university, I was thinking about work. When I was work, I was thinking about university. When I was talking to friends and family, my mind was elsewhere. I couldn’t be where I wanted to be at any one given time. I simply had stacked far too many bangers and too much mash on my miniscule plate.

Mindfulness is particularly relevant in our lives now because we are busier than ever before, and we need to be able to keep our minds on more than one task at one time. As Bonnie Koenig over at Engaging Internationally wrote, being able to translate complexity into manageable action is crucial in development. From a career point of view, this is becoming increasingly an asset. I have seen many job descriptions where “ability to multitask” or “ability to balance a high workload with competing demands” is a requirement. However, mindfulness tells us that despite all these pressures from outside, competing for our attention, we need to be present now. In essence, it means that we need to be able to let go of the other thoughts that are running through our mind, and focus on the immediate.

Mindfulness makes an incredible amount of sense to me personally, because if you are unable to focus on the present at any given time, then why are you alive? If you aren’t listening to your partner when they are talking to you, and I mean truly listening and taking in every word, then why are you with them?

The same goes for development work. One of the fundamental principles of good development is the ability to listen to people. It involves ridding yourself of preconceptions about a particular situation and possible solutions, and instead being able to truly focus on what local people are telling you. Mindfulness makes you a better listener, which makes you a better communicator, and hence a better development worker.

Furthermore, for men like me, who are abysmal multi-taskers, the idea that mindfulness is good is an absolute blessing! No longer do we need to fool people into thinking we have a good “ability to multitask”. We only need to single-task.

The Dalai Lama, when asked what most surprises him about man, replied that man “sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

Without mindfulness, you’re not really living in the present, and as such, you’re not really living at all.

Here are some preliminary tips on how to apply mindfulness to your work:

1) Do less. Easier said than done, right? But, if your mind is constantly wandering over the things that you need to do in your lunch break, after you clock off, or the next day before work, it might be difficult for you to be truly mindful with so many things on your plate.

2) In the words of Dr. Srikumar Rao – “swap multitasking for mindfulness” in the workplace. That means actively working towards eliminating distractions as much as is humanly possible. If you are constantly flicking around between your work, Facebook and Twitter on your Mac – you could try using SelfControl, an application that blacklists certain websites for you so that while the timer is still running, you simply cannot access those sites.

3) Be mindful in every interaction with every single person, regardless of whether they are at the level of government, or from a local farming cooperative. Doing this, I think, requires getting in touch with your inner “everyman”, and not putting value or importance on other people arbitrarily, but seeing them as equals with something to contribute. I wrote more on this issue in this piece about David Foster Wallace.

4) Take a break from being around people, if you need it. If you’re tired from being around people all the time, recognise and care for your inner introvert. Disengage for a little while, so that when it is time to listen and interact again, you’re reared up and ready to go. This might mean taking the odd lunch alone, out of the office with a good book to keep you company.

5) Try harder. If at first you’re finding it difficult to do one thing at a time, persist. We live in an age where doing more than one thing at a time is seen as vital skill, so you might need to actively work at restricting yourself to one activity only, in many different aspects of your life. Start running without earphones in for a change. Don’t talk on your phone when you’re driving. Talk to your partner, without playing Angry Birds at the same time. Or, if you prefer, play Angry Birds, but don’t let your partner interrupt your quest for world domination. You get my drift.

Have you heard about mindfulness before? If so, have you found it helpful in your own life? If not, how do you think it could impact your work?

_______________________________________

Addendum:

This post is about my own experiences with mindfulness. While I can’t profess to be an expert on this topic, there are many resources written by those who are. I suggest you check out Mindfulness for NGOs as a good starting point.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

There was probably a moment when you knew you wanted to do this. For me, it was listening to my mother talk about dengue epidemics and child survival at the dinner table. From when I was very small, I never doubted that I’d do work that made a difference in people’s lives who were poorer or less resourced than I was. Even as a four year-old in India, I saw the gap; I knew it wasn’t fair, and I wanted my life’s work to do something about it.

So, here we are. You’ve got the job, the places you like to hang out on the weekend. Hopefully, you’ve got friends to hang out and explore with. But maybe you’re working late hours more often than not. Maybe you don’t get out into the field anymore and don’t have the time or inclination to go see how your projects are working, and more importantly, to get to know the people they serve.

Don’t feel guilty. Jobs are like any relationship. Sometimes they work out. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes, they work out for awhile and then, just like that, they don’t. Things change. Communities change. Projects change. So do we. Staying in one place requires work, especially for those of us who move around a lot. It’s up to you do put your time in and to do the work, but at the end of the day, how things work out is beyond your control.

Nurture your relationship.

I love being a consultant and getting to decide what I work on. I follow what interests me. But it also means I’m responsible for my own professional development. I spend time each day reading widely about public health and tech4dev innovations and initiatives on the Internet. For me to stay engaged and interested in my job, I need to be constantly learning and trying new things.

We all have this innate love of learning in us. Linking what we do to that inner joy reminds us of why we got into this line of work in the first place and makes us better and what we do. Although there’s a difference between aid workers and missionaries, we both identify the work we do with a higher goal, a vision, a cause. As aid workers, we just have a harder time remembering it.

If you’re feeling connected to your job and your sense of purpose, great. Take time, every now and again, to check in with yourself, to make sure what you’re doing matches up with your vision, and that you’re doing what you love. Life’s too short not to.

Put time into mastering your job, getting to know your stakeholders and colleagues, and learning the language and context you live and work it. Differentiate between short-term discontent during rough or busy spots, and the more pervasive sense of dissatisfaction that points towards a need for change. If you’ve tried and tried, and it just doesn’t feel like a good fit, don’t be hard on yourself.

Maybe you’re not in love anymore. That’s okay. Move on.

I remember at summer camp, we’d have to choose each morning’s craft or activity and the feeling of exhilaration and crisis it forced upon me: candle-making or sailing? Why couldn’t I do both? Formal education, especially as we get older, makes us do that. Year after year, with exams and degrees, we’re forced to specialise, get practical, and narrow our focus, at the risk of excluding parallel interests we also love.

Life doesn’t have to be like that, though. Neither does your job. Careers these days aren’t expected to offer us the long-term stability they offered to our parents’ generation. I think that’s a good thing. It’s energising for me to always be learning and actively pursuing my interests, especially when they’re things that can help me earn a living by helping people. Constantly expanding my professional and personal skills makes me a more integrated, resilient, engaged member of my community. It means the work I do is more interesting, more innovative, more informed by what academics call ‘cross-disciplinary’ influences.

If you’re falling out of love with your current topic area, start to read widely in your field and see what grabs your attention. As long as you’re not changing entire career silos every five years and are willing to put your time in, it’s easy to strategically transition to a slightly different line of work that’s more focused on your interests. This is particularly true if you’re genuinely and deeply engaged in what you want to be working on next and have cultivated some expertise in the area.

Maintain healthy boundaries.

At the end of the day, a job is a lot like a relationship. Because aid and development jobs involve an element of social justice, it’s easy to give them a sense of urgency that is often absent in other career paths (e.g. ones that aren’t trying to change the world). We can over-identify with our jobs, obsess over whether they– or we–are good enough, and struggle to try to make things work in environments that are already extremely challenging.

Occupational studies on aid and development workers’ mental health have found that our stress and perceived isolation levels are very high. Part of the reason is that we don’t differentiate from our jobs enough and we work too hard.

If you’re doing something you like, keep it that way. Don’t make your job your life. Have friends inside and outside your professional circles, and be sure to explore where you’re living and nurture lots of outside interests. Put your time in during working hours, but after you’re done, give yourself a break.

Let yourself explore widely, diving into learning about what interests you. Even if there’s no apparent link with your job right now, pursue learning for the joy of learning. You’ll be surprised where it takes you.

“Is there something wrong with the scientific method?”

This was the tagline of a recent article in The New Yorker. The central theme of the article, I feel, is one of concern – concern that scientists are noticing a considerable decline effect when it comes to replicating experiments. To take just one example from the article:

“It had to do with a class of drugs known as atypical or second-generation antipsychotics, which came on the market in the early nineties. The drugs, sold under brand names such as Abilify, Seroquel, and Zyprexa, had been tested on schizophrenics in several large clinical trials, all of which had demonstrated a dramatic decrease in the subjects’ psychiatric symptoms. As a result, second-generation antipsychotics had become one of the fastest-growing and most profitable pharmaceutical classes. By 2001, Eli Lilly’s Zyprexa was generating more revenue than Prozac. It remains the company’s top-selling drug.

But the data presented at the Brussels meeting made it clear that something strange was happening: the therapeutic power of the drugs appeared to be steadily waning. A recent study showed an effect that was less than half of that documented in the first trials, in the early nineteen-nineties. Many researchers began to argue that the expensive pharmaceuticals weren’t any better than first-generation antipsychotics, which have been in use since the fifties”.

Replication of clinical trials were showing a decline effect, and according to the author of this article, this phenomenon is not just happening in medicine. What is at stake is the very foundation and validity of the scientific method:

“For many scientists, the effect is especially troubling because of what it exposes about the scientific process. If replication is what separates the rigor of science from the squishiness of pseudoscience, where do we put all these rigorously validated findings that can no longer be proved? Which results should we believe? Francis Bacon, the early-modern philosopher and pioneer of the scientific method, once declared that experiments were essential, because they allowed us to “put nature to the question.” But it appears that nature often gives us different answers”.

Naturally, I immediately thought of Randomised Controlled Trials, RCTs, in the context of development, when reading this. There has been a good deal of robust debate* around the usefulness, validity, ethics and limitations of RCTs. Now, you may think I am about to pour water into a cup that is already overflowing. However, this Zen story may prove quite instructive at this point:

Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era (1868-1912), received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen.

Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor’s cup full, and then kept on pouring.

The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. “It is overfull. No more will go in!”

“Like this cup,” Nan-in said, “you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”

I am not suggesting that I can show you Zen, but I do suggest you empty your cup. My purpose here to think about the effects of the decline effect on RCTs in a development context. One of the strongest arguments for RCTs is replication; if the results of an RCT to study the behaviour of parents in regards to their child’s immunisation in Rajasthan, India can be replicated in Kenya, and then again in say, Ghana, we could be closer to understanding how interventions can best be delivered for maximum (positive) effect. However, RCTs in development are quite new, and replications are only just beginning to get under way and only a few organisations can afford to keep it up. What if there is a decline effect? That is, a packaged intervention targeting immunisation began to show a declining effectiveness and falling rates of success? What if those carrying out replications and reporting on findings start to selectively report? The act of measuring is difficult (understatement), and it is only human to fall prey to perception biases.

“One of the classic examples of selective reporting concerns the testing of acupuncture in different countries. While acupuncture is widely accepted as a medical treatment in various Asian countries, its use is much more contested in the West. These cultural differences have profoundly influenced the results of clinical trials. Between 1966 and 1995, there were forty-seven studies of acupuncture in China, Taiwan, and Japan, and every single trial concluded that acupuncture was an effective treatment. During the same period, there were ninety-four clinical trials of acupuncture in the United States, Sweden, and the U.K., and only fifty-six per cent of these studies found any therapeutic benefits. As Palmer notes, this wide discrepancy suggests that scientists find ways to confirm their preferred hypothesis, disregarding what they don’t want to see. Our beliefs are a form of blindness”.

I am not sure how, or if at all, the decline effect has been considered or studied with regard to RCTs in development. It is probably too early to study, as there may not be enough replications to go around. However, the evidence coming from replication studies in biology, medicine and psychology should act as an early warning system for researchers and practitioners in development. Policies are being reworked and packaged interventions are being invested in, based on RCTs, their analysis and results. But, what if these early studies and results are just instances of randomness and chance? What if replications over the next 5, 10 or 15 years start to show a decline effect?

_____________________________

*If you want to try and get your tea cup full of knowledge before emptying it again, here are a list of links for reading. Most are critiques or measured responses. If you want to read about what the results of RCTs can teach us, you need look no further than Poor Economics or More Than Good Intentions.

David Week, ‘Who guards the RCT guardians?’

Dave Algoso, ‘Limitations of RCTs: politics and context’

Marc F. Bellemare, ‘Thoughts on the RCT debate’

Lawrence Haddad, ‘A new harvest of RCTs?’

Bill Easterly, ‘Development experiments: Ethical? Feasible? Useful?’

Timothy Ogden, ‘Revisiting objections to Randomized Control Trials’

Philip Auerswald, ‘Why Randomized Controlled Trials Work in Public Health…and Not Much Else’

David McKenzie, ‘A rant on the external validity double double-standard’ 

I initially started working internationally in the early 1980’s (yes, I know that seems a long time ago!). I have worked for numerous big and small organisations involved in various aspects of ‘engaging internationally’ to try and make the world a better place.  In the past few decades there have been many changes in the international environment. Here are some of my observations on those changes:

1)       “Capacity building” around the world – Many Western governments and agencies have conducted various types of ‘management training’ in the past 10-15 years that has helped to nurture independent and innovative local efforts.  Western or donor country organisations that may have struggled in the past to find local partners (or assumed that there weren’t any) now find it easier to find them.  This transition is still unfolding – and the development of true partnerships is a work in progress – but as an international community we are moving in a positive direction.

2)      The rise of the Internet has allowed for communication across traditional organisational lines  - This can be beneficial. It allows communication to happen between parties that in the past could not communicate directly.  But it can also be challenging. There can be so much communication and data that finding what is relevant can be frustrating and time consuming and coordination can be hard. We now have a lot of data flowing in many different directions but as this information flow can sometimes seem like a flood, it makes the need for knowledge management and the role of ‘curators’ even more important.

3)      Social media forums don’t have the seniority that real life and organisations do -  On social media platforms the ‘voices of experience’ combine with the ‘voices of enthusiasm’ in a way that does not happen as easily offline.  This allows for some amazing opportunities for synergy and lot of opportunity for cross-generational learning. See this great cartoon re: the need the older generation has to not lose the wonderful creativity of youth!

4)      Labels don’t mean as much -  We used to be a lot more concerned with somewhat rigid sectors – are you working in the private (corporate) sector, government, NGOs, etc? Today, the sectors are more porous, and concepts such as social entrepreneurship have become more common.  There is more of a focus on impact.  I wrote more about this here: Impact without Boundaries.

5)      Skills needed - There is a growing set of skills that are needed to be successful in working internationally.  Although basics like communication and organisational skills are on-going ‘staples’, skills like cultural competency, the ability to be a good listener and  ‘filtering skills’ (see #2 above re: the increasing flow of information) are increasingly important.  Michael Keizer wrote a good post about some of these skills “Eleven helpful skills and traits for aid and health logisticians“.

I would be very interested in also hearing what other veteran practitioners may have observed. Also, what are young folk perceiving as the latest challenges in the world of development?

When I started working in the development sector, I quickly realised there were a few things to get my head around. Acronyms. The project management cycle. Aid versus development versus service delivery, and the slippery thin lines that divide them. And of course, the constant stream of International Days.

Planning for International Days is part of my role here at CBM. I inherited a list of all the International Days from my predecessor with little stars and circles next to the ones that warranted different levels of activity; an internal staff email, website content, or even an event. In my first naïve and wide-eyed week, I thought it was a bit harsh to rank important days like this.  If they were all good enough for the UN (or whoever set them), surely they are all good enough for us? But, by around the time I had mastered the staff coffee machine, I had also come to see how necessary a bit of forward planning was when it came to International Days.

Now don’t get me wrong, I still love International Days (IDs for short – I’ve come to embrace the acronyms now). IDs provide a welcome and necessary prompt for us to reflect upon, raise awareness and celebrate about important issues that may unintentionally just pass over otherwise.

But the thing is, there’s many of them. As regular tweeps will know, it’s very rare to get through a week without someone tweeting that it’s ID of this or that, and after a while, they all start to blur. It’s not that IDs aren’t fundamentally good concepts; but it would be a full time job to engage with every single one. So, practicality won, and I had to concede there was some merit in ranking them with little stars after all.

This made me realise that IDs are like birthdays—you have some that you make a huge deal about with special dinners, some that warrant a present and some that only need a text or facebook cheer.  The ranking each birthday or ID gets depends on how close you are with the person, or the issue as the case may be.

And maybe the really big IDs—International Women’s Day for example—which are close to the hearts of millions and celebrated worldwide, are more like your communal holidays such as Christmas, Passover, Ramadan or Diwali; as they have a broader reach than probably any individual’s birthday (although I’ve always been impressed that Americans get a day off for George Washington’s birthday).

So, while International Jugglers Day is probably more on par with an individual’s birthday party celebrated by those special few ball tossing elite and their fans, International Day of Eradication of Poverty is like New Years, recognised by masses worldwide if you count both Western and Chinese versions.

Why International Day of People with Disabilities deserves that star

Now that I’ve worked this theory out, I’m going to proclaim that International Day of People with Disabilities is one of the biggies; like Mothers Day perhaps.

If you don’t consider that issues around disability are relevant to you personally, you might think that this is a bit of an overstatement. The truth is that the World Report on Disability tells us that there are one billion people living with disabilities in the world. That’s one person in every seven, worldwide. With such a high prevalence we should all know someone with a disability of some kind, such as a physical impairment, mental health condition or intellectual disability. And, particularly close to the hearts of those of us concerned with poverty eradication, disability is a huge (though frequently forgotten) development issue.

The World Report also found that over twenty percent—that’s one in five—of the world’s poorest people live with a disability. This is because disability is much more prevalent in developing countries, because disability is both a cause and consequence of poverty. Disability causes poverty because societies frequently exclude people with disabilities. Particularly in developing countries where there are often widespread misconceptions and stigma around disability and its causes, people with disabilities are frequently shunned from society.

Also, the lack of available resources and training in these places means that people with disabilities are denied the supports that would enable them to participate in activities such as schooling or work, or even development programs. This exclusion means that people with disabilities are often denied fundamental rights such as education, rehabilitation and employment, which in turn deprives them of these opportunities to break out of poverty. And, while people with disabilities are more likely to live in poverty, those living in poverty are also more likely to acquire a disability. This is through many common circumstances of poverty such as lack of good nutrition, health care, shelter, clean water and sanitation, and safe working conditions.

This creates a cycle where disability both causes and is caused by poverty.  In fact, this link is so strong that the United Nations General Assembly has recognised that “inclusion of persons with disabilities in all development work is crucial to achieving the MDGs”. Also, societies and programs that include everyone get to benefit from the huge contributions that people with disabilities give back to communities in which they are able to meaningfully participate.

So what does this mean?

In the development sector this all means that in planning we need to consider how people with disabilities may experience or be excluded from our various projects, and ensure that these are made as accessible as possible. This could involve providing assistance to people with disabilities who may not be able to travel by themselves to program centres, breaking down social stigma around disability by ensuring people with disabilities are given equal opportunity to participate, or spreading word of projects in ways that people with communication or learning disabilities will be able to understand.

On a social level, it means that we all should keep in mind that one in seven people worldwide have a disability. Exclusion of people with disabilities doesn’t just take place in developing countries—it’s something that we all need to be conscious of and address in our own lives, social groups and workplaces.

And on a personal level, it means that if issues of development and poverty are close to your heart, then International Day of People with Disabilities every 3^rd December deserves a great big star in your calendar.

For more information on poverty and disability, you can visit and sign the pledge at www.endthecycle.org.au or follow @endthecycleAUS. The End the Cycle campaign is celebrating International Day of People with Disabilities in style at Sydney’s Martin Place on 2 December, 2011, from 12 to 2pm. All are welcome to this fun and free public event, sharing with people with disabilities about their achievements, rights and the cycle of poverty and disability. A huge line up including live music, speakers from WHO and UNICEF, and the End the Cycle photography exhibition will be there.

“They need to to undestand it better,” said one western official. “It’s disappointing, but maybe they do not want to be put in the same box as traditional donors.” (Guardian)

In light of the current aid effectiveness negotiations at the High Level Forum in Busan and increased pressure on China to improve the transparency of its foreign aid program, I have been reflecting on the often overlooked domestic context of China’s aid policy.

A challenge for the Chinese Government as it increases information about its foreign aid is managing how it is received domestically. With more than 200 million people still classified as ‘poor’ and a nascent civil society that concentrates efforts on domestic poverty alleviation and development issues, a ‘domestic lobby’ that pressures improvement in aid quality (and quantity) – as seen in traditional donor countries – appears a long way off.

That’s not to say that there is no domestic influence on China’s aid program: Chinese companies who implement the projects or receive procurement contracts have an interest in the expansion of the aid budget, and in the continuation of China’s ‘mutual benefit’ tied aid policy. This in itself is not altogether unusual – similar business lobbies exist in Japan and Korea (and no doubt many other countries). What I’m finding particularly interesting though is the way that Chinese people – especially the ever-vocal netizens – are responding to specific information on Chinese foreign aid.

The most recent example relates to the Chinese Government’s donation of 23 school buses to Macedonia. Information was reported on the Chinese Embassy in Macedonia’s website on Friday, 10 days after a horrific incident in Gansu Province where 19 preschool children were killed in a school bus crash (in which 64 people were overloaded into a 9 seat bus). People were already angry about the poor quality of school buses and netizens had circulated a photo montage comparing Chinese buses to those in America (collated by chinaSMACK here but warning: some images may distress). Awareness of the announcement of the foreign aid donation prompted more than 500,000 mostly angry comments on Sina Weibo, many expressing sentiments along these lines: ‘Chinese children don’t have fine buses to deliver them to schools, and the Chinese government is actually sending buses to other countries’.

Jing Gao on the Ministry of Tofu website has an excellent overview of netizens’ reactions, including a chart made by an internet user that compares the disparities in living standards between Macedonia and China, and this telling cartoon.

The outcry prompted a response from the Global Times. It firstly reflects on the timing of the information:

‘The coincidental release of information should have been avoided’

But then seeks to defend the aid program:

‘However, China cannot simply stop its aid programs to foreign countries. There is not evidence to prove the excess of these programs’

And back to unfortunate timing:

‘The school bus donation to Macedonia would have gone unnoticed if the Gansu incident had never happened’

While not directly involving Chinese Government foreign aid, two controversies earlier this year – the ‘Guo Meimei Red Cross Scandal’ and the issues surrounding the China Africa Project Hope – raised related responses from the Chinese population. While both scandals were actually bound up more in issues with rich young Chinese and their misuse of charities, people were also concerned about the (in)appropriateness of helping other countries when there remain so many problems within China.

Traditional donors have spent considerable effort (and resources) to try to educate their domestic populations about their foreign aid programs. As China’s program continues to expand, and scrutiny of government spending (across all areas) increases, the Chinese Government will have to find effective ways to explain its foreign aid program to a domestic audience.

To coincide with the 60^th Anniversary of China’s aid to foreign countries, celebrated in August 2010, and the release of the White Paper on Foreign Aid in April 2011, the Chinese media launched significant information initiatives, including special lift-out sections of the China Daily, a TV program, and summaries of key points of the White Paper. This was notable but generally shied away from specific details of individual projects.

Some voices are emerging that promote the idea of China providing foreign aid. One article, by Jin Chen (and translated here), for example, argues that ‘the Chinese Government, entrepreneurs, and NGOs should all participate more actively in international philanthropy’, as ‘this will impact on China’s global reputation and also global strategy in the future’.

However, the fact that people were ringing the bus manufacturer asking if they’d made the donations to Macedonia themselves (as reported in this Shanghai Daily article) is indicative of the lack of knowledge about how China’s foreign aid program works.

Whilst the potential is potentially there for social media channels to be leveraged to get transparency onto China’s aid agenda, the risk (and perhaps more likely scenario) is that the scrutiny makes the Chinese Government think twice about improving information about its foreign aid activities, particularly as the Government is already struggling to negotiate the changing boundaries and expectations of its citizens regarding domestic policies and accountability. Nevertheless, with an aid budget growing at almost 30% per year in recent years, and pressure from the international community to undertake its fair share of global responsibilities, the Chinese Government would be well advised to begin a conversation with its people about its foreign aid program.

We are starting to see signs of how it might be framed. It is unlikely to be presented as an ethical endeavour of ‘helping the poor’. And although promoting ‘win-win’ outcomes may help to explain the aid activities, this may be hard to explicitly prove, particularly if scrutinised at the level of specific individual projects. Given the increasing dislike about the unreasonable power of large state owned enterprises amongst some sectors of Chinese society, presenting Chinese aid projects as also benefiting these companies through contract and investment opportunities may not be the smartest way to go.

Instead, the Chinese Government may continue to explain its foreign aid program through the concept of China acting as a ‘responsible great power’ (of course whether or not it actually is is another question). In fact, under the headline ‘Nurturing nations: China practices global giving’, in the China Daily’s 2010 ‘Special Report’ on Chinese aid, examples of humanitarian assistance, multilateral programs, regional cooperation, debt relief, and assistance for achieving the MDGs are cited as evidence of the Chinese Government’s responsibility in global affairs. China Daily reporter, Yang Cheng, has also opened an article on Chinese aid stating: ‘As a responsible socialist and developing country, the nation has taken foreign aid as an important path to building a harmonious world.’

The Government response to the outcry of the school bus donations to Macedonia seem to be following this line too: ‘China is living up to its international obligations to help other countries as they had supported China during hard times’.

China is facing international pressure to improve the transparency of its foreign aid, but if and how it does this will in many ways be based on how it will be received in its own domestic context.

By Luke Pearson.

Funnily enough, Aboriginal people didn’t originally use a word based in Latin to collectively refer to everyone in Australia any more than people living in the Torres Strait Islands would suddenly choose to collectively name themselves after some guy with the last name Torres, who did whatever it is he did, however long ago it is he was supposed to have done it. Neither did any group refer to all of the above groups collectively as ‘Indigenous’.

There are too many words that exist for me to even to attempt to list them all here, but to give a brief example of the names used by different groups in Australia, they include: Wiradjuri, Badu, Yorta Yorta, and Yindjibarndi. It has also become quite common to hear collective terms for larger areas that encompass several groups, such as Koori, Murri, and Noonga.

Traditionally, there would never have been a need to even consider a word that collectively described all the people who fall within the imaginary boundaries that constitute  Australia. Especially because this imaginary boundary did not exist until very recently. After all, Australia is only 110 years old.

The terms used to describe Indigenous Australians however are much older. Most of these terms were firmly in place long before Captain Cook ever stepped foot on Australian soil.  The choices he had on offer at the time included: native, savage, primitive, aborigine, and a whole lot more. It was also perfectly acceptable to the rest of the Western World for him to have used any word he cared to choose, as Western knowledge of Indigenous Australians at the time was almost non-existent. He would have been considered by many to have been perfectly within his right to have named us all ‘Cookians’ if he wanted to… and if that sounds silly to you, tell that to the ‘Torres Strait Islanders’, or the ‘Rhodesians’, or even the ‘Americans’, or at least those who know that they are named after some guy named ‘Amerigo’, who did whatever it is he did, however long ago he was supposed to have done it.

But like many other people around the world we didn’t get the logical label – the one derived from the label being given to the area of land we occupied, i.e ‘Australians’. We instead were given a label deemed to be more befitting of our ‘natural state’.

We were called ‘aboriginal’.

Many people believe this is still the term that Aboriginal people still choose for themselves. It is not.

To many Aboriginal people, the difference between ‘aboriginal’ and ‘Aboriginal’ is as vast as the difference between ‘turkey’ and ‘Turkey’… and in many instances, just as offensive.

Aboriginal (with a capital A) is probably still the most popular collective term used in Australia at the moment, but the term ‘indigenous’ has been gaining more and more popularity in recent years, especially on a public level through Government, various organisations and the media. There seems to be two camps though amongst those who use the term: ‘indigenous’ or ‘Indigenous’?

Some often ask, why did we need to change from ‘Aboriginal’ at all? This is a fair question and the answer is one that can be logically assumed, but it is harder to pinpoint exactly (at least from the perspective of this observer and commentator).

Aboriginal Australians were once called ‘aborigines’ and also ‘aboriginal people’. Over time many people came to identify with these labels and so demanded that they become capitalised. It seems fair to say that over the decades since this was achieved ‘Aboriginal’ has won out over ‘Aborigines’ and become a common preference amongst a majority of Aboriginal people. There are even those who now consider ‘Aborigine’ to be an out-dated and offensive term. Different individuals however, have their own preferences and reasons and explanations for these.

There were many who had already voiced the idea that ‘Aboriginal’ was not great to use as a collective term as it did not fully recognise and respect many Torres Strait Islander Peoples, who more often than not do not regard themselves as ‘Aboriginal’. This is why for many years it was most common to see the phrase ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’, and even the acronym ATSI (as in AIATSIS, and the now extinct, ATSIC).

The term Indigenous seems to have found its foothold because of the combination of Torres Strait Islander exclusion from the term ‘Aboriginal’, a general dislike of being referred to by an acronym (an ATSI person), academia’s love of being able to create new and improved ‘metalanguage’, and the fact that ‘Indigenous’ is accepted on the international scene. The UN speak often on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples around the world, and events like the World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education have been around for a reasonably long time now.

So the term ‘Indigenous’ was a very attractive option for many people. It appeared to tick all the right boxes and address everyone’s key issues: Wiradjuri people were still Wiradjuri and Aboriginal people were still Aboriginal, but now both also fell under the broader category of ‘Indigenous’ which included not just all Aboriginal people but also Torres Strait Islanders. Moreover, it could also be used when appropriate to talk about our shared status with other people around the world who met the peculiar criteria that seem to classify a particular group as being ‘Indigenous’.

When a word becomes a proper noun, rules of grammar often come secondary to personal preference. Muhammad Ali is a prime example of how many people can callously refuse to acknowledge a change that goes against their personal views (for many years after officially changing his name Ali was still referred to by many in the media as ‘Cassius Clay’). This same attitude is believed by many Indigenous people to be at the heart of the media’s refusal to capitalise ‘indigenous’ when referring to Indigenous Australians. That it represents a belief that Indigenous people do not deserve respect or acknowledgement, that rather than being in the same category of Greek, Catholic or Australian, we are once again being referred to in the terminology of ‘flora and fauna’.

Whether it is a matter of grammar, of malice, or even one of ignorance is impossible for me to say, but I would suggest the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. What I am far more confident in saying about the media’s refusal to capitalise Indigenous (as well as their use of Aborigine/s) is that to many Indigenous people it is both a practical and symbolic example of a lack of cultural understanding, respect and a general lack of awareness and sensitivity when it comes to reporting on Indigenous issues. If media outlets are incapable of seeing linguistics in the same way that many linguists do (as a ‘descriptive’, rather than a ‘prescriptive’ process) and acknowledge that the role of Indigenous Australians is indeed significant enough to warrant capitalisation along with other groups of humans (like English people, Christians… or the Newcastle Knights), how on earth can we expect them to appropriately report on the complicated and multi-faceted issues which face many Indigenous communities? Semantics and choice of grammar or phrasing in writing reflect to the reader a sense of the author’s attitudes and values to a topic. This is one of the obvious problems when it comes to ‘reading between the lines’, it usually leaves itself open to interpretation and juxtaposition.

To give an example of how terms like aboriginal, Aboriginal, indigenous and Indigenous overlap and co-exist, according to my own personal understanding, Aboriginal Australians are in fact aboriginal, but we are not ‘aboriginal Australians’. The same is true for ‘indigenous’. Indigenous Australians are in fact indigenous, but we are not ‘indigenous Australians’. In the strictest dictionary context, I may be an aborigine but I do not personally identify as an Aborigine, I identify as an Aboriginal Australian. I have no objection to referring to myself or being referred to as an Aboriginal Australian or an Indigenous Australian, but I never refer to myself as an Aborigine.

To be referred to as an aborigine, aboriginal or indigenous Australian I believe to be disrespectful. This is especially true, when being mentioned as a part of a larger list – i.e “Dutch Australians, English Australians and indigenous Australians”.

I am Gamilaroi, which contemporaneously means I am Murri, I am an Aboriginal Australian, I am an Indigenous Australian, I am one of the world’s Indigenous people and I am an Australian.

It really isn’t that complicated.

Luke Pearson is a proud Aboriginal man living and working in NSW. He is a qualified teacher, researcher, social commentator, Cultural Awareness Trainer and frequently tweets as @LukeLPearson. He blogs at AboriginalOz.blogspot.com. This is a crosspost with his own blog.

There are any number of academics, professionals and bloggers offering advice on working in aid and development. Dave Algoso’s post is a one-stop shop if you are seeking a round-up of disparate opinions on career advice. However, in light of some more recent thoughts about motivation, well being and knowledge in aid and development, I have been thinking about the space in-between motivation and jobs: education. That is, pursuing higher education for future work in aid and development. More specifically, about what a ‘development studies’ curriculum looks like and what it should/might include. This is not a guide to where you could or should study, although that would be extremely useful. Dan Drezner, of Foreign Policy, offers ‘A useful primer of higher education choices for international affairs‘. Drezner’s analogy for undertaking a PhD is attacking the Killer Bunny:

“And, just to be clear, aspiring Ph.D. students:  I’m the guy with the weird Scottish accent, the bunny is the Ph.D. program, and all y’all are the ones suffering from the blood and gore.

Unless you really want to kill that bunny, just walk away” (Dan Drezner).

Good advice. Such is not available, to the best of my knowledge, for undertaking ‘development studies’ in higher education (Chris Blattman and Alanna Shaikh are exceptions). In particular, undergraduate and postgraduate (Masters) studies in development in Australia. Degrees in ‘development studies’ have multiplied as the aid and development industry grows and expands, particularly across Australia. UNSW, Deakin, Monash, University of Melbourne, ANU, USYD, Murdoch, University of Queensland, University of Melbourne all offer degrees in ‘development studies’. ANU’s Development Studies Network has a great summary of these courses, but no real critical insight for prospective students. Perhaps if the results of the graduate exit surveys taken were publicly available, students could make a more informed choice.

So, I want to open a forum and think about what should/might be included in a ‘development studies’ curriculum. This stems from my own experience as a postgraduate student and the ebb and flow of dissatisfaction I experienced in terms of relevance, value and skill development.

My experience in higher education is both as a student and a researcher. The latter, in teaching & learning for business and economics. There was, and still is, a radical shift occuring across global business curricula in terms of students’ outcomes, skills and learning. Life-long learning has become a key concept, as it is now recognised that education should not be for employment, but for employability. Students face an uncertain future. This has also seen a shift to a discourse of ‘transferable skills’, which I am sure you are all well aware of (and have). Academic standards are also being developed in partnership with government, industry and universities to engender greater accountability, quality learning and employer satisfaction.

I do not believe that ‘development studies’ has benefited from this shift (nor have my majors in Ancient Roman & Greek History or Near Eastern Archaeology). And I believe this is because there is not the same impetus to invest in research for improving the teaching and learning of ‘development studies’ (again, neither for Ancient Roman & Greek History or Near Eastern Archaeology). Investment is being geared towards those degrees that attract the most number of students and that are considered to contribute most effectively towards the ‘knowledge economy’ (apparently, a nuanced understanding of the prosprographical characteristics of consular elections in 2nd Century BC Rome is not valued in the knowledge economy). The Global Masters in Development Practice (MDP) was set-up and developed thanks to a $16 million MacArthur Foundation grant. Many universities offering ‘development studies’ do not have the same resources at their disposal.

Following are some thoughts about different aspects of studying ‘development studies’.

Skills & competencies

Surveys from across the business world, of students, academics, employers, have usually found similar  desires in terms of skills. However, there is the constant problem of matching education and skills with available employment. The problem of skills mismatch arises even in growing economies. There are severe labour shortages for some kinds of workers and a massive oversupply of others. Often this is in spite of market forces rather than because of them, since markets and higher educational institutions tend to lag behind employers’ skill demands before oversupplying them.

A 2008 Tuning Report on the design and delivery of business programmes in higher education in Europe found very similar rankings of the most important skills and competencies by employers, graduates and academics.

What skills and competencies are the most important for those working in aid and development?

Aid v. Development

As with other higher education programs that lead into a profession and industry, we have to recognise that ‘development studies’ is in the same box. However, there is a key difference. Although aid and development are industries, they are not professions. Wanderlust posted a 5-part series on ‘Becoming an aid worker’, the second of which is titled – ‘Aid work is a profession‘. I disagreed, and had a very engaging discussion on this topic. A recent study from ELRHA, a collaborative network that supports partnerships between higher education institutions in the UK and humanitarian organisations around the world, suggests that the aid industry is a long way off from becoming professionalised. Essentially, there is no professional association body or a standardised qualification system. And, if these were developed, it would be very difficult to make this a universally, globally recognised body or system. They would first have to be developed at national levels, most likely in U.S, UK, Australia, Canada or the EU. This will require funding, research, collaboration, consultation, and more. At the moment, qualifications are fragmented; competencies, learning outcomes and curricula change from one Masters degree to another. In addition, there is no one profession that the aid or development industry consists of, unlike the medical, law, teaching or accounting professions. The aid and development industry encompasses all four professions and more.

Furthermore, there is the apparent difference between ‘aid work’ and ‘development work’. Aid work largely refers to humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. Development work is much broader in scope, time and place and can also cut across any number of disciplines and knowledge: law, economics, education, health, etc. However, the line is beginning to blur between what is ‘humanitarian/aid work’ and what is ‘development work’. This is from a recent report on aid policy at IRIN:

“A striking finding…is that humanitarian recipients are relatively predictable: the top five aid recipients – Sudan, oPt (occupied Palestinian territory), Iraq, Afghanistan and Ethiopia – have remained among the top 10 aid recipients over the past decade. Rather than aid being a short-term life-saving measure, the statistics indicate it is being used to deliver basic services year on year, according to Kellett, and in this sense, the divide between humanitarian and development aid may be far weaker than many think. ‘It’s not what it says on the box,’ he surmised…This points to the oft-repeated false division between humanitarian and development aid, said UK Overseas Development Institute (ODI) Humanitarian Policy Group researcher Sarah Bailey. ‘The reality is that our efforts to make a clear division between `humanitarian’ and `development’ are not well suited to the complexity of these contexts… We know that humanitarian assistance is not the best tool to address long-term vulnerability and the absence of basic services, so why isn’t development assistance doing more to tackle these problems?’”

Value

Alanna Shaikh once reasoned that she does not hire development study majors, but changed her opinion. Would you hire someone with a Bachelor of Arts, a Masters in Development Studies, an internship at ActionAid and has read ‘Dead Aid’? What would they have to offer that hundreds, if not thousands, of other students do not have? Enthusiasm? Good intentions? A knowledge of the rights-based framework? An academic understanding of neoliberalism and global trade imbalances? It is always a case of theory v. practice. Many courses would give you an excellent theoretical basis for understanding, but little practical experience or critical learning that will make you more employable.

The only advice that I would offer here is this – study something that gives you discrete knowledge, skills and grounding in a discipline and then do a postgraduate MA. Education, public health, engineering, architecture, medicine, economics, logistics, etc. will offer valuable pathways for entry into aid and development work. A MA in Development Studies has little value-added in terms of skill & technical knowledge development, but does look great on an application for the AusAID or World Vision graduate programs. It is perhaps better suited for those already working in development, particularly for graduates with a few years of experience. As a degree, it gains much more relevancy and value with work experience. If all those in the industry had a discrete background in one of the above, it would perhaps facilitate professionalisation.

Field experience: internships and work-based learning

Field experience is highly prized by both students and employers. Doing the time on internships and volunteer placements is necessary. Built-in field experience, whether it be an internship at an NGO or in-country research in India, should be part of any program in ‘development studies’. But, who should pay for it? Usually, the student bears the cost of gaining relevant field experience in the first one-two years. There are graduate programs in Australia, such as at World Vision Australia and AusAID. There are also a number of paid ‘volunteer’ opportunities through AusAID, such as the AYAD and AVID programs, but these require high levels of experience and usually an area of technical expertise such as nutrition, health, law, or education.

J. of Tales from the Hood laments:

“Professionalizing the aid sector – by definition applying standards which would mean excluding non-professionals from practice – means improving the quality of service provided to the poor. No, of course it will not solve every problem. But it will absolutely solve or eliminate many. Who knows? Maybe I’d even end up out of a job. But even so, professionalizing the aid sector is, or if it ever happens, would be a good thing. Absolutely.

I struggle to see why this is such a challenging concept”.

It is not the concept that is challenging, but the process, which starts with higher education and bringing together a hodge-podge of professions, curricula, stakeholders, studies, skills and interests. The following are some guiding questions for discussion, based on the above and more, as what I have written is by no means comprehensive nor necessarily of any value:

• What is the overall aim of a B/MA in Development Studies?
• What is ‘development studies’?
• Is there a difference between ‘aid work’ and ‘development work’? How should this be addressed in curricula?
• What is the value of a B/MA in the job market, global economy?
• What courses are essential? What courses are not so essential?
• Where does service learning, internships and field work fit into the curriculum?
• How can this help the professionalisation of the sector?
• Is higher education equitable and accessible?

China is, without a doubt, on a fast track to ‘development’ with an astonishing US$3.2 trillion in foreign reserves. But inequality, particularly rural and urban, is extreme with an estimated 150 million people living below the United Nations poverty line of less than $US1 a day. China’s growing wealth has resulted in multiple international aid agencies (including Australia’s Agency for International Development) pulling out of China. So, who is going to pick up the slack and help support 150 million people living in extreme poverty?

I don’t want to over exaggerate the influence that aid agencies have had on combating poverty in China. The Chinese government has done a remarkable job of lifting millions of people out of poverty and they will not stop achieving this, but 150 million people still living in extreme poverty is a huge number. As with most issues in China, it is the scale that makes the issue so significant.

Since working in CSR in China, I have noticed a further shift towards engaging corporations to contribute to NGOs who work in poverty alleviation. This concerns me for two main reasons.

1. CSR in China is currently not mature enough to significantly contribute to poverty alleviation and is still often used as a tool to improve companies guanxi 关系 (relationship) with governments.
2. Unless there is a shift in the way we view capitalism, corporations will never view themselves as part of a social security system.

Corporations in China, both international and domestic, will not fund NGOs or GONGOs (Government Organised Non Government Organisations) to the extent that is needed to support the poorest of the poor. This is not to say that companies do not engage in successful community investment, they do, but it is by no means at the level necessary to significantly contribute to poverty alleviation. At this stage, corporations can do more to alleviate poverty by focusing on improving their internal supply chains and employee working conditions.

International aid agencies in China have worked with (and therefore supported) domestic NGOs. Civil society in China, or the lack of it, is a real problem. Civil society, including community organisations and NGOs, has the potential to play a huge role in poverty alleviation. However, local NGOs are getting little support and now that aid agencies are leaving the situation for some is dire. I have spoken to a number of NGOs in China who are desperate to engage companies under the guise of CSR to fund their organisations. One of these NGOs was supported by an international aid agency that has now, in an official capacity, pulled out of China. It is my feeling that unless you are an international NGO or a GONGO in China, you are going to struggle to get support under the guise of Corporate Social Responsibility.

So, who will provide enough support to domestic civil society that in turn support the most disadvantaged and poor?

Well, in my opinion, it will not be the CSR departments of local and international corporations. Ultimately, the responsibility lies with the government. The Chinese government has the money but still lacks the capacity and infrastructure to develop a social safety net that will support those living in extreme poverty. The issue around the government not supporting NGOs from a political perspective is also a contributing issue. The domestic philanthropy sector is rich (and making some progress) but riddled with challenges ranging from weak laws and regulations to outlandish corruption. China may get there in the end, but between now and then, the holes in the social security system are here to stay.

This is a cross-post with Emily’s own blog.

In the past few days, I blazed my way through “Work on Purpose” by Lara Galinsky and Echoing Green, devouring the stories and winding pathways of the five social entrepreneurs profiled within.

This book is a reflection of our generation – slightly confused, constantly searching, never settling, seeking meaning. For Generation Y, work has been transformed from a simple means of supporting oneself to an opportunity, a blank space which we can paint with our passions and imbue with our spirits. Work is no longer about plain sustenance, but about creativity, innovation, and possibility. And most of all, our generation seeks a deeper purpose for our work. Helping large corporations make more money is no longer satisfying; being a cog in a robotic machine is deeply unsettling.

But you have heard all this before. The way the Millennial generation views work and meaning and life and purpose is nothing new to you. We have been inundated with blogs and articles examining my generation’s characteristics in painstaking detail.

Yet, many see my generation as entitled–we feel like we are above grunt work and endless spreadsheets and paying our dues. We do not want to settle for something we don’t love. And yes, perhaps this quest for meaning reeks of entitlement. But aren’t we all working towards a world where our children have the freedom to pursue their passion for a living? And isn’t it a good thing– no, a great thing– if this generation springboards from entitlement into a generation of social change leaders? And this, indeed, is what is happening. We are experiencing an unprecedented movement of young people passionate about tackling deeply entrenched social problems. And I would argue that our entitlement is, in part, what has allowed us to do important work. What has freed us up from the need to focus only on salary, allowed us to pursue work for reasons beyond supporting our families.

Work on Purpose echoes this quintessential quest that myself and many of my peers are undergoing. What is inspiring, and different, about this book is its painful honesty. The social justice leaders profiled did not follow a linear path to doing good work. Indeed, the roads they took were often winding, painful, and confusing. Most of them did not find their ideal job doing game-changing work that also harnessed their valuable skills immediately after college:

“Although the words and actions we absorb in our homes profoundly shape our ideas of what is important, when it comes time to start a professional life, we often put those early experiences aside. They can be overshadowed by the desire to earn a good salary, the pressure to follow a particular path, and the need to satisfy competing demands from our families, our peers, and ourselves.

Few people fall immediately into jobs or paths that satisfy all these desires, let alone stem from what they think is meaningful. Most people…wander or take misguided turns.”

Cheryl Dorsey, President of Echoing Green, did not find her place in the world until 38! She spent time meandering, learning, falling in and out of graduate programs and ill-fitting jobs. She went to medical school, got an MPP, and even enrolled in a history graduate program. None of them seemed to click or truly ignite her passion — she did not want to be a doctor or a policymaker — but she kept seeking. She found the right place once she joined Echoing Green. She got there eventually. And it’s a lesson to all of us that we can find the right fit — we may just have to exercise a bit of  patience and refuse to give up in our quest.

Along the way, we must ask ourselves certain questions:  What moments from your childhood shaped what you think is important? When in your life have you felt out of whack? In those out of whack periods, what was out of balance? What would you do if you were not afraid of failing? When have you felt in the zone, like you were doing exactly what you should be doing? What is your issue or cause to own?

Why do you do what you do?

Ultimately, Lara Galinsky comes up with a powerful formula: heart + head = hustle. The perfect career lies nestled in this combination: passion and love for what you do and your mission (heart) and the utilization of your concrete skills and talents (head). If you find work that allows you to harness your professional skills to your fullest potential while also allowing you to do something you love & feel strongly about, you have stumbled upon something truly magical.

This is the journey of our generation, and future ones. My pathway seems blanketed in fog for now, but at the same time I know where my feet are taking me. I am asking myself the questions that matter, while knowing things will become clearer with time. This book gives me faith that I, and you, will eventually find that magical balance that sets things in motion to change ourselves, and the world.

We just have to have a little patience.

Ed: What motivates us all in the workplace? In a most entertaining 10 minute animation, find out:

My name is Richenda and I *love* slacktivists.

I hate the title “Slacktivist” yet Mashable’s suggested term “Social Champion” doesn’t feel right either. To me, they are family. The World Vision family.

Working at World Vision USA and more recently World Vision Australia, I have built and engaged online communities of substantial scale. With this experience in mind, I will try to answer the questions raised by Weh in his recent blog post: Is it possible to engage slacktivists in more worthwhile causes, or should NGOs focus their energy elsewhere?

These are not easy questions to answer. 

Is it possible to engage slacktivists in more worthwhile causes?

Yes, without a doubt!

People that “like” or “follow” your organisation are choosing to publicly recommend your organisation to their network and/or choosing to receive communications from you! At World Vision, we call these people our “online family”, not slacktivists! They are new, current and prospective supporters who are happy to interact with us on a daily basis.

Mashable’s feature of The Dynamics of Cause Engagement study by Georgetown University’s Center for Social Impact Communication and Ogilvy Worldwide showing that slacktivists are more likely to take meaningful actions is no surprise to us.

Years of rigorous tracking and analysis has shown us that investment in our online family delivers consistent financial and non-financial returns. In addition to the activities listed above, we are also learning about the positive impact social media communication has on our long term relationships. This is important to us because our main product, Child Sponsorship, relies on long-term commitment to regular giving  to support complex, often misunderstood, community development.

An example of how we share content that aims to increase understanding of community development and affirm the commitment of sponsors

Not everyone in our family sponsors a child, recruits friends or rallies their local member of parliament. We know that some of our community will “like” a status once, while others contribute to content regularly and more meaningfully.

Some are silent readers, while others bring me to tears with their stories and their personal passion for social justice! (Tears from our team are not an uncommon response to these amazing stories!)

One of my favourite cross-channel advocacy examples. From WV Facebook, to a personal blog, to twitter. Love it!

Some share stories to entice friends to become involved, while others may never publicly share content but will personally click through to make a donation.

The level of commitment within the community varies from person to person, and is influenced by the content, opportunities and conversations you give them access to. Your online community will quickly discover whether the stories you tell, the opportunities you provide and the conversations you have are valuable. Which brings me too….

 Should NGOs focus their energy elsewhere?

Yes and No

Cultivating and mobilising online communities takes tremendous amount of time and resource. Any investment in this area should be well thought out, strategic and long-term. Honestly, there is no point investing in social media unless you  have a solid foundation. Before investing in building an online community, an NGO should be asking:

• Is our website in good health? Are people using it to find out more about us or make donations?
• Do we utilise website tracking to understand the behaviour of visitors to our site?
• Do we have access to meaningful stories and multimedia?
• Do we have communication that explain what we do?
• Is our media team able to respond to difficult questions and criticism?
• Does our organisation see a need to stay in dialogue with supporters?
• Does our leadership understand social media and are they willing to invest in it?

If you answered “no” to any of these above questions – you should focus your energy there, instead of, or before, building a social media community. Without these fundamentals, you will find it  challenging to create effective content, understand the impact of your community and engage in authentic meaningful conversations.

If you answered “yes” to all of the above – go for it! Start by building a social media strategy that aligns with your organisation’s goals for engagement and target demographic. Your strategy should drive your tactics -  directing how you build your online family and the style or personality you use to engage them. To help you on your way, I have started a blog series to help demystify social media strategy and give you some practical advice.

Critics may tell you social media will produce no return. I think you will produce no return..if you are doing it wrong.  If you’re doing it right, your online family will take their passion or ‘slacktivism’ into the real world.  You will grow to love and respect your ‘slacktivists’ for what they really are: passionate people keen to make a difference. Trust me, I’m that annoying person on facebook that says ..

A recent post over at Mashable got me thinking about the issue of slactivism. It doesn’t take out much brainpower to work out the origins of the word (slacker + activism), and it’s now so much in common parlance that it has its own Wikipedia entry. Slacktivism is defined as “a pejorative term that describes “feel-good” measures, in support of an issue or social cause, that have little or no practical effect other than to make the person doing it feel satisfaction.”

The word ‘pejorative’ is, I think, particularly accurate. Slacktivism has widely been derided as something that is lazy (hence the word “slacker”), and is done more for the benefit of the slacktivist than for the people who the cause is trying to support. An example of slacktivism that springs to mind occurred last year (twice!) when people on Facebook set their status updates to either describe the colour of their bras, or where their purses were. What was all this in aid of? Raising awareness of breast cancer. Quite rightly, there were some questions asked at the time as to whether anybody with a Facebook account could possibly not be aware of breast cancer.

Similarly, there have been countless jokes made about phrases like “Donate a Tweet” and “Like our Cause on Facebook”, and questions asked about the true impact of these actions. No doubt, asking questions about whether slacktivism itself is likely to promote any meaningful change is entirely valid.

Sites like donateatweet.com ask people to donate a tweet a day. But to what? It isn't clear.

However, a study cited in the Mashable piece suggests that perhaps we shouldn’t be writing off slacktivism after all, because, as it turns out, slacktivists aren’t all that bad. Here are the main findings:

In the 2010 national survey, people who frequently engaged in promotional social activity were:

• As likely as non-social media promoters to donate
• Twice as likely to volunteer their time
• Twice as likely to take part in events like charity walks
• More than twice as likely to buy products or services from companies that supported the cause
• Three times as likely to solicit donations on behalf of their cause
• More than four times as likely to encourage others to sign a petition or contact political representatives

One of the inherent assumptions about slacktivism already outlined, is that the action occurs more for the benefit of the slacktivist than for the cause. Particularly for development workers, this is an easy assumption to make. But before we assume this to be true, we need to spend a little time navel-gazing, and looking into our own motivations.

Last month on whydev, Brendan asked a very simple question: why do you work in development? Even though individual motivations differed, the common theme supporting the reactions we received was a desire to help, despite the difficulties that are encountered. In essence it seems, most people in aid and development not only genuinely care about the cause they are working for, but also work extremely hard in often trying conditions. The slacktivist, however, most likely cares about the cause he/she is supporting, but doesn’t need to do any difficult work to support it. In some ways then, the slacktivist is like the development worker, only a slightly more B-grade option. The slacktivist is the Diet Coke of the development worker.

It’s not difficult to see why looking down our noses at slacktivists is an almost instinctive next step. But this is where we need to separate the slacktivism from the slacktivist. Sure, write off slacktivism as having minimal effect. But what the research seems to show, however, is that slacktivists really want to help, and are actually more likely to do so than others. So instead of dismissing them entirely, perhaps we should engage them better.

Here are some simple suggestions as to how NGOs can harness the power of the slacktivist:

1) Despite a propensity for slacktivism, don’t assume that the slacktivist isn’t willing to do more. For me, this is the take home message of the study. It’s too easy to assume the slacktivist feels that simply tweeting about something or liking a cause is enough to satisfy their desire to help. Push them, and we might see some real results.

2) Engage with what people are good at, and use their skills wisely. In a previous post on CSR, I outlined how an NGO used people from the marketing team of a corporation to clean out shelves and move boxes, when devising a marketing campaign for the NGO would have been a better use of their skills. Similarly, using the skills of slacktivists could occur through further investigation. For example, let’s say someone has just “liked” a page. What next? The organisation could contact the person to detail some volunteer positions that require specific skills missing in the organisation. Hook, line and sinker.

3) Let’s explain to the public in clear and simple language, what good activism is. Rather than simply writing off slacktivism as poor activism, NGOs can help educate what worthwhile activity is, without the NGOspeak. Similarly, it should be the role of NGOs to educate on what damaging activism is.

4) Focus on the cause, not the action. Spend energy questioning whether the slacktivist is promoting a good cause first, before worrying about the fact that their action may be inconsequential. After all, as the research shows, slacktivism is not the only action that slacktivists take.

5) Following on from this, be skeptical about slacktivism which is more in the interests of profit than a worthwhile cause. Last year, KFC in Utah ran a promotion promising to donate $1 to diabetes research for every 64 ounce (1.89L!) soft drink bought. So really, what was KFC’s motive? To contribute to research into diabetes, or to contribute to the incidence of diabetes?

What do you think? Is it possible to engage slactivists in more worthwhile causes, or should NGOs focus their energy elsewhere? Or, are there many good examples of slacktivism that we can’t write off the activity altogether? Let us know in the comments.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

As of yesterday, the Australian Labor Party has indicated that offshore processing of asylum seekers is dead. For now. But does this indicate a new era of clean conscience for our government? A born-again Machine Gun Preacher-like about face towards a more humane approach to those who need our help? Will it mean that Labor will start representing those on the left who originally stood tall with them, and desist from playing bare hairy-chested politics with the Opposition, who will stop at nothing to prove time and time again how masculine their party really can be?

Unfortunately, not likely.

The story of how our government treats refugees opened many, many years ago, but perhaps the final chapter in this section began back in May. Prime Minister Gillard announced the Malaysia Solution, which involved sending 800 boat arrivals to Malaysia for processing. In return, Australia would take 4000 processed refugees into our community. Even for the least cynically minded amongst us, this announcement was one that was hard to fathom, not in the least because of the lack of long term vision involved. Only 800 arrivals? In the 5 months that it has taken for that proposal to well and truly be buried, more than that 800 have already arrived on our shores.

This really begs the question – what was the government trying to achieve? Perhaps it was just dipping its toes into the water, testing it out a little to see if the deal would fly. Given the appallingly low approval rate of the Prime Minister, it seems like a rather risky tactic. Either way, come August 31st, the deal was well and truly pickled when the High Court ruled that the solution was illegal.

What we saw next was an appalling act of “leadership” by the government, who then sought to have the Migration Act amended, effectively overruling the High Court, so that the deal proposed could become legal. In what is truly an amazingly desperate move, Gillard then sought the support of Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, saying that he would come off looking better if he was aligned to the government, because his political stance would be be more firmly entrenched on the “right”. In the end, Abbott refused to give support, not because, like the High Court, he feared for the safety and well-being of the asylum seekers being sent to Malaysia. Rather because it simply wasn’t the solution that he had chosen.

Is this the next step in the Gillard government's plan? Reposted with permission from Kudelka Cartoons.

Yesterday, we saw the Gillard government coming to grips with the fact that, for now at least, the Malaysia solution is dead in the water (poor pun I know). However, that is not to say that it will not be resurrected later. In fact in yesterday’s announcement, Gillard and Immigration Minister Chris Bowen made it clear that the Malaysia solution was something that will be actively pursued.

But, did the government take the opportunity to at least take the moral high ground on the matter, and rub it in the face of the Opposition to show them once and for all that offshore processing was a morally bankrupt policy? Let’s have a look at the message that our Prime Minister had for her opposite number:

“We are at risk of seeing more boats. If we do see that, there is one person to blame, Tony Abbott, for this mindless negativity, his reckless strategy which has brought offshore processing to an end.”

To put it simply, the cynic in me sees yesterday’s announcement as little more than a way to publicly put the Malaysia solution to bed (well for a nanny nap perhaps), while taking the opportunity to take a big stab at Tony Abbott and declare that any boats that arrived from here on in were on his watch, not hers. Frankly, she’d have more luck selling iPads to the Amish than that idea to the Australian public.

Amongst yesterday’s announcement were also some promising details about mandatory detention. If offshore processing is not going to continue, what’s going to happen to the asylum seekers who would otherwise be processed offshore? The answer is that while mandatory detention will continue, the government will be issuing more bridging visas and trying to process more refugees in the community. However, more detention centres, in Wickham Point in Darwin and at Yongah Hill in Western Australia, will be opened to handle the overflowing facilities currently used. I would have thought given that the cost of mandatory detention per asylum seeker is approximately $113,000, the government would be looking at other options rather than building more facilities, even if these facilities are overcrowded as is.

It’s worth making the point here that although offshore processing is currently off the cards, which is a significant step forward for a more rights-based and cost-effective solution for asylum seekers, mandatory detention is still an evil that exists. The Department of Immigration and Citizenship has stressed that mandatory detention exists for administrative, rather than deterrent value. If that is the case, then how come Chris Bowen is able to announce that the bulk of new boat arrivals will be processed in community using bridging visas? More to the point, why are almost all asylum seekers who arrive by plane not kept in mandatory detention? How are they able to be processed free of hoopla?

The fact of the matter is that mandatory detention, like the Malaysia solution, is a way in which the government can look like it has a control over the situation, and on those who arrive seeking asylum. It’s important for them to look like they have control over the situation when in reality, there are much greater causes at play, as Brendan has already outlined on this site. The entire point is deterrence (or at least the pretense of it). In which case, the policy is flawed either (a) morally, because it seeks to harm the people who are needing our help the most, and/or (b) pragmatically, because it’s just for show and doesn’t work.

Recently Prime Minster Gillard was nominated in the Atlantic’s list of Brave Thinkers for 2011, because of her insistence at pushing through the Carbon Tax, despite great opposition to it, and the damage to her popularity. The write up admitted that it wasn’t sure whether this act was a move of political expedience or principled values, but it acknowledged that Gillard was following what she believed in, and staking her claim on it. Now that we’ve seen a softening of Labor’s stance on asylum seekers, will we see some clear direction that her party will follow a line that it believes in, instead of changing their course when it suits them at the time? Only time will tell, but for one, I won’t be holding my breath.

Footnote: It’s difficult to believe that in this tough political climate, Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott once flirted so outrageously with each other on television. Prepare to be nauseated.

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In the lead up to the Fourth High Level Forum (HLF4) in Busan, South Korea, in late November, development thinkers and practitioners are debating what the outcome document could and should reflect, and the role of South-South Cooperation (SSC) providers (often referred to as ‘emerging’ or ‘non-DAC’ donors) in influencing this process. It is within this context that the discussion about Chinese aid in the Western discourse has now shifted from concerns about motives and objectives to broader questions regarding the impact of China on the dominant development agenda.

This post will briefly cover four components that are significant to examine: China’s conception of development & the underlying norms and principles; the relationship to the aid effectiveness agenda; forms of development financing; and China’s role in agenda-setting.

Aid and Development Norms

The Chinese Government’s White Paper on Foreign Aid frames China’s provision of aid as operating within the context of China’s position as a developing country but also as part of fulfilling its international responsibilities. The objective of providing foreign aid is to “help recipient countries to strengthen their self-development capacity, enrich and improve their peoples’ livelihood, and promote their economic growth and social progress” (White Paper 2011). Three things stand out in the Chinese discourse: the promotion of self-development and self-reliance; non-interference and non-conditionality; and equality and mutual benefit. These are used by China, Western governments, and recipients – albeit in different ways – to distinguish China vis-a-vis traditional donors.

Chinese foreign aid stresses the importance of stimulating economic growth and implementing a development model based on each country’s specific requirements and circumstances. Although China supports the MDGs and has used international forums such as UN Summits to call upon all countires to help promote and achieve them, they are not in themselves a core focus of its aid programs. There is no rights-based or gender-mainstreaming programing and very little inclusion of monitoring and evaluation mechanisms – especially regrading the quality or impact of projects.

Although like other donors China utilises foreign aid towards a range of objectives, there is an interesting distinction in the rhetoric used to promote and justify its policy. ‘Mutual benefit’ and ‘win-win’ outcomes mark the cornerstone of Chinese aid – and SSC in general. China’s aid policy is conceptualised with the belief that recipients’ development contributes to China’s development and vice-versa. There is no strong domestic moral imperative for aid giving, nor is it steeped in a colonial, imperial, civilising mission. China also does not deny that it gets some benefit too; rather than approaching foreign aid as a form of giver-receiver relationship, the ‘gift’ of aid is generally explained as benefiting both governments. China dismisses the notion of ‘charity’; instead stressing the idea of ‘friendship’. In being grounded in notions of friendship rather than charity, China presents its aid as being normatively different from that of traditional donors; based upon equality and mutual benefit. This discourse serves both domestic and international imperatives for the Chinese government, but arguably also represents a significant discursive distinction –- and one that is symbolically important to many other developing countries.

A significant difference between China and ‘traditional donors’ appears in terms of the norm of non-interference and no political conditions. Chinese aid policies do not adopt the language of ‘good governance’ or ‘failing vs. effective states’, and in fact utilise the backlash against these (excessive) policy prescriptions by continually highlighting China’s own policy of ‘non-interference’ in other countries’ internal affairs. This is the element that Western donors are most critical of and that China (and many recipient governments) highlight to create a distinction between China and other donors. Of course, as China’s engagement intensifies there is an increasing disjuncture between its rhetoric and practice – particularly when commercial and foreign policy objectives diverge. The Chinese insist that the difference is that they don’t impose or require policy changes: “we’re not trying to change the structures of recipient countries”. This has the advantage of allowing more policy space for developing countries and is thus highly valued. Despite the hype, there is no real evidence thus far that this component of Chinese aid is fundamentally affecting traditional donors’ aid conditionality practices – though prompting a reassessment of the relevance of some of these conditions would be a good outcome.

There is much talk and consternation that China is presenting competition for ideas of development – the so-called ‘Beijing Consensus’. China clearly gives developing countries more options and more experience to draw upon, and can offer some potentially useful ‘lessons’ based on its own (ongoing) development experience. The reality seems to be, however, that most countries view China as a complementary source of development assistance, rather than a complete alternative. China itself doesn’t have a clearly articulated ‘model’ and it is not seeking to turn other countries into ‘Chinese-like’ structures. Of course, its authoritarian system will be appealing to some dictatorships – but arguably these countries haven’t listened to the advice of Western donors & Bretton Woods institutions anyway.

Aid Effectiveness Agenda

Western donors are also concerned that China may be undermining the aid effectiveness agenda and accepted ‘best practice’. Because many DAC donors themselves don’t necessarily follow the recommendations, one could argue that they are already weak and that China is no different in that regard – although it might slow down the process of adoption if other donors are disinclined to reform their practices if this means giving China a comparative advantage. Not being a DAC member, China is not required to be ‘measured’ against regime rules and expectations, nor has it agreed to be subjected to DAC reviews or comparisons (compared with other non-DAC donors such as the UAE). China has signed the Paris Declaration, but as a recipient not donor country.

Paris Declaration Components:

Unlike traditional donors, China doesn’t develop specific country strategies or country programs with multiyear plans detailing individual projects and objectives. It does, however, advocate country ‘alignment’, frequently relying on recipients to select projects and prides itself on its aid being ‘recipient-focused’ and ‘responsive’ to a country’s needs. Its norm of non-interference arguably coincides with the idea of ‘ownership’, and the Chinese Government stresses the importance of each country developing and articulating its own development path. There are cases of nascent involvement in coordination and harmonisation efforts, though only when led by the host country and only at a participatory level rather than through support for sector wide approaches and pooled funds. Its aid is substantially tied to Chinese contractors – in line with its mutual benefit norm – and this is unlikely to change dramatically.

Other rules and expectations:

Like other donors, China has issued quite extensive debt relief throughout the world, and in this regard is abiding by one of the expectations of the development community. Because China doesn’t attached explicit conditions to its debt cancellation, however, there are concerns about debt sustainability, and potential problems posed by China’s resource-backed loans for the IFI’s preferred creditor status. Chinese lending is usually based upon an assessment of the individual project’s risk, not risk at a broader country level – which enables countries greater access to development finance as well as commercial loans. This has benefits and drawbacks and depends much upon the country’s ability and willingness to manage its levels of debt.

Transparency is a strong norm and is likely to be a key element in Busan. 18 donors that are not members of the DAC report through the DAC, and the IATI movement is gaining prominence. China’s transparency is still minimal – and is a concern of Western donors and within recipient countries. It has, however, improved markedly in recent years and in countries that have strong requirements there are cases where China is involved in recipient-led coordination and reporting efforts – the most significant being Cambodia where China reports its aid projects to a common database alongside other donors. The transparency norm currently only extends to ‘ODA’ – in terms of OOF (such as export credits) traditional donors are often as untransparent as China and there has been recent debate about this short-coming of the aid effectiveness agenda.

A common concern about Chinese aid relates to issues of corruption and governance. Since the majority of Chinese aid is ‘in kind’ or tied, the Chinese system doesn’t actually transfer funds to other developing countries. The Chinese (rightly) argue this reduces likelihood of aid money being siphoned off. However, details of contracts and procurement are often scarce and recipient communities have a legitimate issues with ensuring whether they are getting best value for money. There is also scope for corruption between Chinese actors, and Chinese Embassies have significant leeway to select projects and disburse grant funding (not the larger concessional loans though) – meaning that (good) project decisions depend on specific individuals.

A little surprisingly, China has actively advocated for countries to support LDCs and direct 0.15% of GNI to them, which is one of the DAC’s recommendations. A MOFCOM spokeswoman at the UN LDCs Conference in Istanbul in May this year stated: “We also call on the developed countries to fulfill their commitment as early as possible to allocate 0.15 percent to 0.2 percent of their Gross National Income as development aid to the LDCs“. The Chinese Government states that two-thirds of its aid goes to ‘least developed’ and ‘other low-income’ countries – though no definition of these categories is offered. It is an interesting example of China speaking of and embracing an important global development norm.

Development Financing

In most countries China is now a mid-level ‘donor’ but in some cases it is one of the main sources of development finance. The White Paper reveals an aid program that has been increasing at approximately 30% per year for the past few years, and its annual budget stands at about $4 billion (caution: not directly comparable with DAC ODA definitions) or less than 0.05% GNI (2009 PPP figures).

Interestingly, China now articulates a distinction between what it considers ‘foreign aid’ (see White Paper) and other forms of development finance (though definitions and boundaries within these categories are not coherently defined). This is arguably the combined result of pressure from the international community and a desire to be seen to be responding to the discussion about its expanding aid program.

However, it is crucial to realise that Chinese ‘aid’ is not conceived as a separate policy; aid flows are but one (small) element within China’s economic statecraft. The government draws upon a range of financial mechanisms when formulating economic and development agreements with other developing countries. Most of these –- such as official loans at commercial rates, export credits, suppliers’ credits – would be classified as ‘other official flows’ (OOF) under DAC definitions. The Chinese Government also utilises aid and investment ‘packages’ and (occasionally) resource-backed loans known as the ‘Angola Model’. As these other development financing mechanisms fall outside the DAC (and Chinese) definition of ‘aid’ they are also not encompassed in the aid effectiveness agenda. In the lead up to Busan some scholars are now starting to advocate for an extension of the effectiveness and transparency agendas to incorporate broader forms of development finance and thus include the dominant financing from providers of SSC.

China’s aid and development policy places emphasis on diverse economic initiatives such as (free) trade, reduction in tariffs, use of public and private sector within aid projects, establishment of special economic zones, and so forth. China (somewhat ironically) advocates utilising aid as a catalyst for generating profitable projects. Its grant-aid funded agricultural centres, for example, are explicitly designed to be run as profitable joint-ventures within the medium term. Aid is just a small part of its development relationship. Western donors have been working for years to ensure a distinction in their commercial and aid endeavours in a country and thus criticise the commercial aspect of Chinese aid as being self-interested. However concepts such as ‘aid for trade’ and the EU’s policy coherence for development agenda highlight the importance of thinking about the links between different aspects of global and bilateral relationships. China’s substantial new investment in the infrastructure sector, particularly in Africa, has also been a catalyst for renewed private sector interest and the reengagement of Western government apparatus’ such as US EXIM.

A new development agenda?

Whilst in the 2008 High Level Forum in Accra traditional donors were encouraging donors like China to follow the Paris Declaration, the Busan process has shifted towards finding ways to ensure the Paris Declaration remains valid in the context of other forms of development funding. It is possible we will see a stronger focus on outcomes rather than inputs, and a shift towards development effectiveness instead of the more specific aid effectiveness, and a change in language from ‘aid’ to ‘development cooperation’. Commentators such as Jonathan Glennie have suggested a ‘twin-track’ approach as a likely outcome, to take into consideration the differences between ‘traditional’ and ‘south-south’ development assistance.

Providers of SSC ardently stress its distinctiveness but appear reluctant to be subsumed within any more definitive framework or grouping. This is particularly the case for countries like Brazil, India and China, who’s provision of SSC and aid is part of their articulation and demonstration of rising global power. Despite the buzz around SSC – and the real potential benefits it can bring – definitions and guidelines for this modality are yet to be agreed upon.

Chinese aid – alongside other providers of SSC – is undoubtedly prompting reexamination of traditional donor aid policies and practices and provides the impetus and opportunity to reconsider the dominant development and aid structures and processes, but it is difficult to determine a clear normative challenge at this stage – nor is it certain that China wants to play its part in formulating it.

By the very nature of it’s involvement China is changing the development dynamics. The involvement of China and others should provide fresh opportunities for developing countries to further their own development agendas and for traditional donors to engage with them on new terms; not just as poor aid recipients.

At this stage, China is not attempting to overtly challenge the traditional donor development agenda, but appears to be embarking on a dual process of increasing acceptance of some norms and practices whilst continuing to stress its distinctiveness in other areas and it is likely to pick and choose which elements it accepts based on an assessment of its own best-interests at any given time.

Links:

State Council, White Paper on China’s Foreign Aid, April 2011

Busan conference offers chance to tackle aid effectiveness Jonathan Glennie

Who should lead the aid effectiveness debate in the future? Overseas Development Institute, Public Event, 6 July 2011

2011 Survey on Monitoring the Paris Declaration, OECD

Indonesia’s stretch of territory is made up of over 17, 500 islands and is the world’s largest archipelago. The nation is dense in tropical forest and has the third largest coverage in the world (behind Brazil and the Democratic republic of Congo), of approximately 100 million hectares of tropical forest. Due to this wide geographical spread, different types of forests can be found, such as the evergreen lowland dipterocarp in Sumatra and Kalimantan, seasonal monsoon forests and savannah grasslands in Nusa Tenggara, nondipterocarp lowland forests/alpine areas in Papua and extensive mangrove regions nationwide. Within the different sub zones lives an amazing diversity of wildlife including the iconic red haired Indonesian orang-hutans (forest men), proboscis monkeys, gibbons, tigers, rhinoceros, elephants, cassowaries, birds of paradise and numerous other rare insect, bird, reptile and mammal species. Indonesia has a precious and unique ecosystem, but as exploitative forest practices are on the rise, many animals dependent on forest ecosystems have become endangered and face very real threats of extinction.

Collecting traditional herbs

It is not just animals that are affected by detrimental forest practices, many indigenous Indonesians (warganegara pribumi) are facing major upheavals in their lives as these practices increase. Those most affected are the isolated indigenous communities living deep in the jungle (masyarakat terasing) who depend entirely on forest resources to support their survival,livelihood, traditional culture and lifestyles. It is these masyarakat terasing who are most vulnerable to detrimental impacts of forest management decisions that determine their access and ownership rights to land. In an era of increased outside interest in Indonesian forests by parties involved in a number of fields including Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) projects, mining companies, oil and logging companies, plantation projects, industrial developments (both government and private) and other interested industries, there has never been a more arresting need for confident legal protection of indigenous people’s land and human rights.

Although discussions, debates and internal negotiations regarding indigenous rights have been on the UN table for three decades, it was not until the 13^th September, 2007 that an official Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (DRIP) was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly by a majority of 144 states in favour and 4 votes against (out of interest, those states against were Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States). The fact that this declaration has been adopted for less than four years reflects an historical poor state of protection and a startlingly delayed rights-based representation of indigenous sovereignty worldwide. The declaration codifies and articulates a series of rights relating to customary law, natural resource use, land ownership, self-determination and lastly, indigenous autonomy in decision making processes under the principle of Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC).

Article 19 of UNDRIP states that:

States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the Indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them.

While Article 32(2) outlines that:

States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the Indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources.

As a declaration, UNDRIP does not have the status of binding International law and as is, Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) can only be considered a principle of best practice. Although FPIC is not a legal requirement, many private companies and governments recognise the vital importance of this realisation and are working towards implementing meaningful FPIC with Indigenous communities. FPIC is a rights based model that has been designed to give more autonomy and ownership to Indigenous populations. It is not a set of consultations with already established outputs that is ‘presented’ to a said community; it is a process of informed and mutual negotiations that benefit counterparts and stakeholders involved in an ethical fashion.

To gain a deeper understanding of the issues, let’s take a closer look at what each of these principles entail.

• FREE. Indigenous people exercise free choice void of coercion, force, manipulation, bribes or alcohol to come to a consensus. Independent bodies not related financially or politically to the project developers should conduct negotiations to eliminate bias, act as a safeguard against misconduct and provide judicial remedies if conflict arises.

• PRIOR: Clear and sufficient notification is given to the community so that people have space to comprehend the project, request additional information, seek advice, clarify points and ask questions. In Australia this is 12 months, however time frames vary according to communities and projects worldwide.

• INFORMED: All relevant project information is provided in local languages and people have access to independent legal or technical advice from an outside party. Information can include preliminary assessment of the likely impact of the project, stakeholders involved in construction and operational phases (including local people, researchers, sponsors, commercial interests and partners), potential risks involved eg spiritual land concerns or pollution and projections of foreseen implications eg commercial, economic, environmental, cultural and conditions for 3^rd party involvement.

• CONSENT: Approval of the project happens when negotiations are complete and legal documents produced that do or do not give permission for a project to go ahead. Indigenous people have the right to say YES or NO to a presented project and if the community says NO then projects cannot go ahead.

Because FPIC is ‘relatively’ new there are still many roadblocks involved in implementing and fulfilling indigenous people’s rights in practice. As you can imagine, if the negotiating party has private, for profit interests in forest resources, there is a real danger of manipulation or lack of transparency in the negotiating process, particularly considering the unequal levels of power between counterparts. If FPIC is to be a principle of delivered dignity and real equity, monitoring needs to be consistent and impartial to ensure fairness and authentic representation of indigenous rights holders.

In Indonesia, complications in delivering FPIC can arise because it is difficult to establish legal ownership of lands by indigenous communities living in and with the forests. It is difficult to claim rights if land ownership is not even in community hands. In a recent Forest Dialogue in Riau province, one of the root causes of problems discussed was state land. “Most communities in agricultural lands are considered to be on State land and almost all forests are classed as State Forest Areas. As a result, State agencies are granting leaseholds to palm oil companies on agricultural lands and to forestry companies in State Forests without taking community rights or views into account.” This issue is not an isolated or one off concern for Indonesia. One government representative from the National Land Bureau declared that there are over 3,500 land disputes associated with the palm oil industry in Indonesia, most of which stem from land acquisition processes that take indigenous land without allowing for customary rights or FPIC processes to be.

FPIC is a right of prime importance for indigenous people worldwide. The author has recently developed a keen interest in this field while researching indigenous people’s role in benefit sharing agreements through carbon trading projects in provinces of Indonesia. The author feels that more people should investigate and learn about FPIC as a principle of development and human rights and keep watch of how it is delivered in current and future projects in Indonesia and indeed, worldwide.

I was listening to Triple J’s Hack (episode for 8th September) the other day, which was part IV in a series looking at the decade since 9/11. One of the interviewees, an academic from ANU, spoke of the correlation between conflict and migration. And, how 9/11 and the subsequent conflicts have been a catalyst for increased migration. In particular, of forced migration; or in Australian terms, ‘why people are getting on bloody boats and coming to our shores’.

This crucial and central ‘push’ factor of migration has largely been ignored in forums. Have we have forgotten what the nature of conflict is like, and that both Iraq and Afghanistan are very much still in states of conflict? Yet, public discussions are shaped by finger-pointing and blame – on who is responsible. We look inwards, rather than outwards. We rightly question Australia’s continued presence, purpose and role in both these countries. Then, separately, we question Australia’s immigration policy, human rights obligations and treatment of asylum seekers. But, rarely do we talk about both at the same time. About the connection between conflict and migration.

The current discourse in Australia focuses on immigration, often beginning with people on a boat, at a border. Although a recent New Matilda piece rightly questions the ethical premise of Australia’s immigration policy, it only focuses on what happens in and around Australia’s borders. Next, the Gillard Government proposed some very radical changes to the Immigration Act. In particular, 198AA, which gives extraordinary executive power to the Immigration Minister irregardless of international obligations or domestic laws. And then, the Herald Sun decided to attach a very loaded question to recent reporting on asylum seekers – “Is the Federal Government too soft on asylum seekers cheating their way into the country? Yes/No”.

Ludicrous. With the weight of all this talk about pull factors, it “feels like a midget is hanging from my neckless” (Ludacris). Australian discourse shows a lack of imagination. Migration is much more than about the arrival at a border. Migration involves multiple borders with many histories, politics, and agendas. Invisible yet tangible, following contours that are neither linear nor defined. When people are forced to move through these complex webs, we tend to only care where they are going, not why or from what.

Conflict causes, exacerbates and acts as a catalyst of the forced movements of people. Just look at the table below (Fig. 6 from UNHCR’s Global Trends 2010) and the top 7 sources of refugees. So, indulge me and engage in a historical hypothetical. What if Iraq and Afghanistan were not invaded? What effect could that have had on the movement of Iraqis and Afghans both globally and to Australia?

(Sorry, I wish I could present this as a minimalist infographic, but I lack the skills).

From UNHCR's Global Trends 2010

By the end of 2009, there were an estimated 10.4 million refugees around the world.

From UNHCR's Global Trends 2010

Almost half (45%) of those refugees were from Iraq and Afghanistan. By some estimates, as many as 7.8 million since 2003 from both countries combined. But, really, we do not actually know. It is disputed, in particular for Iraq. This can be attributed to: mixed migrations of internally-displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees, both leaving and returning; the capacity of host countries to identify, register and track their movements; and the swift and disruptive nature of the war. For example, since 2003, 2/3 of Iraqis returning were IDPs. According to UNHCR, over 460,000 refugees have returned to Iraq since 2003. In 2010, 230 refugees in Australia returned to Iraq.

Over 3 million refugees have been forced from Afghanistan, with over 96% of them being hosted in Pakistan and Iran. Most Iraqi refugees have also sought protection in neighbouring countries, particularly in Syria and Jordan.

But, how many refugees came from Iraq and Afghanistan in the years prior to 9/11? Well, this does not really elicit the point I am trying to make, but in some ways ito does. Since the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, there has been large movements of refugees from Afghanistan into neighbouring countries and around the world. The same goes for Iraq, but without the Soviets.

Between 1980-2o01, the highest number of Afghan refugees was in 1990 at over 6 million, eventually dropping to 2.6 million in 2000 after a total of 4.6 million were repatriated during the 1990s.

How many came to Australia?

According to UNHCR, in 2001, there were 3,600 Afghan refugees in Australia. Comparatively, in the first 6 months alone of 2010/11, over 1,000 claims were lodged by asylum seekers from Afghanistan who came by boat. Between 1991-2001, 12,000 Iraqi refugees were resettled in Australia. In that same period of 2010/11, 480 claims were lodged by Iraqis who came by boat.

So, it comes as no surprise, that the two countries which top the list as sources of refugees, are also the two countries that (arguably) have experienced little sustained stability and peace since 1980. For Iraq, it was the Iraq-Iran war, followed by two more Gulf Wars with the U.S and its allies. For Afghanistan, it was the Soviet invasion and occupation, periods of civil war, and then the current war and occupation. It is also no surprise that it was during the relative stability of the Taliban’s governance that over 4 million Afghans were repatriated and asylum claims declined (that is not to speak in absolute positive terms about the Taliban, but only to demonstrate the effects of stability and peace. The human rights violations, discrimination and repression, particularly of the Hazara and women, are well documented). I am sure that if not for these successive wars, a result largely of geopolitical concerns, we would between 45-50% less refugees around the world. And, considering that it is predominantly Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers who come to Australia by boat, would ‘boat people’ even exist today? I doubt it.

I would like to see the discourse shift to one framed around conflict and forced migration, simultaneously with a more rights-based approach (‘humane’ does not cut it. It is a word you use when referring to animal welfare). Here is what the Australian government, with the support of civil society, could do:

• Communicate a better understanding of how conflict affects the movement of people: shift from immigration to migration. This is subtle, but of significance, as it moves from the who and how to the why. That is, it is not about who immigrants are and how they arrive, but why they are migrating. Migration is about causal, origin issues, whereas immigration is about the consequences of migration and is focused on procedures, identification and security.
• Messages that are win-win-win. The Australian Government should be communicating our presence in Afghanistan and Iraq as that of peace-building, conflict prevention and development. This can then be tied in with how these efforts will contribute to not only a decrease in the number of asylum seekers coming from these two countries, but increases in repatriation. Or, in other Australian terms, ‘stopping the boats and making sure the buggers go back to where they came from!’ For example, that 430,000 refugees from Iraq have returned home. The Australian government supporting the transition of two nations to democracy (win); the opportunity for Afghans and Iraqis to return home (win); and the decline of asylum seekers coming to Australia (win).
• This can be supported by communicating AusAID’s role in these countries. The ODA budget for 2011/12 in Afghanistan and Iraq is $165 million and 36 million respectively. Relatively small compared to Indonesia and Papua New Guinea’s, but potential to be scaled up towards 2015 and receive a larger slice of the proposed $8 billion AusAID budget.

“Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind

…

The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori”.

(It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country)

In Part 1 of  ‘How do we develop happiness’, Weh Yeoh looked at the increasing trend of governments to enact policies aimed at increasing their citizens’ happiness.

In Part 2, Sophia Kagan looks at how governments can measure happiness and how these measures can impact on government policies. Is there, hiding amongst the empty political rhetoric, a real way in which policy makers can genuinely make people happier?

The origins of measuring ‘happiness’

Ever since the invention of the abacus, increased income has been the holy grail of progress. Both in rich and poor countries, increased GDP was a constant mantra, almost synonymous with development and growth. That was until a realisation started to creep into the minds of economists and policy makers (based as much on personal anecdotal evidence as on empirical studies) that money doesn’t necessarily make us happy.

Of course, they were not the first to come to that ‘ground breaking’ realisation. Artists, writers and philosophers from Artistotle to Kanye West have assured us that money doesn’t equal happiness. Psychologists have meanwhile been mining for data on happiness levels for decades through surveys and experiments and have also come to the conclusion that the correlation between rising income and subjective happiness is weaker than once thought (yes, the rich are generally happier than the poor but as countries get richer they often don’t get happier).

Although Bhutan’s trial of Gross National Happiness began back in 1972 (see How Do We Develop Happiness? Part 1), the debate about the inadequacies of the GDP measure didn’t reach Western shores until perhaps the 1980s when economist Amartya Sen coined the concept of the “capabilities approach” as another way of figuring out how to improve people’s well-being through public policy. The focus of his new approach was to look at the opportunities or freedom that people have to choose the life they want to lead rather than their consumption (example: a traditional approach might classify a man who has not eaten for 2 days as deprived. However, if he is fasting for religious reasons, the capabilities approach would reflect the fact that it is his decision and freedom not to eat).

Sen’s new approach became so influential that it came to form the framework of the UN’s Human Development Index (‘HDI’), which was created in 1990 with the purpose of shifting “the focus of development economics from national income accounting to people-centered policies’’. Though Sen was loathe to fix in stone a list of capabilities to be measured (arguing that this depends on personal value judgements), the HDI does just that – propounding indicators of human development across three themes of lifespan, educational attainment and income. Over 169 countries are now included in the HDI’s annual league tables (that rank countries according to their performance on indicators) making it perhaps the most widely used index after GDP.

Since the development of the HDI there has been an explosion of splinter indexes and league tables including the Happy Planet Index, the Genuine Progress Indicator, the Satisfaction with Life indicator, the World Values Survey and the International Social Survey Programme. The concept has even made its way to the UN General Assembly, which, in July this year, adopted a non-binding resolution that acknowledges happiness as an indicator of a country’s success. The UN resolution calls on countries to “pursue the elaboration of additional measures that better capture the importance of the pursuit of happiness and well-being in development with a view to guiding public policies”.

A closer look at different ways of measuring ‘happiness’

1. Capabilities approach: Examples of this approach are the HDI, the MPI (discussed below) and the Millennium Development Goals. This type of measurement (built around objective measures rather than subjective levels of happiness) has been particularly common in the international development sector where it is perhaps most relevant. Although traditionally measurement of poverty has been focused on household income (think of the seductive simplicity of the $1 or $1.25-a-day measure), this often doesn’t give a comprehensive picture of why and how people are poor. Enter the Multidimensional Poverty Index, a sister index of the HDI which measures acute poverty across 104 countries through indicators including child mortality, nutrition, years of schooling, access to electricity, drinking water, sanitation, cooking, and, even, the flooring of your abode. A household is identified as multi-dimensionally poor if it is deprived in some combination of indicators whose weighted sum exceeds 30 percent of deprivations. Sounds great in theory (after all, the measurement can at least provide policymakers and donors with information about the most vulnerable households and groups), but the indexes are not without their share of critics. Some lament their failure to include more factors (such as environmental degradation or other ecological factors). Others quibble over the formulas used in the number crunching, arguing that it gives an overly negative image of certain countries, such as many of those in Africa (for more info see here and here).

2. Measuring ‘subjective’ happiness (ie through self-reporting and analysis): One example of this is the UK, where the government proposes to collect statistical data about people’s perceptions of their well-being and life priorities (through self-reporting on such questions as how happy or anxious they have been feeling, how satisfied they are with their lives). The advantage of this approach is that you can directly gage what is important to the population using flexible indicators. In addition, this type of measurement can be seen as a democratic way of impacting on government policies. The difficulty is that subjective happiness is just that – subjective. It can be hard to analyse and use to draw useful conclusions.

Of course, both subjective and objective factors can be used together in measuring happiness. In the report commissioned by France’s president Nicholas Sarkozy, drafters Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen attempt to marry objective measurement with self-reporting (though the report is fairly vague on exactly how this is to be done). The OECD has also attempted to combine the two types of measurement in its own index which allows the users to play around with the weighting of the indicators, depending on what you think is most important.

Measure this! How do you objectively measure the intensity of (un)happiness when priorities can be so drastically different? You also run the risk of collecting a whole lot of contradictory data that is hard to use for the purposes of decision making

Are the indexes fairly similar though? Does data from one support the other?

Instinct might tell you that these measures should fit together. After all, if I live in a country with high life expectancy, good education opportunities, good healthcare, then presumably my life satisfaction will be fairly high. And if I have overall life satisfaction then I’m likely to respond fairly well in ‘happiness’ surveys?

Not so, it seems. Partly this might be due to the fact that short term happiness and long term happiness aren’t identical and the fact that self-reporting surveys might measure short-term ‘hedonic’ contentment (or discontentment) or they might measure long-term satisfaction (see Part 1, which discusses how having children may result in short term unhappiness but long term satisfaction). Partly it may be because there are just so many surveys asking so many things that ultimately there’s bound to be some contradiction without coherence and consistency.

Take the case of Australia. Australia has consistently rated high on HDI, moving from 4^th place in the world in 2008 and 2009 to 2^nd place in 2010. It also ranks very highly on OECD charts. However, some argue that this characterisation is inconsistent with other data and incorrectly implies that Australians are ‘happier’ than they really are. For example, Blanchflower and Oswald (2006) use life satisfaction statistics to find that Australia’s performance is only mediocre, and even poor in some categories such as job satisfaction: looks at all the various indexes long enough and you’ll see a myriad of other contradictions for other countries as well.*

This is confusing. If there’s little correlation between the various happiness measures, might it not be best to stick with something clear like GDP measurements in policy making?

Measuring happiness and using it for public policy is a little tricky but that shouldn’t cause governments to give up. In fact, governments already take well-being issues into account when governing – for example, they look at air quality, urban planning such as community areas and parks to improve citizens’ wellbeing even though they are not strictly speaking GDP-related concerns. Should governments, however, take the step of quantifying citizens’ happiness (both through a needs and an outcome assessment), to make the process more rigorous and scientific? Considering the difficulty of measuring happiness, would it be useful, or just a costly and distracting exercise in navel gazing?

My conclusion is that measuring happiness (or well-being, satisfaction with life or whatever you want to call it) is a good thing when using the right tools because it provides transparency and incentive to government. It is without measurement that government can give lip service to these concepts without taking any genuine action. For example, quantifying greenhouse gas emissions has been important in making real progress beyond aspirational grandstanding. However, overcomplicating the issue with too many measuring sticks is also not ideal. Perhaps it’s best to focus on a few measurable indicators (those employed by HDI can be a good starting point), particularly on measures that are quantifiable, but supplementing where necessary with targeted subjective surveys. Despite scepticism, both objective and subjective indicators have been shown to provide meaningful and reliable data when used in the right way. Not only does this hold the promise of delivering a good measure of quality of life, but it also gives governments a way to better understand their citizens, beyond just knowing what they earn and how much they pay in taxes.

In summary, a matrix of indicators, not just GDP, is likely to give us a much better picture of development in both wealthy and least developed countries. Although the indicators can be hard to determine, there are plenty of measures which gives us a good guide that can be followed and tweaked in future.

*See article here for a response to Blanchflower and Oswald’s assessment

“Learning to live the paradox of action as reflection, and reflection as action”

- Westley et al., Getting to Maybe. How the World is Changed.

"We can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with ourselves." — Dalai Lama XIV

Supposedly carved into the temple of Apollo in Delphi was the phrase ’Know Thyself”. I often wondered if in itself self-knowledge holds the risk of turning into self-obsession. And whereas the risk is there, knowing oneself – understood as cultivating self-awareness – holds immense possibilities of change: within, and outside in the world. No effective change is brought about without a degree of self-reflection and self-awareness. Great leaders and social innovators from Nelson Mandela, to Aung San Suu Kyi, Thich Nhat Han, the Dalai Lama, Mother Theresa, Martin Luther King, all have held together the paradox of action and reflection, they all seem to have started their engagement in/with the world as an inside out process. This because we cannot just expect others to change: ‘wanting to change others means accepting a profound change in oneself. Self-reflection and self-revelation are necessary’. To me there seems to be a link between psychological/personal awareness and social/political awareness. Jon Kabat-Zinn himself, the founder of the mindfulness-based stress reduction programme, emphasises how a reflective practice such as mindfulness has wide effects in the body-politic (see ‘Healing the body politic’ from the his book Coming to Our Senses). So it comes as no surprise that for social innovators ‘there is gold in a reflective practice’, and ‘it is essential to understand that there is a connection between self-knowledge and worldly knowledge’. Self-knowledge as self-awareness requires us to get out of the constant ‘doing mode’, to cultivate who we are. Which, in my opinion, is what makes all the difference when it comes to serving as an aid worker, a volunteer or an NGO manager. Nevertheless what prompts many into aid work is activism, the desire to make a difference, ‘to do’ things that matter. It is somehow a quest for a meaningful life. Here reflection should not be understood as a state of passivity, but as moment of ‘being’, where we nurture those qualities that will inform our ‘doing’. Reflection becomes important because the way we think about the world, and how we understand it frames our actions. So it is of no secondary importance to learn the art of standing still, seeing that the world is not simply acted upon, but rather it interacts with us, with who we are. To paraphrase the work of my friend and colleague Jennifer Lentfer‘it is not what we do, but HOW we do it’ that matters. Engaging in personal enquiry and reflection is therefore part of the action, it becomes an essential component of how we do things and who we are. Learning to standstill helps us to take stock and move forward effectively.

'Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself'. — Leo Tolstoy

The story of the woodcutter from The Barefoot Guide to working with Organisations and Social Change (a wonderful, inspiring guide) conveys the message of why learning to pause is crucial:

‘Once upon a time an old woman was walking through the forest near her home when she came across a man chopping down a tree. They exchanged brief greetings but he continued chopping. He was working very hard, determined to complete the job and see results before sundown. She watched him a while and then disappeared. A little later she returned, bearing a stone and a small bucket of water. When he paused in his work to wipe his brow she handed these to him and said, “Sir, I see that you are very busy. But, to put it bluntly, it looks to me like you need to pause a while, take a breath and sharpen your axe.” “Go away, woman, I am too busy I don’t have time for this!”’

When do we sharpen our own axes? Do we take the time to standstill, take a breath, reflect? How many of us are just too busy for that?     For further reading, check out: The Barefoot Guide to working with Organisations and Social Change (free download); Kabat-Zinn, Coming to Our Senses: Healing Ourselves and the World Through Mindfulness

This is a reposting of an original post on Mindfulness for NGOs. 

By Emily D’Ath, Weh Yeoh & Brendan Rigby

This is a joint post in response to the first discussion for the ‘The Aid Blog Forum‘; an initiative started by J. at Tales from the Hood.

The first topic is Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Emily, Weh and Brendan present each of their responses to the guiding questions for this discussion. Join in!

How should we think about CSR?

Emily – Firstly, there needs to be a clear delineation between CSR and what is called ‘community investment’. Community investment is basically a more sophisticated and structured type of philanthropy. It is through community investment that most NGOs will interact with the private sector. Without delving too far into the depths of the definition debate around CSR:

CSR involves the recognition by private enterprises about the challenges the world is facing in relation to sustainability, both social and environmental. The main aim for a company engaging in CSR is to balance the interest of all stakeholders related to their core business e.g. the environment and shareholders. CSR, in my view, should be voluntary and goes beyond the law.

For an example of a company that is practicing CSR check out Marks & Spencer and their ‘Plan A: Do the Right Thing’.

We need to be clear that most NGOs in the development sector currently, or will, deal with corporate foundations or CSR departments who want to contribute money to the community. Whether or not you agree with this is a personal choice but something NGOs need to think about. Do you want to take money from a company that does not have the best ethical standards in other areas of their business?

Brendan - We need to think more broadly and inclusively about CSR. The biggest concern I have about CSR is the that fact that it largely operates within the traditional business model, but almost as a separate entity. An afterthought. Another avenue for raising a company’s profile, albeit under an altruistic banner. For CSR to evolve into a more holistic practice, we really need to unpack the underlying concept of CSR. That is, sustainability. What does sustainability mean to different actors? To business? To communities? To government? Currently, the ‘business as usual’ mantra still dominants many notions of sustainability. Sustainability has been co-opted into the business of growth, expansion, and the bottom line. However, we need to understand and enact the social, cultural, and environmental dimensions of sustainability and ensure that CSR be about future generations, not just our own.

What existing practices or ways of thinking about CSR should be stopped or change? Be specific.

Emily – CSR is not philanthropy. Particularly in Asia, CSR is still viewed in terms of simply donating money. In China, it can even involve donating money to local government officials. As mentioned previously, CSR should be systematically changing the way businesses work to become more sustainable. In an ideal world we would not have CSR departments, as sustainability would be integrated into every aspect of how a business operates.

Brendan - I agree with Emily, and would go further to say that sustainability cannot be thought of as ‘sustainability’; as this separate entity that we are required to consider. Rather, it should be so deeply embedded in our thinking and our lives that it does not need articulation. To point where business just is sustainable. Food production just is sustainable. We do not try to be sustainable, we just are sustainable.

Weh – I agree that the partnership between NGO and private enterprise is inevitable. But I think the most important part about this is thinking about expertise, and it’s important that private enterprise is able to release control of situations and rely on the expertise of NGO partners. I’m thinking about this in the context of Australian politics, where, under people such as the Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, no one is an expert anymore. A scientist disagrees with my world view on science – screw him, I’m going to discredit him. An economist thinks my direct action plan is too expensive – screw him, I’ll discredit him too!

Along these same lines is the idea that because private enterprise is funding a lot of “charitable” activity, and not government, we are now coming to the situation where we’re using a non-democratic way of deciding which of community’s problems are being solved. By comparison, when government decides which problems are to be solved, at least we have some control over that, in that we democratically elect them. However, nobody democratically elects private enterprise, so what right do they have to pick and choose which of society’s problems deserve attention? The only way to get around this problem, is again, to consider the question of expertise. In deciding which areas need the greatest attention, the expertise has to come from the community, not from the boardroom. If, and only if, private enterprise can do this, can CSR be effective. (Yet I personally doubt it).

Finally, the existence of CSR should not, I think, absolve the government of it’s responsibility to continue to fund development work. Rather, CSR should be an addition, a bonus if you like.

Brendan - Specifically, CSR and notions of sustainability have to be embedded in education. And, not just higher education, but right down to primary schooling. Sustainability is a concept that crosses boundaries and disciplines, encourages creativity and new ways of thinking. It can find its expression in art, business, economics, geography, science, history, etc. This is not a new idea, but one that needs to see greater adoption in education systems around the world. The upcoming Rio+20 would provide a great platform to push such an agenda.

What principles should guide NGO marketing and corporate relations departments as they engage with counterparts in the corporate CSR world to consider partnerships and opportunities for programs in the field?

Emily -

• Partnerships should be mutually beneficial otherwise it can be hard to justify to both parties why they should renew or engage in ongoing support for an initiative.
• Partnerships should be 3-5 years, to ensure both parties are committed and programs can have real medium to long-term impacts.
• Programs need to have a strong monitoring and evaluation system in place, to ensure accountability and feasibility for both parties.
• Do due diligence about potential partners before entering an agreement. Be clear about what your expectations are and make sure you are comfortable with a company’s expectations. Don’t assume the only reason a company wants to engage with you is for PR or marketing purposes. Private companies aren’t fundamentally immoral but amoral. In fact some of the most committed environmentalist I have met work in executive roles for private companies.

Weh –

• At the risk of harping on about one point, expertise is the key. We need to think about what private enterprise can bring to NGOs, and money is not the only thing. We need to think outside the box about what private enterprise is good at, and then use these skills. One example I can think of is an NGO that engaged corporate types to voluntarily clean out their office, organise files, stack shelves and the like. When it came down to analysing what these people did on a day to day basis, it turned out that they were from the marketing team of their company. A far better use of resources would be to use their skills to create a marketing campaign for this NGO, as this was something that the NGO lacked experience in. I would much rather see NGOs using resources from the private sector wisely, instead of only looking to that sector for funding, which can often come with stipulations and rules that make using the funding impractical or tiresome.

The global economy, even before its evolution and sophistication, was and is about access; about controlling access to resources, knowledge and markets. Economic growth for any one nation is also predicated on this same concept of access. However, as the many of the current economic, political and social systems are set up, only a small percentage of a given population benefit from a nation’s acquired access. They have privileged access through geography, patronage, gender, status, nepotism, corruption, and family history. For example, in the U.S, the top 20% of the population have 85% of the wealth. This year, the poverty rate in the U.S hit 15.1%, or 1 in every 6 people. In Australia, according to a report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), the wealthiest 20% of households in account for 62% of total household net worth. Research has also shown that such wealth inequality is not truly understood by the public.

“I think one of the reasons that we see people having a disconnect between understanding how much wealth inequality there really is, is this very strong American belief in the ability to be socially mobile and to be mobile with your wealth. So people have very strong beliefs that across generations and even in their own life they can go from rags to riches. And it’s certainly possible. I mean one of the fantastic things about America is that that is in fact possible. But it’s much, much rarer than people believe, and especially wealth transmission, so money that goes from generation to generation to generation is very flat. So it tends to perpetuate a great deal over time” (Prof. Michael Norton, Harvard Business School).

Wealth in very uneven in its distribution, both in the U.S and Australia, and across the world. Yet, international institutions continue to push for economic growth-oriented policies in international development contexts. These policies are deeply rooted in a particular understanding and histories of industralisation, capitalism and growth. However, there are others, such as many UN agencies, smaller actors such as Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), Community-Based Organisations (CBOs), and individuals like Amartya Sen, who push for a broader understanding of, and approach to, development. Ones that encompass well-being, social, environmental and human development, reframing concepts of freedom and happiness without the intense focus on wealth.

However, this concept of access has trickled down into our articulation of these new spaces in development, and into sectors such as microfinance and education. It is believed that greater access to, and control of, finances and credit will empower and reduce poverty. Yet, the evidence is far from conclusive. In education, for example, the eight Millenium Development Goals (MDG) articulate access. In particular, MDG number two and three which relate directly to education say nothing of learning. Indeed, it is not even stated in the MDGs whether children need to learn once they are in a classroom. It was wrongly assumed or just not considered. It is only recently that international attention has prioritised a post-access agenda as data reveals declining standards, high dropout rates, and low achievement rates in countries such as Uganda, Ghana and India. Although there has been remarkable success in striving towards the MDGs, in some cases, we are seeing rising levels of inequity. For example, according to a World Bank report on Ghana, a girl in a rural area from the poorest quintile is 13.9 times more likely not to have attended school than a boy in an urban area from the richest quintile. This is despite the government achieving almost universal primary school access and an average GDP growth rate of 5% over the past decade.

It is not such a far leap to then say that the access agenda is characteristic of very individualist societies, and has perhaps contributed to a blindspot on equity.

The conventional wisdom holds that if a child has access to education, then it is their responsibility to take advantage of it. Traditional educational pedagogies encourage individualism and competition. Through learning activities, standardised assessment tasks and even whole systems. Complimented by extra-curricular activites, children are constantly encouraged to compete against their peers; even when with a team, they compete against a team of their peers. Education systems are geared towards giving children a competitive advantage throughout their lives.

But, what if we were able to change this narrative? To encourage truly collaborative learning, in which children share knowledge, ideas, resources rather than compete for access? If we want to challenge the current economic growth model, then it must start with education. An initiative of the Post Growth Institute, an international group seeking to inspire people to explore paths to global prosperity that do not rely on economic growth, is beginning the challenge through an innovative and participatory approach. On September 15th, at various public locations worldwide, people will hand out their own money to complete strangers, two coins or notes at a time, asking the recipients to pass one of these coins or notes on to someone else. The aim is to raise awareness and start conversations about the benefits of economies based on sharing, as well as offering a learning experience that gets us thinking more critically and creatively about our relationship with money and how we could have new types of economic activity. It would be great to see this event adapted to schools to include children, teachers and parents in conversations about not just economies, but education, based on sharing.

To learn more, and to participate, visit: http://freemoneyday.org.

This is a cross-post with the Post Growth Institute

Recently, two heavyweights in the aid & development online community, and respected professionals in their own right, posted reflections on why they work in the sector. This was followed by very reluctant, but wise advice from Dave Algoso (who wrote ‘Career advice (from people smarter than me’ on whydev for us). I highly recommend that you read what they have to say (the symmetry of their titles is beautiful):

• Testify: by J.
• Justify: by Alanna Skaikh
• Clarify: by Dave Algoso

Rather than write a post of my own reflection (which would be called ‘Electrify‘), I want to open this thread of introspection to you. Why do you work in aid and development? Or, if you are not yet working, why are you studying for your MA in Development Studies or similar? Why are you currently volunteering at [large or small NGO]? To quip, why dev?

We often hear from, and read, the same bloggers. But, rarely do we hear from other voices. From you. Occasionally, you make a comment, post a link on Facebook or hire an airplane to write a message of smoke in the sky.

So, read the above posts. Think about Dave Algoso’s two sub-rules about knowing yourself: 1) Know what you value; 2) Know what you are good at. And, let ourselves and others know why you do what you do. If anything, such introspective writing will help you at your next job interview.

_____________________________________________

I also highly recommend reading:

• What David Foster taught me about development: by Weh Yeoh
  
• Aid worker: first, know thyself: by Jennifer Lentfer

Preface: TADNSW is an Australian charity providing personalised equipment, modified bikes, refurbished computers and advice to children and adults with disabilities and their carers. I am a former employee of TADNSW who now works as a rehabilitation advisor with Handicap International, a Belgian- based international NGO that focuses on supporting people with disabilities who are living in poverty. My views in no way reflect those of my employers, past or present.

I have to admit that when I left TADNSW to work with Handicap International in China, it was with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. Sure, we faced difficulties working in the disabilities sector back home all the time, but here I was going to a country that I had no experience working in, with language skills that I would rate as barely passable, and in a disabilities sector that I was very unfamiliar with.

Apart from studying a Masters in International Development, I worked for 3 years with TADNSW as a physiotherapist alongside the current physio, Brendan Worne. Here in China, my role is similar, but instead of concentrating on the provision of assistive devices to people with disabilities, my input is more on the systems that Handicap International is helping the Chinese government to build and strengthen.

You might think that working in Sydney, Australia, and Guangxi, Southern China, are so far away from each other that it’s almost like being on a different planet. That is true in many (important!) respects. Good coffee in Guangxi is extraordinarily hard to find, and you don’t need to take out a small business loan every time you want to buy a bunch of bananas (they cost about Aussie 60c a kilo here).

But even though I am regularly stared at for my outlandish height (which, at 6 foot, is nothing to write home about by Australian standards), there are many similarities between the disability sectors here and back home. The same underlying problems that we face in Australia are here, often just amplified.

At the base of many of the issues that people with disabilities face in Australia is a lack of dignity. There is no dignity in living a life that doesn’t allow full participation in society, that involves sitting on the sideline and observing play as it carries on. As many people would know, this can involve not having the correct pieces of equipment to enable the people with disabilities to participate. Often the gap between what is needed and what is available in the market place is huge, which is a good justification for TADNSW’s existence.

TADNSW - helping through innovation.

Assistive devices is a big buzz phrase here in Guangxi as well, although the rationale and logic is a little different. While we spent much time trying to keep the cost of equipment down in Australia, to make it affordable for everyone, equipment that is provided here is very much given value according to the price tag. In other words, low cost assistive devices are always going to run second rate to expensive, complex and often unsuitable devices. As such, the common practice is to ignore low cost assistive devices that would provide the children with much benefit, in favour of stuff that is factory made and expensive.

Financial support is another area that is highly topical in the disability world, with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) hopefully being a step forward in the right direction. Just as you see very few rich families with children with disabilities in NSW, poverty only amplifies the problems associated with disability in China. In my first week here, a visiting professor from Beijing said something that really struck a chord with me. He worked in the agriculture sector and had visited Australia before. He said that in Australia, the cities are less developed than those in China, with less infrastructure. Those who regularly complain about Sydney’s public transport would be interested to know that using Beijing’s subway is a dream by comparison, and riding bicycles in most Chinese cities is almost always a safer, and more enjoyable experience. Yet, in the countryside, the gap between Australian and China is enormous. As tough as farmers are doing it in Australia, they face nowhere near the amount of poverty that rural China faces.

As a result, children with disabilities do not often have access to education in rural areas. The closest school that is able to take them may be too far away, and their parents do not have the ability, time or money to get the children out there. Compounding this is often a lack of funding for equipment and rehabilitation that will assist the child to maximise his or her potential, so that being able to get into the classroom and participate is just a distant dream.

Without access to education and participation, the cycle of poverty continues, with the barriers that exist to prevent children with disabilities getting involved only exacerbating it.

Handicap International - giving children with disabilities the chance to participate fully.

In Guangxi, China, Handicap International works at various levels to promote the independence and participation of children with disabilities. We work not only to support inclusive education, but to get back to what the true definition of disability is – the barriers that society builds. For example, are there physical barriers in the environment that need to be addressed? Are there attitudinal barriers amongst the child’s peers or teacher? Is the child able to receive rehabilitation to improve his or her abilities, and can assistive devices help to overcome any of these barriers?

At the very heart of all these problems is the level of poverty in rural parts of Southern China. Just as lack of financial support is a huge problem here, the very same problem amplifies disability in Australia. Which makes me often think that the two settings are not as far apart from each other as you would initially guess.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

In order to learn more about who you are and what you’re interested in, a number of bloggers have banded together to create a joint survey of our readers:

Please take the survey here

The survey is a project of the @Smart_Aid initiative. International aid and development blogs have expanded rapidly in the past few years, and our audience has expanded too. We want a better sense of just who is reading these blogs and what they’re interested in. The survey will take just 5 minutes. All responses are anonymous. After you take the survey, we encourage you to tweet it, blog it, and otherwise share it with others who read aid and development blogs.

If you have a blog of your own, please post it! You can contact Dave Algoso at findwhatworks@gmail.com for more information.

“Contestants on the one-off game show from the public broadcaster VPRO, part of an annual week of experimental programmes, comprise five asylum seekers who have exhausted legal avenues to stay in the Netherlands and await imminent deportation to their country of origin.

They compete in a quiz about Dutch culture, history and language, with the winner awarded €4,000 (£3,500) to help cushion them when they are expelled. Consolation prizes include a bulletproof vest”. (Peter Walker, Guardian)

To what extent can we use entertainment to exploit communicate messages concerning the humanity of asylum seekers and refugees? It is like playing Russian Roulette, but the empty chambers are actually loaded, and the loaded chamber empty.

There are two premises to this show that are false. First, according to the Guardian article, “the intention is, far from mocking asylum seekers, to instead demonstrate how well integrated many are”. I’m sorry, I am afraid the answer we were looking for is ‘entertainment’. Any pretence that the underlying purpose of this show is to raise awareness of the country’s tightening immigration laws is false. The stakes are too high for those competing. The entertainment value is right where the producers want it to be. This is why we love game shows. We love to see people lose – it’s very satisfying. Besides, to measure the affect of this show, and determine whether it ‘raises awareness’, the network would need to run a randomised controlled trial (RCT), for which a control group watches Keeping Up With the Kardashians.

Second, that the intention of the show is to demonstrate integration. So, how does the game show work? How do the contestants demonstrate how well integrated they are?  Well, like the author of the Guardian article, I Google translated the Weg van Nederland website. Apparently, the host, flanked by two air hostesses,

“bombarded them with quiz questions that they can prove how much they have learned in the Netherlands, including for the Dutch royal family, history, map of the Netherlands, Dutch artists and the Dutch language”.

Photograph: Desmet/Paul Weijenberg / EPA

If people had to prove how well integrated they are by answering questions concerning a nation’s history, culture, language, and politics, I’m afraid many natural-born citizens would lose. Hell, I would probably lose if I was bombarded with questions about Australia. I could competently answer questions about 2nd Century Roman history or about the offensive line of the Minnesota Vikings, but many Australian-related questions would probably elude me:

1) In what year did Federation take place?

2) What are the three levels of government in Australia?

3) What was Don Bradman’s test batting average?

4) How fast could Prime Minister Bob Hawke skoll a yard glass?

5) Which one of these celebrities is NOT Australian? Russell Crowe, Mel Gibson, Nicole Kidman, Skippy the Bush Kangaroo?

6) How many kilos did Warnie lose in order to get hitched with Liz Hurley?

7) What exactly is a ‘flaming galah’?

How many steps between this game show and Big Brother is there? Why not just skip those steps, and install cameras throughout places like Christmas Island, which will broadcast directly into viewers’ homes? Before the Australian Government’s political agreement with Malaysia was scuttled by the High Court, a recording of the swap was to be uploaded onto YouTube. There are other ways to effectively use media as a medium to advocate, educate and raise awareness about issues like immigration.

Depending on the ratings, I’m sure there is already talk of spin-offs. Why not have a children’s version of the show, in which unaccompanied minors compete in the style of game shows such as, ‘Are you smarter than a 5th grader?’ or ‘Amazing‘? We could even skip the need to remake the 1987 classic, The Running Man, and just adapt it to a reality TV format:

“Damon Killian is the host of THE RUNNING MAN, a game show wherein convicted felons asylum seekers are given the chance to run to freedom but have to elude the stalkers; men who hunt them down and kill them in gruesome manners”.

Tony Abbott could be Dynamo, Chris Bowen, Subzero, and Bob Katter, Buzzsaw.

Dynamo

Subzero

Buzzsaw

The only saving grace from this new form of game show is that despite the cruelty demonstrated towards its contestants, it comes no where near that displayed previously on some Japanese game shows. Well, not yet at least.

An interview with Godifri Mutindi. 

Working overseas in development can often create some rather sticky situations. One such situation occurs when there is a considerable gap in pay between foreign NGO staff and local workers. Very little is known about the true effects of this gap, both in terms of relationships between foreign and local staff, and on the effectiveness of programs. This week on whydev.org, we have a special interview with Godifri Mutindi, a development consultant who grew up and studied in Zimbabwe. His opinion on the subject is both raw and insightful.

Godifri, thank you for taking the time to answer a few questions on this topic. What is your professional background and what is your particular interest in aid and development?

I trained as a secondary school teacher and taught for 12 years in Zimbabwe. I am concluding my Masters of Business Administration with a South African university. In Mozambique I worked as a teacher of English Language and then for an international NGO.

I am interested in bringing positive change to developing countries which are victims of several historical injustices – cruel chiefs, mercantile capitalism, slavery, colonialism, destructive and bloody liberation struggles, civil wars (in some countries), dictatorships, coups (in some), corruption and the list is endless. I believe that despite all these challenges, especially Africa has a very promising future. And the countries which bring ‘aid’ and ‘peace’ planted these conflicts in the first place and are coming to do business.

In this post on How Matters, you stated that “ large gaps between the locals and the expatriate conditions of service, even for people with the same qualifications” constitutues a form of corruption. Can you please expand on that point?

When a person’s hiring criterion or their conditions of service do not depend on competence, but on their country of origin, I submit this is corruption. It is the same issue we have in developing countries of leaders employing their party supporters or tribes. And usually, they bring non-Blacks to developing countries (nothing racial here).

Do you think that gaps in conditions, such as salary, between expatriate staff and local staff contribute to creating a divide between these staff members? If so, what is the effect of this divide?

There is obviously frustration from local staff, who may be of equal or higher qualifications or performance. There is also animosity that the development partners appear as seeking to create equality and human rights, but they actually further the difference.

Developed countries have a responsibility to and legal obligation to help the developing countries, for our poverty and problems are directly related to slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism. We are not campaigning for people to sit and relax but it should not be presented as if we are beggars.

On a wider scale, do you think that the gap in conditions can actually lead to less effective delivery of aid? If so, how so?

It can not be exactly like that. The Western people are intelligent and at a higher level that developing countries. They actually budget for these issues, like the USAID’s Buy America, in which they create their home industries through buying a certain percentage of goods from the US. But on performance yes, there is a negative point. These people will be earning big money and other perks and the local people will be sweating. This, unfortunately, is the reality.

And Western countries, as always, continue shifting goal posts. They easily manipulate international law and recuse themselves of the commitments they signed some years ago (Denmark and the Netherlands have pulled out of education despite developing countries being very far from reaching Millennium Development Goals).

Poverty is a multi-million dollar business which they do not want to end.

What practical steps do you suggest that NGOs take to close this gap? For example, do you advocate that they pay expatriate staff less, and local staff more?

This issue needs serious research as there are serious issues and many stakeholders are interested. What is the reason of paying local staff in local currency when the budget is in US$, for example? I have never been to a country where it is illegal to pay people adequately. Development work is short term, by nature, and very risky.

We recently posted an article about the divide between expatriate staff and local staff and how language can help shape that divide. For example, white people who work abroad are only ever known as expats, whereas people going the other way are usually called migrants. What are your thoughts on the matter?

It is part of the same plot.

For many young people in this field, leaving behind their home countries can be a daunting task. Often there is pressure from various sources to earn a decent wage, and costs such as mortgages that have to be taken into account. What advice do you have for people in this situation?

Younger and middle aged people should take the chance and learn out there. There are opportunities which one can get and it is good to get the experience from there, rather than only the text book. Even if they do not physically return, they contribute towards their countries’ development in ideas and resources.

What other advice do you have for young people working in developing countries?

It’s good to invest in one’s country’s human development. It is part of nationalism, Pan-Africanism or solidarity with the former oppressed people all over the world.

So there you have it. A complex issue that needs further research. We’d love to hear what you have to say in the comments. Do you agree with Godifri? Is there a better way forward? Drop us a line. 

Happiness is a bit of a buzz topic at the moment, and it’s no surprise that it has found its way into discussions around development. Over at the Centre for Global Development’s blog, Charles Kenny notes that there is an increasing trend towards using subjective measurements of happiness as indicators of quality of life. Of course, the use of these subjective measures is always going to complex for a number of reasons. For example, Kenny points out that statistics do not demonstrate that having children impacts subjective ratings of happiness. Does this mean that having children does not make us happy? More broadly, if happiness is our goal, does that render having children unimportant? Or, is subjectively rating our happiness an inadequate and insensitive method to measure social progress?

Using happiness as a measure of a country’s development is not a new idea. Since 1972, Bhutan has used the phrase Gross National Happiness (GNH) as an alternative to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to measure quality of life and social progress. The concept of GNH in Bhutan is interesting from a historical point of view, as the country only became a democracy as late as 2008. This means that measures to forward the GNH of the population were solely decided by the King. Seeing as the very definition of happiness and its contributing factors were decided by the monarchy, and not by the people, they were bound to get some strange results. As such, the policies surrounding the pursuit of GNH ranged from the draconian (the banning of the internet and television until 1999) to the extremely progressive (the banning of plastic bags) to the bizarre, but somewhat understandable (the banning of wrestling channels on TV).

More recently, French president Nicolas Sarkozy has followed in Bhutan’s footsteps by proposing that happiness should be the country’s main focus, not GDP. Cynics in France have dismissed this as a convenient method of shifting the spotlight off France’s ailing economy.

Overall, attempts at objectively defining and standardising happiness are littered with problems. Take the World Database of Happiness for one. The graph below shows how happiness in various countries has changed over time (click through for a bigger picture). The creators of the graph have tried to link fluctuations in happiness with events that occurred at a national level at the time, which, needless to say, involves making a huge number of assumptions.

Happiness across different countries over the past 30 years. Image courtesy of good.is.

The problem with world wide measures of happiness is that they ignore individual and cultural definitions of happiness. If you were to ask an individual what their definition of happiness is, they would give wildly different answers to the person standing next to them. Take this outwards to a global level and you’ll see that you’ll get completely different answers from someone in a rice field in China and someone on a street corner in Dubai. So yes, although you can ask individuals for their own subjective measure of happiness at a given time, trying to standardise this across the world ignores cultural and linguistic nuances.

As importantly, this sort of comparison is open to all sorts of abuse. Take this survey for example, which conclusively demonstrated that China is the happiest country in the world. Other notable countries to round out the top 5 include North Korea, Cuba, Iran and Venezuela. Meanwhile, the US faired poorly, down at number 203 as the least happy country on the planet. South Korea was ranked at 152. Starting to see the connection now? The survey may not have had methodological flaws, except for the fact that it was conducted in North Korea. A country whose citizens repeatedly declare: “We are the happiest people in the world. I will trust ‘the General’ and always follow him only.”

Perhaps picking up on the absurdity of countries trying to measure happiness, the Onion wrote a short piece about Britain’s plans to chart happiness late last year. The government planned to rate happiness based upon the following variables:

• Ratio of compliments received per pounds spent on shoes
• How often you check that no one’s looking and say, “Tits”
• How often one sells out the Royal Albert Hall
• Stiffness vs. pliability of upper lip
• Distance in miles from Simon Cowell
• How often one has just the perfect bit of beans on toast
• Number of perfectly good pieces of string salvaged from the rubbish bin on monthly basis
• Number of fake laughs per hour vs. number of sad laughs per hour

A particularly happy Brit

 

Maybe then, a more accurate factor to observe is not so much happiness, but opportunity. This may be something that is easier to measure, at least from an outsider’s point of view. Overall, although I’m sure it has its own problems, trying to measure someone’s ability to grab different options in life is likely to be a better measure. I’d be interested to hear what others have to say in the comments.

This is part one of a series of posts on happiness, with a more in-depth piece including discussion around HDI (Human Development Index), and excluding discussion around man whispering, to follow.

Footnotes: For an excellent illustration of how opportunity varies across countries, have a look at James Collison’s brilliant photographs from various children’s bedrooms across the globe, in his work, Where Children Sleep.

For a more serious and intellectual discussion on happiness as a measure of a country’s progress, have a read of this Economist debate here.

You can follow this author on Twitter here.

By Stuart Thomson

“Building is viewed as process, not only product. The process is a dance of constant negotiations. At the end, the trace of the dance is seen in the building. In this process the architect leads a complex collaboration that folds culture, place and people into a new relationship with each other, effecting transformation.” – Gregory Burgess, Multiplicity of the Whole

Engaging in development work attracts a variety of metaphors. It really depends on who you are and what it is you’re doing. Development workers, together with community and partners, are the architects of community change. We build foundations, frameworks and structures out of our human successes and failures. And as development professionals and institutions we commonly engage through the medium of projects and programs. In other words there’s often a complex dance of joint interventions that aim at both saving lives whilst working to build and strengthen robust systems and structures. As co-contributors or architects for change we must therefore be continually mindful of the role we play in building a collective community future. My role and the role explored in this article is that of a Country Program Coordinator (CPC) for World Vision Australia. More specifically, the article explores the implications for my role of a three-month secondment to World Vision Kenya, as opposed to the regular fleeting monitoring visit normally undertaken by CPCs.

The motivation for engaging in development work and especially in travelling to contexts and countries far from what we are used to raises important issues. Many ask, “what am I running from?” Some may ask, as in Helen Fielding’s satirical novel about aid workers, Cause Celeb, “am I: (a) Missionary? (b) Mercenary? (c) Misfit? (d) Broken heart?” However, I asked a very simple question of myself: “Do I truly believe that this secondment will lead to any real benefit for World Vision Kenya and the communities with which we work?” Careful consideration of this question resulted in the realisation that whilst there was a large potential to do good, there was potential for the opposite. However, just like Gregory Burgess, I believe I should not see the failure in the product of this secondment before it has begun. Rather, I should see it as a constant process that requires great awareness in a time of folding culture, place and people.

As I prepared for my trip the question at the forefront of my mind was: “During my time in Kenya, where will my touch points be”? Or as Burgess would ask: “Who will I be dancing with”? As a CPC for Kenya sitting at my desk in Melbourne, the answer was relatively obvious: I dance with my field office counterpart in Kenya. It is clear; it is defined. During shorter field visits my role is also usually relatively clear. However in contemplating a three-month field trip the lines become somewhat blurred. In Kenya, would I be responsible for the dance with the community and development partners as well?

I found some solace when answering this first question by reflecting on Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, a fundamental concept of quantum physics. It states that it is only possible to understand the position or the motion of an object, not both at the same time. Therefore, I needed to consider a second question relating to process and direction: “When I meet my partner, what kind of dance should we do?” Previous experience shows that some dances are slow and close, some are fast and further apart, some are rhythmic and others are not. To be successful however, as in Burgess’ definition of building, it is essential that both parties understand what dance they’re dancing, and are happy with its undertakings and potential results. The result otherwise may be a lot of bruised toes.

The first step therefore was for World Vision Australia and World Vision Kenya to understand and agree upon what form the extended trip would take. This took some time. During a humanitarian emergency, staff are sent to the field immediately. However for development programming the process isn’t as urgent or as smooth. Discussion papers, business cases and terms of reference were developed and lengthy meetings were held. Finally a decision in principle was reached between the two parties.

The second step was to determine the specific purpose of this trip. Generally, field trips are undertaken for two main reasons. The first is to gain experience of a context and build relationships or knowledge. The second is when a specific task is identified, requiring a specific skill set. As I had worked and lived extensively in East Africa previously, this trip could not be justified as a need to gain experience. The World Vision Kenya leadership team had identified advocacy as a specific capacity gap. This need matched my skill set.

Once these first two questions were resolved, the third and perhaps most important question I posed to myself was: “During this dance, what is the space between myself and my partners to be filled with?” As Burgess may ask, “what is the collaboration of culture, place and people that may affect transformation?” The answer to that question would ultimately result in the successes and failings of my extended trip to Kenya.

Capacity alignment, not building

In addressing capacity issues, prior knowledge of the staff and capacity at World Vision Kenya helped me identify challenges that could be addressed. After working with this field office for three years, I knew the staff had significant expertise in areas such as health, WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) and HIV and AIDS. However, they sometimes faced challenges in strategically aligning this expertise. In development work there is often a false presumption that people need to be “taught things”. The ideologue preaches, the misfit teaches the next big thing. However individuals and communities in the field are often very aware of their situation and equipped with a plethora of tools to address it. What is often needed is an external voice, not to add to the burden of knowledge and tools, leading to even greater complexity, but to help clean up and simplify the complexity that is already there. This fundamental principle underpinned my visit to Kenya.

Transcending power and finding common ground

My position as a CPC and knowledge of the culture provide me with the opportunity and confidence to transcend many levels of power during field visits. At one time I may be talking candidly with a World Vision National Director and the next moment joking with a field worker. I am happy to air my views to both, unlike many of my World Vision Kenya colleagues. In Kenyan culture it is not as easy to voice your views to managers and superiors as it is in Australia, with our largely egalitarian society. And as a CPC, I come to World Vision Kenya with resources and funding; well at least access to potential funding. This opens doors to power at various levels.

CPCs can sometimes overlook the power dynamics at play and this can result in a false sense of importance, which is dangerous. It is dangerous because it is coupled with poor awareness. An example of this may be directing field staff to conduct certain activities that are not culturally appropriate or developmentally sound. This is often seen as the missionary style of development that comes with good intentions but is often misdirected. The opposite may also be true for the CPC in choosing to be culturally relative, never questioning or challenging practices in the field. I have found myself “hopping” between the two, having a lot to say and being direct on one topic and then having nothing to say on another. To find that middle ground when operating as a CPC in the field, in knowing what to say and when to say it, is a challenging and vital step in being an effective development practitioner.

The power that CPCs (indirectly) wield, together with our cultural background and baggage, often make it difficult to find common ground with our field counterparts. Breaking down the walls to find common ground and build trust is an essential component of our work. I have found that the most successful approach is just spending time with field staff to build relationships. Learning the local language, socialising, sharing food and experiences together go a long way in disarming restrictive power dynamics. By seeing the human in each other we may break through to a place where knowledge and ideas are shared openly and honestly. Close relationships, combined with greater awareness and patience, allow the CPC a unique opportunity to affect positive change.

Knowing your space

Often good intentions, combined with field need, lead the CPC to do work during an extended visit that fills a gap in capacity, but that also leaves a gap when he or she is gone. During my three months in Kenya there was pressure to step in to spaces and do work that was the responsibility of permanent field staff. This had the potential to undermine staff confidence and compromise the purposes of the secondment. Being aware of what can be done in a reasonable timeframe and facilitating change during time in the field are important. Otherwise, despite good intentions, doing work for field staff may result in more damage than good once the visit is over.

Being intentional in using the capacity and status that come with the CPC role may result in strategic activities with high potential for sustainable and positive outcomes. For example, I attended meetings with development partners such as AusAID so that they saw the full spectrum of involvement in Kenya. It may also be useful for CPCs to support field staff in reinforcing established messages. However, the CPC should be aware of creating additional expectations amongst communities or making false promises that field staff will need to deal with once the visit ends.

One insight I gained related to the tension between community needs, and organisational agenda and development thinking. The dance between longer term development thinking and the direct needs of community members and households must be clearly articulated and linked to reaching common outcomes.

This tension is exacerbated when the field office does not have a clearly articulated and operationalised strategy. In these cases the pressure placed on the field office by the CPC and donors to start new initiatives may result in a chaotic development process. When sitting in a field office for an extended period, the CPC can be tempted to try reorganising the strategy and the field office can be tempted into seeking the CPC’s assistance to align strategy with program implementation. Therefore, it is not only important for development professionals and field staff to understand their space, it is also vital that fundraising offices and donors understand their space as well.

Timing and perspective

In development it is said that we shouldn’t start where we are at but where the community is at; that we need to meet the community not only on common ground through building relationships but at a time when the community is open and ready for change. It is important for CPCs to recognise engagement opportunities, such as during project assessment, design and evaluation phases, when field staff and the community are ready for new ideas and inputs. This was also true for my time in the World Vision Kenya office. World Vision Kenya had been going through a restructure during 2009 and into 2010 and advocacy was a relatively new area of activity for them. My trip therefore was an opportunity to do two things. First, it allowed me to engage in the structural reform processes that were taking place, and second it provided me with an opportunity to work with the Kenyan staff to integrate advocacy into the organisation’s practices and processes. To do this it was important to provide examples of what such integration might look like for projects and programs. World Vision International’s Child Health Now campaign provided a workable and focused model.

Folding culture, place and people into a new relationship 

As I discovered in Kenya, the process of folding culture, place and people together is deeply rooted in the culture and position that a CPC holds. Disarming the power dynamics that exist in relationships between CPCs and field staff is a step that must be taken whether on a short or long-term assignment. A longer assignment, however, can cloud these relationships because there can be an expectation that the CPC will fill gaps in the field office structure. But this can be avoided by establishing clear terms of reference and agreement on outcomes.  Meeting field staff where they are and offering an external perspective can be immensely powerful and mutually rewarding. However, it is the depth of insights that a longer-term assignment can produce that creates opportunities for the CPC to make a greater contribution to the direction and alignment of office strategies. This is ultimately what we hope will lead to greater transformation for the poor and vulnerable in the communities where we work.

This article originally appeared as: Stuart Thomson, 2011, The Space Between’ in Annual Program Review World Vision Australia 

After growing up in rural Victoria Stuart has travelled and worked for the past 20 years on different corners of the globe. He has worked in the villages of Central America, Africa and more recently the Asia Pacific Region. Holding degrees in Nursing, Environmental Studies and Philosophy and a Masters in Physical Geography he is currently completing postgraduate studies in Community Cultural Development at the Victorian College of the Arts. He is currently employed as a Senior Campaigns Advisor to World
Visions Child Health Now Campaign, a global advocacy campaign aimed at reducing child and maternal deaths. As an avid amateur film maker Stuart is passionate about raising the voices of the most vulnerable to the most powerful decision makers on this planet.He is happily married to his Tanzanian wife Nancy and resides in Melbourne, Australia.

In December 2009, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution that proclaimed the 12^th of August 2010 to 12^th of August 2011 as the ‘International Year of Youth’ (IYY). Themed ‘Dialogue and Mutual Understanding’, it coincided with the 25th anniversary of the first IYY, ‘Participation, Development, and Peace’.

With half the world’s population under the age of 25, governments, Civil Society Organisations, and other development-focused agencies have seized upon adolescents and youth (defined by the UN as those between 15-24) as ‘target groups’. Funders have all emphasised youth programmes and youth empowerment activities, allocating a large amount of their budgets to the same.

It’s interesting then, that 25 years after the first IYY on participation, young people are still struggling to be included at decision-making tables across movements and issues. That youth programmes are more often than not designed and created by someone not-youth with little to no perspective on youth issues, culture and attitudes. It’s interesting that we’re talking about ‘dialogue and mutual understanding’ when a lot of young people are still struggling with the participation part of it all.

Participation.

It’s a word that’s thrown around a lot, with organisations justifying ‘participation’ to funders and themselves as an appropriate number of attendees of X target group. This often ends up tokenising groups and prevents them, and others, from truly participating. The issue here is that youth are primarily viewed as a ‘target group’. Jargon notwithstanding, it relates to them as passive receivers of programmes and projects instead of actively engaging with them. Alternately, youth are approached from a ‘protectionist’ framework, contending that they must be ‘saved’ from harm, rendering them passive but also further disempowered. It prefers to work for youth, unacknowledging of the number of strong, mobilised, self-empowered youth that actively engage in issues that impact them. It, however unconsciously, chooses not to meaningfully work with young people.

So, what does it mean to work meaningfully with youth? For one, it engages youth at every level. From inception to implementation to monitoring and evaluation, along with every other step in between. It means ensuring that their opinions, beliefs, concerns, and issues are at the centre of the programme; not someone’s assumptions of what those are. Young people face many barriers towards accessing resources, exercising their rights, or realising opportunities. This can make them a vulnerable group, with high rates of human rights violations, increased societal pressure and an inability to make decisions in their lives.

Consequently, projects must ensure that they aren’t just meaningfully involving youth but that they are youth-friendly. This means creating safe spaces for young people. I’ve seen programmes that have been executed during school exams or school hours, or have provided services (say, condoms) that required young people to access them very publicly, neither of which take into account the unique challenges of working with young people and their particular realities.

Although I have highlighted how young people have been left out of the decision-making processes, there have been many recent successes for youth engagement and activism. Our television screens and twitter feeds have been ablaze with reports of young, exasperated, disenfranchised people at the forefront of revolutions in Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Greece, Spain… a list of countries that grows longer by the day. While the catalysing reasons, priorities, and outcomes may differ, they all share a distinctive feature – the willingness of young people to mobilise, to act, and determination to exercise their rights.

That these have been ‘young’ revolutions has been commented on countless times, but what that actually means in terms of youth engagement, decision-making, and subsequent leadership is something that remains unclear. With the recent UK riots displaying the shocking lengths a frustrated, angry, and seemingly disenfranchised population can go to, it’s imperative to look at how young people can consistently be engaged in all aspects of governance. There has been a lot of youth-generated activity this year; to learn lessons from, and build on for a more youth-centered approach. Lessons, not just for those in positions of power, but for youth activists, advocates, and leaders themselves.

However, the youth movement must also self-reflect. Now that there is youth representation of sorts, what is being said? Are the people at the tables representative of the issues being tackled? Are they empowered to speak? Are the youth movements running the risk of homogenising the spectrum of youth issues? It’s essential to the validity of the movements to question who is speaking at these tables. Are the youth movements cognisant of the many disparities within their own spaces? And are those voices speaking for themselves, and are they heard? Are the movements looking at setting up sustainable structures?

I think it’s important to pose these questions for social movements, so it guards against internally marginalising, encourages leadership and empowerment within its own movements, ensures sustainability, and meets its objectives. It needs to ask itself these questions so that it remains relevant, continues to push for youth involvement in decisions that directly impact youth, and ensures its own purpose. It’s a similar set of thoughts for creating youth-specific programming and projects or even a consensus-based entity like the currently discussed UN Youth (along the lines of UN Women). These programmes and institutions should both reflect the strong central idea that underscores the youth movement – ‘Nothing about us, without us’. An ‘us’ that is inclusive, empowering, representative, and sustainable.

“Ghana has finally discovered oil. Discuss ways that you will use the oil revenue to develop the country if you were President of Ghana”

CitiFM, a radio station in Ghana, is asking children to address this hypothetical in its annual ‘Write Away’ contest. Extraction of Ghana’s oil reserves, estimated to reach 5 billion barrels in five years, began in December 2010 by Tullow Oil PLC. This company single-handedly propelled Ghana’s Stock Exchange to the 3rd-largest on the continent when it went public on 27th July this year. This is an incredible opportunity for the future of Ghana’s environmental, economic and human development.

Do children hold the key?

There are a number of aspects of this competition that are appealing. The prizes should encourage participation, if nothing else – a one week educational trip to one of three destinations, including South Africa, Namibia or London. It is also a great opportunity to foster children’s creativity, writing and critical thinking skills. Early childhood development is a challenge for many Low- and Middle-Income Countries. A healthy, caring and educative first 6 years are pivotal in shaping a child’s long-term well being. A 2011 World Bank report from China found that:

“Prenatal care and the quality of life experienced in the early years from birth to the first six years affect physical and brain development of children, and lay the foundation for cognitive and socio-emotional development in subsequent stages of their lives. Investing in early childhood development and education yields high economic returns, is the most cost-effective strategy to break the inter-generational transmission of poverty, and improves productivity and social cohesion in the long run”

The findings from China reinforce those found in studies from the U.S, Kenya, Jamaica, India & Peru. There are long-term economic and well being payoffs for children, communities and countries. This competition also highlights another key aspect of current thinking of development: democracy. It fosters a sense of inclusive democracy. Sure, their answers will not affect high-level policy decisions. Some children will let their imaginations run wild (as they should) and probably include a fund for attracting top quality footballers currently playing in Europe. However, getting children to think about their future, and the future of their country, is powerful a starting point for fostering long-term democratic participation, citizenship and critical thinking. Children need to, and can, be challenged with such questions.

And I’m sure their answers will surprise us in their clarity and sensibleness.

Postscript 16th August 2011

Researchers at the Center for Global Development (CGD) argue that the Ugandan government should distribute expected oil revenue to citizens through direct cash transfers and tax the stipend. See the full story here.

And, wouldn’t you know it, Todd Moss and Lauren Young of the CGD have also argued for direct cash distribution of oil revenue in Ghana. See the report here.

I wanted to share an incredible article I recently ran across, by Rosalind Eyben on Contestations: Dialogues on Women’s Empowerment:

“Recent years have seen a marked shift in official development discourse, with less emphasis on a rights-based approach and more on an efficiency approach to gender equality, a tone set by the World Bank’s 2006 action plan – ‘Gender equality is smart economics’ which a number of official development agencies committed funds to resourcing.  Other equally disturbing trends are emerging, such as DFID’s adoption of the Nike Foundation’s ‘Girl Effect’ theme of ‘stopping poverty before it starts’ by ‘investing in girls’ – an approach that entirely ignores the historically derived structural inequities that are keeping many millions of girls [and boys!] in conditions of poverty.

Nike’s message is a simple one. It is communicated in a slick two-minute animation, on YouTube and at www.girleffect.org. Take a look.  It paints a picture of ‘the other’, living in a situation of dirt, disease and despair. A girl surrounded by flies, taken out of the context of her family, community and country, objectified as the solution to the world being ‘in a mess’. It paints a totally unreal picture of linear cause-effect change. Based on the mantra ‘invest in a girl’ it tells us there is a single, simple solution and we can stop worrying about the historically derived patterns of injustice and inequity in the world. Nor do ‘we’ have to either bother with finding out more about what is happening in the lives of people in poorer parts of the world nor how they perceive their own lives and how they want to make their own futures.

It is a message that is profoundly anti-rights. And it is one that says nothing about where boys – and men – might come into the picture. It ignores notions of justice and equity in relations between people and countries that underpin a rights based approach.  The seeming triumph of the 1990s had been that social justice was seen as a sufficient reason for efforts to be made to secure gender equality. Women’s and girls’ well-being was an end in itself. Today, it is all about calculating the rates of return from investing in a person as if she were a piece of machinery.

Removing the realisation of rights, including women’s rights, from the donor agenda is part of a wider tendency to define development in terms of instruments – immunisations, bednets, numbers of children going to school, quotas for women in parliament – rather than xxx [you choose a good word, I was going to put “the social changes needed to make a fairer world”]. So we see investment in immunisations and bed nets rather than in x and y. This reflects the growing influence of large corporate sector philanthropic organisations and of the big accountancy companies. Technical solutions are sought for what are perceived to be technical problems…”

This is a very important message and distinction, one that is being lost in the midst of ‘randomised trials’ and monitoring and evaluation to ensure that X girls obtain education or healthcare. Yes, tangible results are important, but are we forgetting the rights-based approach, that tries to address the underlying problems of structural inequalities?

The Girl Effect: Well meaning but is it addressing underlying structural problems?

This doesn’t just apply to women’s rights, but in non-profit efforts as a whole. An efficiency approach is more about quantity than quality. It’s about getting more bang for our buck. It’s about saying – “we helped 1000 women obtain health care/education!” Large numbers of beneficiaries sounds good to donors, but what about the quality of the services provided? And the quality of life as a whole for each woman, man, or child we have helped? The long-term impact?

Isn’t it better to invest deeply in one community and ensure they are truly empowered, lifted up, and have an improved quality of life as a whole, rather than to provide piecemeal services, without addressing any systemic challenges? The approach that donors like is more about scaling up, than depth of impact within one community.

Ultimately, devising programs on the basis of being more economically efficient is not a rights-based approach. Think about the death penalty: arguments that putting someone to death is far more expensive than imprisoning them for life do make sense, but what about the deeper moral argument? Saying that reducing prison sentences makes economic sense because prisons are expensive is one thing, but arguing for an improved criminal justice system and abolition of the death penalty on moral grounds is another thing altogether. The moral and rights-based argument, in my opinion, gets down to what makes us human — and is thus far more powerful. It hits at the core of human rights. It’s a rights-based approach.

Is our obsession with indicators, numbers and monitoring ignoring the rights based approach?

Indicators and numbers and monitoring are important, but so is asking people what they really need, and allowing them to have a hand in devising and running projects for their own communities. It’s important not to just focus on the numbers that sound most impressive, but also what is really demanded and needed. What upholds the human rights that each beneficiary has. Even if it costs more, or is less economically efficient, or doesn’t look as sexy to donors.

And so, I agree with Rosalind when she concludes:

“…today, many donors only want to fund projects for which the exact outcome of their support can be attributed to the donor and determined in advance. This ties the hands of aid recipient organisations. It takes away their ability to consult with their members in response to a local context always in flux.  It stops that process of empowerment that happens when individuals and organised groups are able to imagine their world differently and to realise that vision by tackling the injustices in their society”.

“The Immigration Department will film the first group of asylum seekers processed under the new refugee swap deal with Malaysia and post the video on YouTube” (ABC News).

“This is the true story… of eight strangers… picked to live in a house…work together and have their lives taped… to find out what happens… when people stop being polite… and start getting real…The Real World”. It is not far-fetched. A reality television show based on Christmas Island, a gross hybrid of The Real World and Border Security. I read the above tagline with a deepening feeling of trepidation, a feeling that I am becoming well acquainted with every time there is a new policy announcement or decision on asylum seekers and refugees. What’s next?

This decision by the Australian Federal Government to “influence people not to get on a rickety, dangerous boat, not to take that very risky voyage across the northern waters to Australia, and not to engage with people smugglers” through new media is a misguided, naive Gen Y approach by Baby Boomers. Does the Australian Federal Government truly believe that this will support their efforts to deter people smugglers and asylum seekers? What do they hope to capture in their filming? Are they hoping the video will go viral? Julia Gillard stated that the authorities on Christmas Island are authorised to use force and that it is not a question of volunteering, as if the question of whether or not they decided to seek asylum was one of volunteering. The use, or fear, of force against them was probably one of the reasons why they sought asylum in the first place.

It is a disturbing use of social media to communicate government policy to foreign actors. It strips these people, both government and asylum seekers, of their dignity. At the very least, asylum seekers and refugees should be treated with dignity. The currency of human rights also carries the values of dignity and respect. I don’t feel comfortable walking through baggage claim at Sydney’s Kingsford Smith Airport and seeing that obscured sign that informs passagers Border Security is filming. We have to inform Channel 7, in between waiting for our baggage and clearing customs, of whether we give them consent to show our faces. Do asylum seekers have the same option? Does the Australian Government have their consent to show their faces? Revealing their identity, by showing their faces on YouTube, could be putting any number of people at a greater risk of persecution and harm: for both the asylum seekers, particularly if they are repatriated, and for their families in their country of origin.

Not only are their serious ethical implications, but such a move to go viral could put asylum seekers and their families at a greater risk of persecution and harm. At the very least, it does not treat the asylum seekers with the dignity and respect, which all people should be afforded, whether you pass through Australia’s border security by plane or boat.

Update 4th August 2011

Dr. Khalid Koser, a Non-Resident Fellow at the Lowy Institute breaks this decision down from a policy perspective. He argues that it only falls down on 2 of 6 recommendations he and his colleagues made to the UK Home Office in how to disseminate information to potential asylum seekers.

Update 8th August

David Manne (@david_manne) and his team, representing 40 asylum seekers, have gained a temporary injunction against the transfer to Malaysia. The High Court on Sunday granted a temporary reprieve to the first group due to be transferred to Malaysia.

By Weh Yeoh & Brendan Rigby

Well, it seems like we missed our first birthday. The very first article on whydev was published on the 14th of May, 2010, which means that we are over 2 months late to celebrate. It’s been an amazing year, and the list of contributors evident on the side bar of this page just keeps growing and growing. We’d like to take this opportunity to thank each and every contributor to whydev. Almost everybody who contributes is an extremely busy person, with many other things on their plate, which makes contributing to the discussion at whydev all the more special. Now would also be a good opportunity to encourage all those who are considering writing something to pull the finger out and have a go, and join the discussion. If it’s relevant, we’d welcome almost anything (except perhaps limericks).

There have been so many good posts over the past year or so, from so many different voices. Choosing the top four or five was always going to be a struggle, with so much good stuff out there.

However, in picking our favourite posts from the past year, we decided to go for the ones which were the most insightful, where we thought that we had learnt something really valuable, and it was an original idea. Also, because we wanted to compile this list for people who may have missed some of these earlier posts, we may have left out some brilliant, yet topical posts, because they may be of less relevance now.

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So, without further ado, here are Weh’s top 5 picks:

What is development? by Rachel Szeleky

How could you not start here? Rachel explores what development means to her, and in doing so tackles a very difficult topic in a very intelligent way. What is development? Having finished a masters in the topic and now working the field, I don’t know if I’m any closer to answering that question myself.

Career advice from people smarter than me. by Dave Algoso

Easily our most popular post, which makes me think that people in the field of development are really keen to get in, but often don’t know how. Personally, the greatest message I gained from this post was that being passionate about helping people is not enough, you need tangible skills to back it up. Reading Dave’s links and concise summaries helped me to land the job that I currently have. Not bad for 20-30 minutes of light reading!

Are you a Greek or a Barbarian? by Brendan Rigby

Apart from some superb shots of Conan the Barbarian and hipsters, this was the last in a series of posts written by Brendan which really got me thinking about language, power and privilege. Ultimately, it bound up the idea that being most effective in development is often about closing the gap between “aid workers” and “beneficiaries”. It was controversial, but the best posts often are.

A business model of care. by Janet Newbury

I admire Janet’s ability to cut through the bullshit and get straight to the point, and this piece highlights that perfectly for me. Another piece that examines language that we use and the creeping power of business to sway our society in the direction that it wants. Overt skepticism towards corporations…what’s not to like?

What happened to advancing Australia fair? by Laura O’Neill

A great, free, sprawling mess of thoughts from Laura where she laments the state of our country’s politics, particularly in relation to refugee issues. Enjoyable to read, and thoroughly depressing.

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And, Brendan’s Top 4 picks:

Investment bankers and human beings: can you spot the difference? by Mario Hasanakos

Although not many of us have a soft spot for investment bankers, this post from Mario will leave you rethinking previously held conceptions. You may even rethink your career. It left me asking a number of questions, ‘What is the most effective way for me to have an impact on issues of equity and justice? Is it through development work? Or are there other pathways?’ It also left me with a greater appreciation of others’ choices and professions, and that development work is not necessarily a higher road.

Foreign aid with Chinese characteristics: China releases first White Paper on aid by Philippa Brant

China is already playing a very pivotal role in international development, albeit, one many of us are perhaps unaware of. As China continues to expand its influence and presence across the globe, it is vital that we try to understand the why, how and what of China’s presence in the development space. Philippa gives us a very insightful and critical glimpse into Chinese aid architecture. A must read for students and professionals of international aid.

Warning! Take with a grain of realistic salt: working in development by Alex Jameson

Alex does not hold back on the bluntness or realism in this forward looking post. Once you have a job in development, what can you expect? What should you expect? Alex breaks it down for you in this post, but reminds you to take it all with a grain of realistic salt.

What David Foster Wallace taught me about development by Weh Yeoh

I really encourage you to read any one of Weh’s posts (well most of them), and not just because I agree often with his world views. In this particular post, he really gets to the heart of  personal motivation and challenges you to look at your own reasons for wanting to work in development.

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Well, that rounds out our pick of the best whydev posts that we’ve had in the past year or so. We wholeheartedly encourage you to go back and read them if you haven’t. And even if you have, maybe you can pick up something new that you hadn’t noticed before.

Do you think there’s an outstanding post that you remember, that we have missed? If so, do let us know in the comments.

Our favourite links of the past few weeks:

If you are thinking of doing a PhD in development, the guys at Aid Thoughts offer some thoughts about field work and time in the field; while David Jones discusses the reduction of freedom in academia and why he got the hell out of there.

Duncan Green, of Oxfam, questions whether a recent UNICEF working paper gets it wrong on gender inequality; followed by a lively discussion in the comments.

The Women’s World Cup Final, between first-timers Japan & USA, set a new tweets per record during the match. This record out-paced both the Men’s WC Final in 2010 and the Superbowl early this year.

A new World Bank report for M&E junkies (204 page PDF doc.) entitled - Challenges in Monitoring & Evaluation: An Opportunity to Institutionalize M&E Systems.

Linda Raftree, for the Christian Science Monitor, concisely summarises the recent African Gathering London event on how social media is revolutionizing Africa.

Clive Crook at The Atlantic grapples with how you measure and advance happiness and why more Americans are not moving to Mexico (or Australians to Tasmania).

Owen Barder offers 10 far-too-sensible suggestions for making aid work better, which was also submitted to the Economic Affairs Select Committee of the British House of Lords.

For a longer read, this review essay by Yale’s Mike McGovern offers an anthropologist’s view of popular development economics and economists. Spoiler: economists may actually be anthropologists.

“Those with the biggest ideas can be shot down by those with the smallest minds. Think big anyway”. (Dr. Kent M. Keith)

Global Citizens

In times of unprecedented globalisation and immediate access to international news, events around the globe have become a significant aspect of daily reality for most of us. We often find the destructive acts of nature, economic recessions, and ongoing conflicts that we witness making their way into dinnertime conversation, but little else. However, for some (citizens, institutions, and governments), these events fuel efforts towards poverty alleviation.

In Canada, we have CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency, to support those who struggle elsewhere, and our Australian and American counterparts have AusAID and USAID, respectively.  The mission of CIDA is to” lead Canada’s international effort to help people living in poverty”, and according to its website, CIDA does this through its aid effectiveness agenda which focuses efforts along three theme priorities, namely: “increasing food security, securing the future of children and youth, and stimulating sustainable economic growth.”  Likewise, AusAID and USAID also prioritise poverty alleviation, and economic growth is also among the primary commitments of these organisations.

Poverty Close to Home

Of course there is poverty within Canada as well; in fact according to a recent book called Child Poverty in Canada by Patrizia Albanese, we remain “among the least successful at addressing child poverty among modern, industrialized nations” (p. xiv).  Even though we committed in 1989 to eliminate child poverty nationally, rates actually increased in the ensuing decade, and it wasn’t until 2007 that they finally dropped to the 12% they had been in 1989.  While we celebrated this ‘success’ in 2007, Albanese reminds us that 18 years prior it had been “cause for alarm and shame” (p. 107).

Perhaps taking a look at how we address poverty at home can shed some light on our international initiatives, and their prospects.  If we can learn what took place during those years in which child poverty increased in Canada – the same years during which economic growth also increased – we may rethink our approach to international aid in relation to poverty alleviation.

Beyond Causal Explanations of Poverty

Albanese is careful not to simplify such a complex social issue as poverty.  She dedicates a great deal of time and attention to family, neighbourhood, and community factors, and attends to matters of gender inequity, racism, disability, age, and geographic and language barriers (which are all indeed significant in complex ways).  However, she reminds us that focusing our attention in these areas can lead us to “forget the wider social, political (public policy), and economic factors that help to create and maintain the low-income status quo” (p. 56).

It is to these factors that I will turn for the remainder of this discussion.  My reason for focusing on these economic and political factors is not because they are more important.  I am focusing here because I think we will find that in light of Albanese’s research, ‘economic growth’ as a ‘priority theme’ for international aid will cease to make sense.  Fortunately, Albanese does not leave us without alternatives.  Drawing from an array of international examples and from Quebec’s precedent-setting child-care initiatives, she demonstrates that there are much more hopeful, sustainable, and pragmatic possibilities already in play, thus demonstrating the potential of more egalitarian policies.

But first, a brief note: Why refer to child poverty, and not family poverty or poverty in general?  It is clear that children are not impoverished in isolation; their poverty is connected to the poverty of those who care for them.  On the one hand, this shift has been a strategic and successful move on the part of anti-poverty advocates; centering child poverty has helped to keep poverty on the agenda in a political climate that is more likely to blame individual adults for their own hardships.

At the same time, state policy discourses have drastically shifted from referencing family poverty to child poverty.  Perhaps not surprisingly, “the shift in discourse has de-gendering and individualising effects on family poverty” (p. 3), contributing to the view of poverty as a matter of ‘charity’ rather than a social justice issue.  This move towards charity is outlined in great detail by Shereen Ismael in her book Child poverty and the Canadian Welfare State: From Entitlement to Charity.  But I digress …

Poverty in Political Context

Both Albanese and Ismael track the ideological changes in Canadian governance in relation to child poverty rates.  As Ismael describes it, we have transitioned from a welfare state to our current residual state, which explicitly promotes an ethic of liberal individualism.  She links this transition with such developments as: extreme market capitalism, emphasis on child development (which individualises child poverty), and the downgrading from federal to provincial jurisdiction of matters of social policy.  All of these shifts have led to a current situation in which child poverty has been normalised and as a result, is not decreasing despite increasing national and provincial economic prosperity.  She notes that “in the welfare state, increases in federal expenditures precipitated declines in child poverty; under the residual state, increases in federal expenditures accompany increases in child poverty” (p. 59).

Albanese, although using slightly different language, observes similar shifts and notes that both Canada and the US are among the ‘less generous’ of the affluent nations.  Within societies such as ours which have adopted neo-liberal policies, there is an assumption that the state will step in if citizens are in dire need, but will otherwise leave individuals to make social welfare decisions themselves.  She notes that “the mixture of Canadian policies … assume and reflect the perspective that a main cause of poverty is the individual and his or her personal choices and actions” (p. 103).

What Else Can We Do?

It is not necessarily how much money governments spend, but how they spend it, reminds Albanese.  While economic prosperity is comparable between the EU and Canada, for instance, rates of child poverty are much lower in the EU than in Canada.  Furthermore, it has been during the periods of our most accelerated growth that the gap between rich and poor has grown the most in this country (with both the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer). Thus, the argument that we need to grow economically (and help others do the same) in order to bring people out of poverty simply doesn’t follow.

Looking to Western Europe, however, we can see that there are realistic approaches to alleviating poverty, and that doing so means prioritising people, not markets.  According to Albanese, social democratic regimes – such as can be found among the EU – are more likely to

“support programs promoting the material, educational, emotional, and physical well-being of all its citizens – to prevent poverty … This is done through the implementation of generous parental or maternity leaves, paid health and family related leaves, employment supports, accessible child care programs, national housing strategies, etc.” (p. 104-105)

A significant component of social democratic state interventions is that they are more likely to provide universal measures (such as higher minimum wages, and those listed above), rather than targeting poor families.  Universal supports are far more effective in: a) preventing poverty from becoming an issue for families; and b) enabling them to ‘exit’ impoverished situations more readily.  Targeted programs, on the other hand, which focus resources only on those ‘in need’ often serve to trap families in situations of dependency because it is difficult for them to access (and sustain) supports unless they are destitute.

Intentional Engagement

In 2005, Canada, Australia, and the U.S were among the bottom third of 26 developed countries compared in terms of child poverty rates.  Given our dismal domestic track records when it comes to poverty, are we really in positions to provide recommendations and aid on an international level?

It could be argued that given our relative affluence and privilege, it is our responsibility to engage in matters of social justice, whether within our borders or beyond them – and I agree.  But is it ethical to be informing our interventions based on what we are doing domestically (but we know isn’t working)?  In this sense, how we engage with these matters is itself a matter of social justice.

For instance, rather than focusing on ‘economic growth’ in our international initiatives, might we instead consider Albanese’s observation that it is not simply how much is spent, but how governments distribute their resources that contributes to lower rates of child poverty?  The recommendations she makes, several of which are listed above, draw from many successes around the world, as well as recent ones in Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador.  Given that these are not the most affluent provinces in Canada (and that British Columbia, which is growing economically, has the highest rates of child poverty in Canada), perhaps we should take heed: poverty alleviation does not rest on economic growth.

Drawing from the vast body of evidence as to what is and is not effective regarding poverty alleviation, we can see that insisting on prioritising growth in efforts to alleviate poverty (at home or abroad) is not only misleading, it will continue to move us farther from our stated aims.

This article can also be found at postgrowth.org

By Raili Simojoki

Have you used ever the words ‘retarded’, ‘special needs’, ‘special’, or ‘slow learner’ to mean stupid or weird? I have. The words’ wrongness makes them kind of fun to say – you feel ironic and a bit subversive. But you’d be less comfortable using these words in a context where they might be overheard by an intellectually disabled person or one of their family members. Why do you have to come face-to-face with people before you start thinking about their feelings? It wasn’t until I started having gay friends that the fun of using ‘gay’ as a pejorative term wore off. Sad really, that empathy can only travel such short distances, that you need to come face-to-face with people before you start thinking about their feelings.

Debates around ‘disablist’ language erupted recently when writer and satirist Ben Pobjie tweeted during a rugby match, ‘That was one of the weirdest, most learning-disabled tries I’ve ever seen’ (for the sport-challenged, ‘tries’ in this context means rugby moves). This prompted writer and disability advocate Stella Young to write a post on ABC’s Ramp Up criticising his use of the term ‘learning disabled,’ arguing that it hurt just as just as much as the less-PC term ‘retarded.’ Pobjie’s surprisingly vociferous reaction was to damn the piece and its author as ‘a moronic blog post about a tweet that the idiot author didn’t even understand or ask me about.’

A few days later, Geoff Lemon, in an otherwise compelling blog post about the carbon tax and the first world entitlement mentality, compared the carbon tax debate to ‘a dozen retards trying to fuck a doorknob’ (this was changed ‘a dozen drunken idiots trying to root a doorknob’ when republished by ABC’s The Drum). Responding to comments on his blog challenging his use of retard in this context he argued, ‘in my day-to-day understanding of the word, and in my usage of it here, it doesn’t refer to the disabled … while some [readers] have been uncomfortable, the vast majority … have understood my usage. Over 70,000 people have read this now, and about 20 have complained, while at least the same number have singled out that line for particular praise. I’m ok with that split.’

But when you’re talking about the hurtful effect of your words on a disadvantaged minority group, the argument that not many people have complained, and that others have found a line clever, doesn’t really wash. Human rights, including the right not to be discriminated against, are designed to be upheld regardless of majority views. And 20 complaints in this context is rather a lot when you consider that not everyone who’s offended will make a complaint. Further, whether or not the writer intended to refer to the disabled in this context, it’s foreseeable that the term would be interpreted this way amongst some readers, particularly as the imagery seems to refer specifically to persons with intellectual disabilities. A reader who has a child with an intellectual disability, a child who has experienced ongoing discrimination including being labeled as a ‘retard,’ might be able to separate their child’s hurtful experiences from the use of the word in this context, but it’s unlikely.

Even apart from any offence taken by readers due to their personal associations with those with disabilities, I’d argue that using the term retard in this way is harmful in itself. Retard, if taken in its strictest sense, isn’t a bad word– it means slow to learn – and yes, many people with intellectual disabilities do learn slower than other people. But when used as an insult, it reinforces the idea that people with intellectual disabilities are dumb, abnormal, and on the outer. Yes, it is just a word, but language as the basis for our thoughts and attitudes means that it is worth paying attention to. This is why in 2010, the US Senate passed a law called Rosa’s law, which removes terms such as  ‘mental retardation’ and ‘mentally retarded’ from federal education, health, and labor laws.

Of course, many words in our language have a discriminatory origin, and there’s a spectrum of acceptable usage. We still say something’s ‘lame’ and talk about ‘crippling’ anxiety and something being ‘dumb’.  We describe people as ‘crazy’, ‘mad’, even ‘schizo’, a term which has also caused controversy. It’s arguable that the usage of many, but not all, of these words has moved on from its original context. But as demonstrated by campaigns like The R Word, a movement which has focused on campaigning against the use of the word in popular culture and public discourse,  the venom hasn’t leached yet out of terms like ‘retard’ or its equally negative synonyms yet. It was for this reason that the Black Eyed Peas recorded a cleaner version of ‘Let’s Get Retarded’, changing it to ‘Let’s Get it Started’, and columnist Dan Savage renounced use of the term a few years ago.

As a comedian or satirist, someone’s always going to be offended by what you say, and if you’re constantly self-censoring, you’ll lose that vital spark that gives your words colour and life. So attempting avoiding offence to everyone and all groups is clearly nonsensical. But when you risk causing hurt to, or reinforcing prejudice against, a fairly marginalised group who aren’t necessarily able to stand up for themselves, it’s worth considering whether you really need to use these potentially hurtful words. And I just can’t think of an instance where it’s worth it.

This is a cross-post with Raili’s own blog. Raili Simojoki’s articles and reviews appear in The Big Issue, Crikey and The Drum. She is currently working on a writing project with older people through Banyule City Council. Raili has previously worked in state politics, anti-discrimination and tenancy law.

The development of civil society in China is happening largely on internet microblogs. With limited civil society infrastructure but individual-friendly technology, this is easily understood. China’s public discourse and government accountability can’t progress far without institutions of civil society.

The recent Red Cross Society of China (RCSC ) scandal ablaze on Weibo (Chinese Twitter) is a good example of why. It highlights how quickly internet vigilance slips into internet vigilante action (or, coining an electronic age term, vigilant-e action).

The Red Cross malarkey

A young Chinese woman, Guō Měiměi, posted photos draped over her Maserati on her Sina Weibo microblog while claiming to be General Manager of a Red Cross marketing arm, “Red Cross Commerce”. Quickly, Chinese netizens did some hacking and found the stench of nepotism and the corrupt siphoning of charity funds, because Miss Guō  is from a down-at-heel family herself yet owns multiple luxury cars and packs a whole lot of glam. They allege she is the daughter or the mistress of RCSC vice-president Guō Changjiang, or his son’s girlfriend, or the step-daughter of the chair of the Tian Lue Group, a corporation associated with RCSC, or that guy’s mistress…

RCSC claims there is no Red Cross Commerce, and that a ‘Red Cross Chamber of Commerce’ exists but doesn’t control any of the charitable funds which RCSC receives. (RCSC’s official statement also notes Red Cross Commerce’s operations are now suspended and that RCSC has invited in investigators.) Miss Guō retracted her job description and defended it as a joke. But private and media microblogs continue to allege embezzlement in dealings between RCSC and some affiliated corporations. There’s more detail on the close dealings here and here.  The story has just hit international news, with the BBC reporting Ms Guō’s boyfriend has resigned from another Chinese Red Cross commercial enterprise, after coming under fire from management for giving Ms Guō her many luxurious possessions.

Australian alternative news medium Crikey notes “It hasn’t helped RCSC’s cause that it was just recovering from the internet posting in April of what was claimed to be an invoice showing the society’s Luwan branch in Shanghai had spent 9859rmb ($1524) on a meal, or 500rmb a head”. I’ll come back to this, because it showcases the spectrum of utility of internet postings. This article doesn’t dispute that there are issues RCSC must face up to.

As more and more netizens joined the online hunt for Miss Guō and her credibility, they also joined to physically descend on Beijing airport when Miss Guō was to fly overseas. It’s unclear whether this was simply a show of vehement disapproval, or an attempt to stop her freedom of movement.

The Vigilant-e and Development

Vigilantes are, by definition, undesirable. The difference between vigilance and vigilante-ism is this: vigilance is keen scrutiny by citizens of power and those who use it, in China’s context particularly to keep government corruption in check. In other countries, where the phase ‘the price of freedom is eternal vigilance’ hails from, the scrutineers were less concerned with corruption and more concerned by enemy incursions (historically) and by abuse of State power for oppression (nowadays). Anyhoo. Vigilantes differ in that they take the law into their own hands, and the label ‘vigilante’ generally connotes a querulous, rebellious rabble. Vigilante-ism is not the kind of action that reflects, or engages in, or nourishes, informed public debate. But that kind of public debate is exactly what civil society needs to progress.

So this vigilant-e action creates two harms (at least). One, it distracts and distorts public discussion, like a royal wedding in a republic debate. Two, it encourages people to unite outside of the law rather than encouraging people to unite inside law and in support of the regulation of power in society by law (otherwise known as The Rule of Law). In the bigger trajectory of development, the establishment of a Rule of Law is important. But it is also essential that it be organic: the people have to mold the content of their laws and adopt a mindset of following them. Vigilant-e conduct, while exciting (maybe because it’s exciting) only forms habits of casting the law aside.

Information and Clamour

Uninformed debate is not that useful. A fair bit of online ‘vigilance’ is chains of aggressive chat, waxing speculation and assertion of voice for its own sake.

In countries where there are few institutionalized outlets to participate in public discourse, and recriminations for many discussants, it’s no wonder people feel their voice is stifled. But this also causes something of a fermenting-exploding phenomenon, whereby angry people get really heated up online and stray into pretty extreme territory on less-than-extreme topics. You know it, you’ve all closed a window of screeching comments after a news article at some point.

The online watchmen are at least partly a self-selecting bunch, not necessarily representative of the masses despite the appeal of conflating the netizenry and citizenry.  I’m certainly not saying plural opinions are bad, but just because an opinion is expressed online doesn’t mean it is a considered opinion, or that it is expressed for appropriate reasons. Some people fixed on an issue will perform their perceived role with knee-jerk alacrity. As one microblogger says of Miss Guō’s case, “China itself is now a society with hatred of the rich. Once cyber manhunt launches, it becomes even more rampant.” Morally, it’s not fine to hate the rich just because they’re rich, but more crucially to the development of civil society, that energy needs to be directed away from manhunts scape-goating shiny individuals and directed to the system in order to to change how money and power are distributed. At a stretch, you could say this RCSC frenzy has galvanized people against corruption, but really, who wasn’t against corruption already?

In terms of any particular public debate and the overarching, general credibility of public debate, polemics based on misinformation and gossip are dangerous substitutes for informed points of view.

And if informed points of view are hard to come by?

What would be much more useful are institutions that allow greater accountability to the public and better public discussion. For example, freedom of information laws so that civil society can deal with the substance of key social issues rather than getting worked up over the shadows and the hype. Freedom of information laws are institutionalized, so they inject some rigour into the process of keeping a government accountable. Remember, the RCSC is a quasi-government organisation, so government accountability measures could have been a much bigger part of this online debate that which flight Ms Guō might be taking. Active anti-corruption agencies are another institution, or rules and methods for independent auditing of charitable institutions.

And, critically here, institutions of free media, rather than a microbloging diaspora. Media institutions can develop the information-gathering resources, skills and clout that microbloggers cannot. They are crucial for progress in civil society. It is a couple of larger newspapers whose investigations have brought detailed financial information caused real strain for Red Cross Commerce and related corporations. While these papers’ investigation germinated in microblogs, this is a good illustration of how institutions of civil society (here, media) are essential and much more powerful than many microbloggers.

Some of these are clearly a little pie in the sky for China right now, but internet vigilant-es are not a long term substitute, and, in fact, can inhibit the development of such civil society institutions because they don’t use the power of combined voice to push for structural changes, including institution-building, but they do obscure the need for such changes.

As mentioned near the top, the RCSC got online attention earlier this year because of an online posting of an extravagant bill for a lunch it hosted. This consequential discussion did bring to light the lack of independent auditing and confidential accounting at RCSC. This could have been a lightning rod for public momentum demanding change to institutions to create independent auditors and impose accountability rules across a number of large charitable and semi-government organisations. But it wasn’t. And pressure for practical changes like independent auditing is absent from the posts about RCSC’s recent scandal. Debate is evanescent in the microblog world.

Loony Eclipse

Tide of public opinion is pulled by the loonies. Scandal and celebrity are the engines of online opinion and discussion. Miss Guō’s microblog following is topping 108,000 people now, after being a few hundred till scandal broke. We cannot rely on microblogging to identify the best issues for public debate and must be wary that it has no head, or centre, to make strategic decisions about which civil society action will have the greatest long-term impact.

'Baby' Guō Měiměi microblog

Microblogging has evolved from the entertainment and communications industries (now so entwined), not from investigative journalism or check-and-balance institutions. That doesn’t mean microbloggers have no role to play now that they find themselves functioning as an accountability mechanism, but they remain highly vulnerable to hijacking by powerful interests and to being victims of misinformation. Some say this was a stunt by Miss Guō. We hit the age-old problem of the watchdog:  who watches the watch dog (for Latin-loving canes: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes)? This concern is particularly relevant when the watchdogs are disparate, often anonymous, unregulated.

Harm v Harm

Finally, the Red Cross, too, is a civil society player. By slaying it on the altar of vigilant-e action, does China end up with any progress in public debate or accountability? The answer is, ‘online: not really’, as the hackers and bloggers aren’t asking for any systematic anti-corruption measures to be implemented, and ‘offline: certainly not’ given the harm done to Red Cross and its ilk. This beguiling, blogging force tars with the same brush those institutions who have managed to establish roles for themselves as non-government actors, particularly in the development and charitable works sectors.  Blogs are reporting that many would-be-donators have decided to boycott RCSC (e.g. China Red Cross clusterf*cked by 20-year-old brat); though RCSC may deserve the suspicion, the distrust isn’t limited to RCSC. If there are broader flaws with the organisations participating in civil society in China, then institutional changes are needed. But when it comes to fixing the broader problems, or adding really useful contributions to public debate itself, microblogging has a way to go.

By Greg Jericho

So word leaked out this morning that the Carbon Price was going to not wreak the  expected havoc on the price of consumer goods. It was reported that the price of Tim Tams would increase by $0.012. This I guess means my masterful plan to stock up on chocolate biscuits and reap the windfall gains once the world comes to an end with the institution of a carbon price was rather misplaced.

Oh well, no less stupid than suggesting the mining industry is fighting for its survival, I guess. But let us not be side-tracked, when Julia Gillard came out at noon and announced the carbon price, it was a significant moment.

One of the criticisms of the Rudd Government was that is didn’t make the tough decisions; didn’t do anything unpopular. Putting a price on carbon is definitely in the tough decision pile, and quite snuggly fits in the “unpopular” drawer as well. Deciding something which heretofore had been free will now have a price is not something that happens everyday.

The whole policy can be read here (56 pages – have fun). The Treasury modelling is here (even more fun).

To say that it is pretty complex is to take a big drink out of the understatement bottle. So let’s have a quick squiz at a few things:

First the Government has come up with a bit of a video on how the carbon price works. I quite like it:

It’s simple yes, but not demeaning, and not boring like the bloke with the power point trying to explain the Resources Super Profit Tax (RSPT). Do not underestimate how few people understand how a carbon price works. I would bet a majority think it is like a Goods & Services Tax (GST) or is something we need to account for in our incomes tax returns. So explaining how it works is item number one for the Government. Now to the announcement:

The introduction of a broad based carbon price in Australia, commencing from 1 July 2012 with a fixed price period and transitioning to a fully flexible cap-and-trade carbon pricing mechanism on 1 July 2015.

• The fixed price will commence at $23 per tonne of CO2-e;
• Coverage of the scheme will include stationary energy, most business transport emissions, industrial processes, non-legacy waste, and fugitive emissions, with direct liability under the mechanism limited to large emitters;

The price was not a shock – it had been leaked on Thursday. The general reaction seems to be – yeah that’s lower than we’d like, but higher than we’d hate. The Treasury modelling gives a nice graph on where it sits visa vis the European carbon price:

So it’s pretty comparable. What does it mean for prices?

So not a big hit to prices; a lot less than the GST – but remember as well the GST was accompanied with much bigger compensations and tax cuts. But the difference of course is the GST was meant to do that, the carbon price is supposed to be felt – Abbott is exactly right when he says that. When it goes to the flexible ETS in 2015, the rules are thus:

Pollution caps:

• Five years of pollution caps will be announced in advance and extended each year to maintain a minimum five year period of caps at any given time. Price cap: – A price cap will operate in the first three years of the flexible price period. The price cap will be set at $20 above the expected international price in 2015/16 (as set in regulations no later than 13 months before the end of the fixed price period) and will rise by five per cent in real terms each year. – A review of the role of the price cap will occur after the first three years of the flexible price period.

Price floor:

• A price floor of $15, rising by four per cent in real terms each year, will operate for the first three years of the flexible price mechanism.
• A review of the role of the price floor will occur after the first three years of the flexible price period.

So a minimum of $15, and a maximum of $20 above whatever is the international price. What else was there?

• International linking will be allowed in the flexible price scheme;
• Kyoto compliant credits from the Carbon Farming Initiative will be able to be used for compliance.
• The establishment of a new more ambitious 2050 target for emissions reductions which will be set at 80 per cent below 2000 levels.
• The establishment of a new independent Authority – the Climate Change Authority – which will provide advice to the Government on progress towards meeting announced targets;
• make recommendations on pollution caps, voluntary action, trajectories, long term emissions budgets and mechanism design issues;
• conduct regular reviews on the carbon price mechanism, NGER reporting, the Renewable Energy Target and other matters upon request.

The Climate Change Authority (CAA) is interesting – it will be headed by former Reserve Bank head Bernie Fraser, and will advise the Government on the carbon pricing mechanism – including future pollution caps, which will in effect help determine the carbon price under the flexible pricing system – because it will determine how many permits are in the market. The CCA will also work with the Productivity Commission on issues such as assistance to polluters. The Productivity Commission report will be looking at such matters as: “Industry sectors where there is strong evidence of windfall gains as a result of the assistance.” Of which you can bet there will be many, given emissions-intensive trade-exposed are getting free permits covering 94.5 per cent of their activities affected by the carbon price. (This point alone pretty well renders Abbott’s suggestions that the mining industry is fighting for its survival and that Whyalla will be wiped off the map are complete bulldust) But enough of this; let’s get down to a couple things – what will it do to emissions:

As you can see a big swag of the reductions in carbon emission come from overseas. Abbott will be onto this, suggesting it is a waste of tax payers money (and also trying to suggest his own policy would not require such abatement if it was to get to 5 per cent reduction). What it also shows is that in terms of domestic levels only we are not going back to the stone age. Two per cent by 2050 sounds like nothing, but bear in mind the population will grow to an expected 35 million by then, so we’ll have an extra 13 million people generating 2 per cent less emissions. What it also shows is just how damn hard it is to reduce carbon emissions. And given no one – not even those economists who do not like the carbon tax – thinks a direct action policy such as suggested by Tony Abbott will reduce emissions more efficiently, it gives an indicator of the job ahead of Abbott – especially if he wants to tell us it can be done without abatements sourced from overseas. To believe Abbott is right is like suggesting price increases of cigarettes has been less effective at reducing smoking than warnings on packets. Sure warnings and nicotine patches (essentially direct action measures) are great, but if smokes still cost $4 a packet, a hell of a lot more of us would still be smoking. What the ALP will focus on is the reduction compared to what would have happened had there been no carbon price. In her speech announcing the policy, Julia Gillard said:

“By 2020 our carbon price will take 160 million tonnes of pollution out of the atmosphere every year.

That’s the equivalent of taking forty five million cars off the road”.

That’s a good figure to spout. It makes sense to put things in a form people can grasp. 160 tonnes of carbon sounds a lot, but is it – you feel like you need to know a climate scientist to ask to find out? 45 million cars on the other is a lot and you don’t need to be a bloke in a scientific white coat to grasp it (you just need to ignore that the main driver of car use, petrol, is excluded from the carbon price!). But what will it do to the economy – especially electricity generation. This graph is pretty instructive:

Notice the green column next to “brown coal”? Err no? That’s because it ain’t there. By 2050 it is planned that no brown coal fired power stations will be operating. Black coal ones also take a big hit. They are replaced by a huge boost in renewable. This policy is hoping to change the economy. As the Treasury modelling states:

“Over time, the electricity sector will move away from coal-fired generation to renewables, with renewable energy growing from 10 to 40 per cent of the generation mix by 2050, and conventional coal-fired generation falling from 70 to below 10 per cent of the generation mix by 2050″.

The key is that “over time” bit. The statement also contains:

“Once commercially viable, carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology will deliver significant emission reductions, comprising almost 30 per cent of generation by 2050″.

Which is ummm… optimistic. It ends with:

“Of course, the exact mix of generation will depend heavily on a range of uncertain factors, including the cost of new technology and the price of energy commodities like gas”.

In other words, we hope it’ll get there, but geez, we’re talking 2050.

This is a shortened version of an original post at Greg’s ‘Grog’s Gamut’, which includes number crunching on Australia’s tax system and what this will mean in terms of compensation for individuals and families. 

Greg is a guy interested in sport, literature and politics. He is currently working in the Office for the Arts of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. The views expressed are his and his alone and in no way reflect the views of the Government nor any Department, nor do they in anyway reflect the work undertaken by Greg in his capacity as an employee of the Australian Public Service. You can contact him at ggamut[AT]live.com.au 

Development in African countries can be supported through a simple measure, asking Australian mining companies to publish what they pay in tax to foreign governments. Why is this not happening?

AAP Image/Miles Godrey

Austinmer Beach car park was full, and cars had started to park across driveways and on footpaths. A crowd was slowly gathering on the beach, and despite the cold, a warmth exuded as people chatted excitedly in anticipation of the day’s stunt. It was an unusual sight for a winter’s morning, 3000 people with no intention of going for a swim. The community had gathered on Sydney’s south coast to protest the approval of coal seam mining and were pleasantly surprised when an aerial photograph of their human formation made the front page of the Illawarra Mercury the next morning: ‘Stop Coal Seam Mining’.

Looking across the Indian Ocean, communities in Africa are also reacting to the impact of mining. Australian mining companies have already invested more than $20 billion in mining projects across the  African continent. According to Mr Joel Negin, Senior Lecturer at the University of Sydney:

“These are not just countries where Australia has a deep engagement, like South Africa or Kenya, but it is in Guinea, Burkina Faso and Angola. Places where Australia’s aid presence is very small or non existent”.

The Australian government is trying to keep pace. It has increased diplomatic relations to 53 countries from 41 in the year 2000, and its aid budget to the continent has increased from $86 million in 2006, to $275 million in 2011. “Africa could be on the brink of an economic take off,” said Kevin Rudd, in a speech to visiting African dignitaries in Sydney. The Foreign Minister spoke about the mining boom and Australia’s growing aid presence at a forum on the Australia-Africa relationship. The visiting Minister for Mines from Mali, Mr Amadou Cisse, reminded Rudd, who would and would not be benefiting from the boom.

“For a long time we were the milking cow of other countries. Now our eyes are open to it.”

And there is a feeling that this boom is going to be different. African leaders have developed ‘Africa Mining Vision 2050‘ for creating no less than:

“A sustainable and well-governed mining sector that effectively garners and deploys resource rents and that is safe, healthy, gender & ethnically inclusive, environmentally friendly, socially responsible and appreciated by surrounding communities.”

The relationship between mining and development is complex. As the civil society movement on Sydney’s south coast is demonstrating, the revenue mining raises is not always the primary concern for communities. But in the absence of a strong civil society holding government to account, Australians can still rely on a structured bureaucracy, protecting Native Title, the environment and communities from at least some of mining’s negative impacts. African countries might not be so lucky – Mali provides an example.

Six Australian companies are currently operating in the land locked West African country, contributing vital foreign investment to a country with few export industries. The government of Mali reformed its mineral code in 1991 to attract more foreign investment and has since become Africa’s third largest producer of gold. Despite this increase in investment and the resulting exports, after twenty years Mali ranks a dismal 160 of 169 on the Human Development Index.

Image credit: Philippe Rekacewicz at Le Monde Diplomatique

What are Australia’s responsibilities in monitoring the contribution of these six companies to the sustainable development of Mali? Ultimately, it is the responsibility of the Mali government and in his recent visit to Australia, the Minister for Mines recognised their failings and reached out for support for a School for Mining to build capacity in their resource sector.

In the meantime, what role does Australia have? Officially: none. Companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange are required to report on possible impacts on the share price, but anything beyond that is voluntary disclosure. Whilst the industry is working towards creating benchmarks for corporate social responsibility (CSR) guidelines, these guidelines are neither enforceable nor is there evidence that social programmes delivered under CSR are providing long term benefits to communities.

According to Mr Negin, some social programmes as delivered by mining companies “provide nominal benefit to the communities surrounding the mine, and often cause tension with neighbouring regions who have failed to benefit at at all.” Chairman of the Australia African Industry Group Chairman, Rick Yeates agreed that more could be done. “Social programmes are not our core business. We focus on corporate and operations functions, not the social”.

AusAID has stepped into a supporting role, bringing government mining officials to Australian Universities, to attend short courses, aimed at strengthening governance structures and their capacity to manage  resources sustainably and equitably. However, it is not just an issue of government’s capacity. Mr Negin highlights, “If the Australian government struggles to get as significant a portion of the mining revenues that it wants, it is obviously going to be difficult when African governments have less leverage in dealing with the mining companies.”

Presently, Australian companies come to individual agreements with African governments with very little public disclosure. A common practice is for companies to make minor investments in development projects in lieu of fair and equitable tax payments.

Jubilee Australia is an Australian NGO that advocates for economic policies and structures that promote  equitable and sustainable use of resources. National Director Adele Webb believes a crucial leverage point for more responsible investment is transparency of tax payments.

“Community development provided by companies is negligible compared with the massive economic transformation required to kickstart sustainable development in most African countries. If Australian investments in extractive industry projects are to translate into future development for the countries of Africa: transparent and equitable mining tax laws and the re-distribution of this revenue is of paramount importance”.

To promote fair tax, the United States recently passed the Dodd-Frank Act requiring oil, gas and mining companies to publish what they pay in tax to foreign governments. This gives communities the information to combat corruption and to demand government accountability for responsible resource use. Stephen Conroy laid out the Australian Government’s position on the Dodd-Frank Act in Parliament, “we do not consider initiatives such as the Dodd-Frank Act to demonstrably reduce corruption”.

This view is completely unfounded. Ms Webb contests the government’s position.

“There is ample evidence to support the claim that transparency of payments to governments does reduce corruption. There is no demonstrable evidence yet as Dodd-Frank has yet to be implemented”.

The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is one such global movement seeking greater transparency in the industry. 18 African countries comply with the EITI’s principles for the full publication of company payments and government revenues from oil, gas and mining. Despite some suggestions from government that it may be adopted, Australia is yet to become an implementing member. Oxfam’s Mining Ombudsman reports that Australia’s adoption of the standard, as a resource rich country, will assist the principles of transparency and EITI to become a global norm. This is a simple strategy for supporting development in Africa, demand our government become an implementing member of the EITI and review its position on legislation such as the Dodd-Frank Act.

And as the protest on the south coast demonstrates, there is already an appetite for greater transparency in resource management, but it remains to be seen if the government will heed the call.

On Wednesday, 6th July, the independent review of Australia’s aid program was released (you can download the executive summary, goverment’s response and full report here). The review, the first in 15 years, was commissioned after corruption and waste was revealed. AusAID is currently investigating 175 cases of suspected fraud, dating back to 2004, in 26 countries. This is a very timely and critical review, as both major political parties in Australia have agreed to increasing the aid budget to 0.5% of GNI by 2015. In the official response to the release of the aid review, Mr. Kevin Rudd, accepted 38 of the panel’s 39 recommendations.

Here is what you need to know:

• The recommendation Mr. Rudd did not accept: include ‘international development’ in his title, Minister for Foreign Affairs
• Panel states that Australia’s aid program is ‘good – improvable but good’ that is experiencing administrative stress that will increase
• AusAID’s presence in China & India will be phased out over time; not clear what the timeline is or will be. Currently, Australian aid to China accounts for about 0.8% of the 2011-12 budget, or $35 million. Allocation to India is about $25 million.
• AusAID will release a ‘transparency charter’ by the end of 2011, ‘to provide more accessible information on what we fund and the results we achieve’
• Increase in the number of volunteers, particularly through the recently launched and integrated Australian Volunteers for International Development (AVID) program
• In replication of DfiD’s recent aid review, ‘value for money’ is a key term, appearing no less than 57 times as a phrase and adopted as an ‘operational principle’
• Renewed focus on the ‘fragile’ Pacific; in particular, South Pacific micro-states
• modus operandi of AusAID is changing from contracting to partnerships. Only 20% of aid is channeled through contractors; down from 40% in 2005. The number of ‘technical advisors’ will also be reduced by 25% over the next two years. That means more is going through multilateral, NGO and government partners. In particular, the World Bank, ADB, Unicef, Global Fund, GAVI, UNHCR, WFP are identified by the panel as candidates for increased core funding. The Commonwealth Secretariat and ILO are put on notice by the panel.
• Australia should aim, by 2015-6, to shift program towards global programs and humanitarian assistance (see table below)

• Panel highlights ‘gender barriers’ as the most important barriers that need to be broken down
• Encourages Australia to engage with emerging donors in the region (read: China)
• The panel proposes a four-year strategy cycle for the program
• Encourages the government to improve the overall objective of the aid program - ‘to assist developing countries to reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development, in line with Australia’s national interest’ – “by removing ambiguity about the role of the national interest and highlighting people, rather than countries, as the focus of aid”.

“One problem with the objective of the program as it is presently stated is that it is unclear and ambiguous in relation to how the national interest should figure in the program. The Review Panel believes that this issue should be brought out into the open and addressed squarely. Those responsible for managing the transition to the much increased aid program of the future need clarity and guidance” (p.8)

• Country programs: maintain 20 country programs in SE Asia, Pacific and Afghanistan and Pakistan. Panel recommends ‘high’ expansion in Pacific, East & South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa; in particular, Indonesia, ‘other East Asia’ and South Pacific micro-states

"It is notable from this table that it will be in the Asia–Pacific region (which includes East Asia, PNG and the Pacific, but not South Asia) that Australia would be most active in delivering aid through bilateral channels and most prepared to accept a broader spread of activities across sectors" (p.22).

• Renewed and strengthened sectoral focus around four themes: 1) investing in pro–poor, sustainable economic growth and private sector development; 2) promoting opportunities for all; 3) supporting social stability, improving the quality of government and strengthening civil society; 4) and preparing for and responding to crises.

In most corporate boardrooms, if you suggest focusing on human rights as a community investment strategy don’t be surprised if you are met with deathly silence or an uncomfortable shuffling of papers. But, if you push the common path of education, the environment and youth, you will most likely have instant buy-in.

Community investment is the philanthropic arm of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and goes beyond internal CSR strategy and CSR reporting. The aim of community investment is to support and ‘invest’ in the communities that support a business (check out MTV Exit, MTV Asia’s anti human trafficking program in collaboration with USAID). Companies that pursue genuine community investment are doing so because they want to, and because they see benefit in doing so. However there seems to be a limited number of companies that engage in human rights as part of their community investment.

On a personal level, most of us are shocked by human rights abuses of any kind but particularly, for example, the trafficking of children or slave labour. So, why do most companies freeze like a deer in headlights when it comes to including these issues in community investment?

From my perspective the lack of engagement with human rights in community investment has to do with, among others, two things:

• It is more to do with a lack of know-how to navigate the complexity of human rights advocacy than it has to do with lack of empathy.

For example, if a shoe company sourcing from China wanted to focus on slave labour, but has heard reports of local Chinese officials protecting sweatshops, could the company’s business relationship in China be affected? How do you deal with the cultural, political and development nuances that feed into human rights abuses, such as rapid industrialisation, loss of land and poverty? In this instance, companies need to partner with local or regional organisations that deal with slave labour on a daily basis. This way they have access to experts who know the local environment and can work to develop risk averse strategies and campaigns against slave labour in China.

• There is a perspective that governments and international law should protect human rights, not companies and that human rights are bigger than CSR or community investment. I disagree. The same argument could be made for the environment, education or any other development issue but there is a plethora of community investment projects focusing on these issues, and human rights should be included.

There is no denying that human rights are an extremely complex, sensitive and globalised issue and any community investment in the area needs to be approached with diplomacy. But throwing human rights in the ‘too hard basket’ is not very socially responsible.

Here are some suggestions for companies wanting to include human rights in their CSR agenda:

1. Start globally. Openly voicing a company’s concern about human rights abuses sends a strong message and is a step in the right direction.
2. Work locally. Work with trusted partners who specialise in human rights to develop effective risk averse programs that help navigate the local complexities of human rights.
3. Focus on key and specific issues and be clear on how your company can contribute.  No one can solve the myriad of human rights issues, but focused initiatives can make a difference.
4. Be bold and break the silence. Consumers are looking for reasons to be loyal.

Emily is an experienced project manager with practical and research experience in sustainable development and corporate social responsibility. She has worked in Australia, China, Laos, Thailand and Malaysia. Emily currently lives and works in China.

When the idea of SBS’s new series, Go Back To Where You Came From, was first pitched, I have to admit that I expected its impact to be quite low. Like many others, I thought it was going to be another case of preaching to the choir. The program was being aired on SBS, which, not being a commercial station, was more likely to have viewers that are already aware of what refugees face. What was really required was an exposure that was greater than that of SBS’s, to reach people who perhaps knew little about what refugees go through, other than what they occasionally heard in the news. As Sarah Forsterling wrote for whydev, “Let’s just hope that a commercial channel picks it up in the near future so it reaches the minds of the many that need to be educated.”

I don’t disagree with Sarah. Exposure to the mainstream would cause many people who are unsympathetic to asylum seekers to rethink their attitudes and hopefully promote some meaningful social change. Some of the 6 participants themselves were able to alter their attitudes towards refugees over the course of their journey. No doubt, many would also be able to achieve this from their own living rooms.

However, we would be selling GBTWYCF far too short if we thought it would only be beneficial viewing to those who “need to be educated”. Even for those who are well versed in refugee issues, GBTWYCF is highly instructive. It provides a valuable insight into the minds of people who are not sympathetic to refugees, and the reasons why they hold these opinions. At its very simplest, it is a great case study as to how these opinions are formed, and how they hold up when they are challenged.

Perhaps the person with the most extreme views was Raquel, the 21 year old from Western Sydney. Raquel started the series openly stating that she was a “racist” and that she didn’t like Africans. Forcing her to stay with a family of African refugees who had been resettled in Australia was a master (if not slightly obvious) stroke from the producers. As she listened to truly horrible stories of the family’s daughters being raped at the ages of 8 and 12, you could see how, through empathy, she began to see a human side to their plight. By the end of the series, Raquel herself admitted that perhaps she had held some previously uneducated views that, once challenged, forced her to change her mind.

Raquel, 21 from Sydney, finds herself immersed amongst Africans who she proclaims not to like. Image courtesy of SBS.

 

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.

(Atticus Finch from Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird)

A major aim of the series is to encourage people to empathise with the plight of those who have come to Australia via boat, by putting them in the place of the refugees themselves. The question was asked by refugee expert Dr David Corlett several times: “If it was you, would you get on a boat?”

Although this is an extremely effective way to encourage people to show compassion towards asylum seekers, there is something about the question itself that makes me feel somewhat uncomfortable. The fact of the matter is, people are getting on boats.

Once we establish that getting on boats is an extremely risky, even life-threatening action, then I think we no longer need to question their motivation or their logic. Questioning whether or not they have made a correct decision involves making assumptions about people that we have never met. For anyone to say that it is wrong to put yourself and your family at risk by getting on a boat means that I think this person is inherently irresponsible. On what basis would I be able to make this judgement about someone’s personality?

The simple answer to this question would be that I am making a judgement based purely upon prejudice. A prejudice that is fueled by shock jocks and conservative politicians. Surely, in the absence of evidence that suggests otherwise, we should make the assumption that asylum seekers are just as rational as you or I. And while knowing that their boat journey is extremely dangerous, still going ahead with it only shows that their efforts to flee persecution are justified. Knowing that they are getting into this level of danger only indicates how desperate they are to leave the country that they are in.

An Iraqi asylum seeker who is visibly disturbed by the sight of water, after getting on a boat to Australia and being unable to swim. Image courtesy of SBS.

Meeting and living with the refugee families meant that the participants were able easily identify with a group of people who they had previously never met. The theory of the identifiable victim bias tells us exactly this – that putting a face and a name on someone who is suffering is much more likely to make us empathise with them. This occurs even more when we consider the importance of “lived experience”. Seeing the experience up close will always be more impactful than reading it online or in a newspaper.

In the second episode, the participants lived with a group of 40 Chin refugees living in one apartment in Malaysia. They bonded together, prayed together, and even helped them study in a makeshift school. Later on in that same episode, they were able to accompany Malaysian police on a raid of a residence suspected to house illegal immigrants. On the way to the site, Adam, the 26 year old Cronulla lifeguard, said: “If it’s the Chins (who are being raided by the police), I’ll lose my shit”. During the frantic raid itself, that eventually turned out scores of “illegals”, participants gleefully assisted the police to find men and women who were hiding under floorboards or in the trees. Raquel herself proclaimed that she was “happy”, because they had found people who were doing the wrong thing. However, when one of the contestants identified a Chin refugee in the group who were captured, feelings of remorse spread across their faces.

The turnaround from the empathy that the participants had felt for the Chin refugees was astounding. To their defense, the raid itself was a highly charged affair that wouldn’t have provided them much time to reflect on their reactions. It would have been easy to get into the spirit of the “hunt” and forget that the people they were after could easily be refugees like the Chins, except for one major point.

They hadn’t met them, lived with them and bonded with them.

Yet what this turnaround demonstrates is that perhaps putting a human face on one or two groups of refugees is not enough. That perhaps this won’t solve uneducated and prejudiced attitudes towards refugees globally, because there will always be “good” refugees and “bad” refugees (the good ones are the ones we know, the bad ones are the ones we don’t). Rather, a deeper understanding of the origins of refugees and human rights in general may mean that people are better able to get past the tacky demonisation of this group that we often hear in the media. And this is where I hope refugee advocates were paying attention. It becomes clear that empathy alone is not enough, you also need extensive education and understanding.

However, before anyone can invest energy in trying to understand a situation, they first need to have their attention drawn to it, and they first need to start caring. And with record ratings achieved by SBS over the three part series, that is definitely something that Go Back To Where You Came From has achieved.

The 7th Annual Lowy Insitute Poll, surveying the public opinion of Australians on a wide variety of issues, was recently published. New questions this year included those on foreign aid.The Lowy Institute asked Australians to give their ‘hunch about what percentage of the Australian Federal budget you think is actually spent on foreign aid.’

The research reveals that 31% of Australians think the Federal Government spends a whopping 20% of the budget on foreign aid. In fact, it is only 1.3%, representing 0.35% of GNI or $3.30 each week for Australians earning $1,000/week. Australians were also asked ‘what percentage of the Australian Federal budget, if any, do you personally think should be spent on foreign aid?’ On average, Australians suggest that 12% spent on foreign aid, less than the estimate of what is spent but an enormous increase on the actual amount. Only 4% say nothing should be spent and a further 3% that less than 1% should be spent.

Similar surveys overseas have found similar misunderstandings of foreign aid allocation in national budgets. On average, Americans estimate that 27% of the budget was spent on foreign aid, compared with an average of 16% in Australia. In the same survey, conducted by WorldPublicOpinion.org, Americans believed that 12% of the budget should be spent on foreign aid. Another survey (above) by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) at the University of Maryland found that Americans think 25% of the federal budget is spent on foreign aid. When asked how much would be appropriate to spend on foreign aid, the median response was 10%. These perceptions would probably explain why 59% of Americans would favour cuts to the foreign aid budget. I think we would find similar support for cuts to aid in Australia.

There is a high level of consistency across these and other surveys. They raise a number of questions about our understanding of public policy, our shared values and how democratic governments manage their relationship with electorates. In particular, how they communicate nationally shared values and public policy decisions to the electorate. Governments have a responsibility to clearly communicate and educate about public policy. But, do they do it well?

Spencer Henson, at an event co- hosted by the Insitute of Development Studies (IDS) on UK public perceptions of aid, concluded that

“we need more research, to allow us to interpret the data we have and understand causality better. We have problems with communication as we do not understand the people we are trying to communicate with…we would be better off to tackle the issue of failure head on, acknowledging it and explaining it, and contrast to examples of aid working well in other contexts”.

Is it about selling and understanding your audience? Democratic governments often try to understand its audience through polling data. Statistics help mediate the relationship between the elected and elector. However, how we interpret such numbers can be flawed and short-sighted. The West Wing provides a great example of this. Characters Joey Lucas and Josh Lyman are arguing about what the polling numbers on gun control mean for a certain Congressional district. Josh argues that they need to dial the rhetoric down on gun control. Joey counters, arguing

“You say that these numbers mean dial it down. I say they mean dial it up. You haven’t gotten through. There are people you haven’t persuaded yet. These number mean dial it up. Otherwise you’re like the French radical, watching the crowd run by and saying, ‘There go my people. I must find out where they’re going so I can lead them’”.

Advertisers understand their audience, particularly those hired by condom makers.

I am not suggesting that the government should use sex to sell foreign aid, but that it should get serious and creative about communicating the subject. Aid that is, not sex. More money should be allocated in the aid budget to selling and educating the public about Australia’s aid program. There are many objections I am sure to this suggestion. However, there are also benefits, as condom ads so well explain. For Australia’s aid program, this could lead to more public support for the proposed increase of the aid budget to 0.5% of GNI and eventually to the international benchmark of 0.7%. There has been much discussion around Australia’s aid program recently, promopted by the Independent Review of Aid Effectiveness, which has now been submitted to the Federal Government. The debate has been lively, insightful and needed. How widespread,  inclusive and visible  it was is another matter. It is another missed opportunity by the Australian Federal Government to dial it up, as with climate change and the contribution of refugees.

Paul Mylrea, Director of Communications at the Department for International Development (DFID) explained that DFID has attempted to segment its audience.

“…but has done so according to their level of support for development appending, starting with ‘Active Enthusiasts’ and down to ‘Distracted Individuals’. DFID focuses their communication efforts on the first two groups rather than trying to convince sceptics. Mylrea explained that DFID is also actively exploring how these attitudes are formed, and how people might be moved from one group to another. A recent initiative of the department’s is the rebranding of British international aid spending as ‘UKAid’ – something more meaningful to most people than the ‘DFID’ acronym. The idea is to label government activity, and thereby show that the 0.7% of GDP to be spent as aid can make a real difference. The challenge is to remain accountable to the British public at a time when polls suggest a downturn in support and a shift from international to domestic concerns”.

As in some of the condom ads, you do not need to sell sex, sex sells itself. You do not need to sell effective, smart aid. You just need to communicate it well. Aid sells itself.

Update 5th July, 2011

ChildFund Australia just released the results from their survey of 1,000 Australians, which found that 2/3 believe that aid was effective to some degree, but that 1/3 did not believe that aid was effective in reducing child mortality.

ChildFund Australia’s CEO, Nigel Spence, had this to say in the accompanying media release

“It is encouraging to know that most Australians continue to believe aid is effective. But it is also evident that there are many inaccuracies and contradictions in understandings about aid, and there are indications that public support could be declining.

Australian aid agencies have a critical role in engaging the Australian public in global development issues, but must find ways to communicate the complexity, successes and limitations of aid. It is time to deliver a more contemporary, humane and accurate story about aid and global poverty.”

By Sarah Fosterling

Go Back To Where You Came From was fantastic and should be compulsory viewing for all Australians. Superb work by SBS Australia.

The story tracks the journey of 6 ordinary Australians who have differing views on refugees, as they travel backwards to retrace the path that refugees take when arriving in Australia. The first episode, which aired last night, introduced the 6 participants to refugees currently living in Australia. 3 of the participants met and stayed with a family from Burundi living in Albury, New South Wales. One in particular, Raquel, is a self proclaimed “racist”, who openly states that she doesn’t like black people. Watching her discomfort as she ate a traditional African meal with her hands, and then the empathy that she felt when the mother of the family described the atrocities she had suffered made for compelling viewing.

The other 3 participants were sent to the Western suburbs of Sydney, to live with a group of Iraqi refugees, some of who had actually travelled on boats to arrive to Australia. At one stage, the 3 Australians joined them in a swim at the local pool. There was one man who was noticeably uncomfortable around water, and his story of how he travelled across the seas despite being unable to swim was particularly touching. Travelling to Villawood Detention Centre to meet with some refugees clearly upset some of the men, as they were told of how after consecutive rejections, some of the refugees felt that suicide was the only possible option.

The 6 participants were then taken on board a boat which would ordinarily house up 60 or more refugees, to brave the rough waters off the Australian coast. Unsurprisingly, the journey proved to be extremely challenging after only a few hours.

As great as it was to see people having their views challenged, how much impact can the show have without the reach of commercial television? After the three nights of the show are over, will there be an outcry as was seen over live animal exports? Unfortunately, highly unlikely.

Would you send me back?

As mentioned on a blog post published by UNICEF last week – why is it that so much more public outrage occurred in response to the treatment of live cattle being exported to Indonesia, compared to the deporting of people to Malaysia under the Gillard government’s refugee swap scheme?

One of the biggest issues is ignorance.

There is a definite lack of education, which was clearly illustrated last night. How do people know if they don’t see?

Did you know that in 2010, Australia accepted 0.03% of the world’s refugees, asylum seekers and displaced people; of the 43.3 million refugees globally, we took just 13 750?

Go Back to Where you Came From is creating superb uncomfortable viewing that has the ability to humanise asylum seekers. Let’s just hope that a commercial channel picks it up in the near future so it reaches the minds of the many that need to be educated.

Everyone loves a little test.

In the meantime, send some mates who need a little education on the issue this great interactive Asylum Seeker fact tester which lives over on the SBS website. Also if you missed last night, you can watch it here.

Finally, if you had fled war, terror, starvation… would you go back to where you came from? Highly unlikely. And do you think Raquel will survive her experience in Malaysia? Again, highly unlikely. Great viewing tonight indeed.

Sarah is currently the Digital Marketing Specialist for Save the Children Australia and is also studying a Masters in International Development. She loves traveling, bicycles, languages, photography, fresh air, international supermarkets and working for the greater good and not the man. She just launched DonateADesk, an organisation that allows corporations to donate office space to not-for-profits, and currently blogs over on Social4Social.

A shorter version of this piece first appeared on Sarah’s blog, Social4Social, which you can find here.

Our favourite links for the week:

Who is the ‘Development industry’ – Tobias Denskus at Aidnography

Providing a home to the neglected mentally ill – India News: Mental Health

What Do Donors Discriminate On? Evidence From Kiva.org – Preliminary research paper presented at the 2nd European Research Conference on Microfinance, June 16-18 2011.

The Places We Live – Jonas Bendiksen and Magnun Photos

The myth of temporary protection visas – Sue Hoffman, The Drum

Buy a half-gallon of sugar water at KFC, give a dollar to diabetes research – Jess Zimmerman, Grist

Happiness as Development – Charles Kenny, Center for Global Development

“There is nothing compassionate about policies which encourage people to put their lives at risk and that’s the problem,” May 2010.

“There is nothing humane about a voyage across dangerous seas with the ever-present risk of death in leaky boats captained by people-smugglers,” July 2010.

“There’s nothing compassionate about a policy that encourages people to get on boats, especially children,” February 2011.

“There would be nothing humane about an arrangement that encourages children, accompanied or unaccompanied, to get on boats,” June 2011.

These four quotes all tell a similar story – one of a policy that encourages asylum seekers, including children, to hop on boats and risk their lives unnecessarily. I don’t want to spend time trying to debunk this nonsensical argument, and the obvious reasons why Australian politicians tend to focus on pull factors, because considerable time has already been spent doing this in various other pieces on whydev. The point is not so much the content of the message, but the amazing consistency of the message we are being told.

Those who have been anywhere near a TV, newspaper or radio in the last few years will not be surprised by repetitive catchphrases. In between “moving forward” and “stop the boats“, Australians have recently suffered through a whole range of mindless repetitions from both major political parties. Unsurprisingly, both Liberal and Labor party leaders have cottoned on to the well-known fact that repetition works, in that it helps people remember their party’s stance on an issue. However, as consistent as the above message is, it doesn’t represent just one party’s stance, it represents both. In fact, not only does it represent both parties – these quotes have been taken from four separate people.

It probably comes as no surprise that the first quote belongs to Opposition leader Tony Abbott. As for the remaining, the second belongs to Julia Gillard, the third to the Opposition Spokesman for Immigration, Scott Morrison, and the final quote to Chris Bowen, the current Minister for Immigration and Citizenship.

Tony Abbott, Julia Gillard, Scott Morrisson and Chris Bowen all share the same view that a humane approach to asylum seekers involves discouraging them from seeking asylum.

Keeping in mind that there are four separate authors, have a read of them again. What we are seeing is a truly astounding consistency between the two major political parties on this issue, so much so that the lines are being blurred as to whom is whom. As someone who has come from a family of people who until recently supported Labor, I often find it difficult to distinguish between Labor and Liberal. It’s no surprise then, that for many young people like me, we are seeing an unprecedented shift of support away from Labor, towards the Greens. In fact, amongst young people, there is now an almost even one third split between Labor, Liberal and the Greens. Since 2002, the Greens have seen an increase in support from this demographic from 8% to 27%.

All in all, the shift from Labor to imitate the hard stance of the Liberal Party on this issue is puzzling. As Joe Hildebrand quite rightly points out on The Punch, they will never be able to win more votes by taking this stance. Anyone who wants a tough approach on asylum seekers will always preferentially vote for Liberal, who will always be tougher. In fact, all that this shift is likely to encourage is a further alienation of its core base towards the Greens, as evident from the drift illustrated above.

The Labor party’s adoption of hardline policies typically associated with more right-wing parties is part of a world wide trend of parties drifting to the right. In fact, by analysing both the economic and social policies of Labor, and then plotting them on a graph, the position that the Labor Party currently holds is further to the right than the Liberal Party was in 1980. It’s also clear that that the only party that can truly call itself “left” is the Greens party, and that the Labor and Liberal parties both occupy spaces on the right. The following graphs have been plotted based upon policies during the 2007 and 2010 election runs, and show that even in a short space of time, both parties have drifted further right.

Australia's parties during 2007 election

Australia's parties during 2010 election. Images courtesy of politicalcompass.org.

It is therefore clear that not only do we get mass repetition from one party individually, but we also get mass repetition from two parties with some very similarly aligned values, particularly when it comes to refugees.

It is worth paying attention to the effect of this repetition on convincing the public of a certain policy’s merit. Research has shown that when people are paying little attention, simple repetition is effective in persuading people of an argument’s validity, regardless of its merit. However, when people start to pay attention, and the argument is weak, this effect disappears. For the general public, who do not have much interaction with refugees, it is likely that they will pay scant attention to the actual logic behind the argument that Abbott and others espouse. The more likely scenario is that they will hear it across various media, and may not actually question the underlying facts behind such a policy. This means that, as far as psychology is concerned, simply hearing the argument repeated several times may lead to being convinced that this policy makes sense.

As an interesting side note, the most effective number of repetitions for a statement to be believed is likely to be somewhere between 3 and 5. Coincidentally, I started off this piece with the same argument 4 times, and therefore, as the reader, you’re probably all agreeing that the humane option is to scare unaccompanied children away from fleeing persecution!

If we perceive that simple repetition leads to at least some retention of an argument, and that this argument seeps into our subconscious without us knowing it, then I often wonder if we are also seeing a lower threshold for accepting hardline policies for asylum seekers. I wonder if, through the process of repetition and desensitisation, we are more likely to accept “tough” policies.

Immediately after the Malaysian refugee deal (which involved sending asylum seekers from Australia to Malaysia for processing) was announced, the UNHCR representative in Malaysia, Alan Vernon, to my surprise threw his support behind the scheme. Vernon was quoted as saying that this could prove to be a positive turning point for refugee human rights, despite Malaysia’s poor record on the treatment of refugees. Recently, Marion Le, a refugee lawyer who was previously critical of John Howard’s Pacific Solution, has said that she would encourage a reopening of the Nauru detention centre, because at least it was better than processing refugees in Malaysia. Finally, the outrage that occurred after the mistreatment of cows being exported to Indonesia was recently revealed on ABC’s Four Corners has far exceeded the reaction of the general public to the live exporting of human beings to Malaysia.

Because of the constant barrage of repetition that both Labor and Liberal partake in, are we losing our way on human rights?

On this issue, I would rather Australians draw a line in the sand and stand up for what is right, rather than for what is politically convenient. There’s a great deal of wisdom imparted in the following words, spoken at the Lowy Institute in July last year. Both political parties would do well to heed the advice that one shouldn’t take a particular stance on refugees to try and win over the public, because this sort of political posturing doesn’t work. Rather they should simply take the stance that they think is morally correct.

“If you are hard headed, you’re dismissed as hard hearted, if you are open hearted you’re marginalised as supporting open borders. I say to those engaged in this type of rhetoric: ‘Stop selling our national character short. We are better than this. We are much better than this.’”

These words were spoken by Julia Gillard not more than a year ago. She would be doing well to take on board her own advice.

Crazy Bake is a well-known NGO in Beijing, which seeks to improve the lives of patients living in a mental health facility. It is a program

“Involving the mentally ill at their facility just outside of Beijing. Crazy Bake’s goal is to improve the patients living conditions by giving the patients a meaningful task that is within their capabilities. The project was initiated by Yvonne Gerig and Natascha Prigge. In the past 3 years the project focused on a gardening project, crazy grow. Crazy Bake is an extension of the program designed to incorporate more patients and ultimately collect more funds for good use”.

The bakery is attached to the private hospital at which the patients stay. There is no psychotherapy or occupational therapy available for the patients. The expenses incurred by the patients, for food, housing, care, and medication is 800RMB (AUD$115) per month. Every patient (note: not beneficiary) receives a monthly ‘salary’ of 80RMB per month (AUD$0.37 per day). Sales amount to 1000RMB per week. Money is also raised through sponsorship and gifts-in-kind received in donation. Furthermore, according to the organisation, the patients are directly involved and in control of the decision-making process. They decide what to acquire with the sales profits at the hospital. Some notable acquisitions over the past few years:

• Purchase of a karaoke machine
• Purchase of a fridge for ice cream

You can learn more about the organisation in this MSNBC video spotlight.

Now, there are a few things to consider before we judge too harshly or otherwise. David Oaks, of Mindfreedom International, urges us to find more inclusive language than ‘mentally ill’. Crazy Bake’s website is littered with the phrase, and, in addition to the name ‘Crazy Bake’, does not support their mission to change perceptions of mental health in China. Despite this, the organisation is up against one heck of a wall in terms of mental health support in China. There is widespread discrimination and misunderstandings about mental health in China. It was only in 2001, that homosexuality was formally removed from the official Chinese Classification of Mental Disorders. “Traditionally, Chinese consider mental disease to be a shame,” and there is a fear of revealing issues to family and colleagues. In a society grounded in the cultural notion of ‘face’, this is of no surprise.

There is another way to approach this issue though, at it involves taking back previously inappropriate words (in much the same way that the African American community, people with disabilities, and women have done so) and hence, raising awareness of mental health issues in China. Through this lens, using the word “crazy” may raise awareness through its stark use:

“I feel words such as ‘crazy’ can actually be positive in certain contexts. Consider, ‘I’m crazy in love,’ or Apple’s early motto for their computers, ‘Insanely great.’ The word origin for crazy is ‘cracked,’ and in Japanese art the pottery with a beautiful imperfection has a special Wabi-Sabi value. On the other hand, a newspaper editorial or journalist disparaging certain citizens as ‘lunatics’ ought to be opposed” (David Oaks).

Of the health budget in China, which was 5.5% of GDP in 2009, only 2.35% of it goes towards mental health (although we should always proceed with caution when it comes to reported statistics, particularly budgetary, in China). This is in a country where reportedly 1 in every 13 suffer mental health problems.

“China has only about 14,000 qualified psychiatrists…about the same number as France, with 60 million people—compared to China’s 1.3 billion [...] Two million Chinese try to kill themselves annually…and China’s 750 or so state-run mental-health institutions can’t keep pace with the rising demand for their services” (from here, original article not found).

1 in 13 is about 100 million people. More alarmingly is the estimation that Chinese children account for 15-20% of children in the world with mental health problems. The mental health profession and services are still very much in their infancy. In 2005, there were only 572 institutions in the whole of China providing mental health services. That is only 1.4 beds per 10,000 people. The lack of services and support is further exacerbated in Chinese rural areas, where the majority (750 million) of the population lives.

It is an issue that I am only vaguely aware of, and one that I was completely oblivious to living here in Beijing. I may have even purchased some baked goods made by the Crazy Bakers without the slightest clue of its source. Mental health is not an issue that I am experienced or knowledgeable enough to address. Excuse the sports analogy, but if mental health were baseball, I would be the guy watching basketball. I can only highlight mental health as an issue that is rarely addressed, as far as I am aware (please speak up and correct me), in the mainstream aid and development community.

The stigma, discrimination and lack of inclusiveness is not just endemic to China. According to WHO, 450 million people globally are affected by mental health problems, which cause devastating and life-threatening human, social, and economic costs. Furthermore, there is a fear of losing ‘face’ not just in China, but across many different societies, albeit by a different name. According to one recent survey of attitudes towards mental health, 50% of those surveyed would be uncomfortable talking to their employers about a mental illness. Yet, if you were to take a sick day, it could likely be due to your mental health. According to Mind For Health, a UK-based advocacy group, mental health problems are responsible for an estimated 14% of the Global Burden of Disease (illness and deaths), but receive only 1% of world health expenditure.

Andrew Chambers, writing in the Guardian, calls mental health the invisible problem in international development. Researchers in 2003 found that of 191 countries studied, 32% did not have a specified budget for mental health. Furthermore, of the 89 countries which responded to the researcher’s questionnaires, 36% spent less than 1% of their total budget on mental health. Invisibility is further exacerbated by the lack of interest from NGOs, charities and the wider international community.Vikram Patel, Professor of International Mental Health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, writes that if/when mental health in Low- and Middle-Income Countries gets attention, new and innovative approaches need to be taken. The approaches to public health found in High-Income Countries cannot be replicated or reproduced.

What comes out of these readings and thinking on mental health in the development context are some questions worth thinking about and discussing:

• Is suffering from an infectious disease, like TB, more important to individuals and to others than suffering from schizophrenia?
• Can we place a value on different dimensions and indicators of health? Have we already? How do we do it?
• Is there a perception that mental health is not a serious issue compared with say, education, income generation, etc.?
• Is mental health considered a ‘valuable good’ by poor people? By you? Should it be?
• Are investments in mental health cost-effective?
• What role does stigma play in the lack of interest?
• What would the social inclusion model offer in approaching mental health?

What ‘Crazy Bake’ shows, in working in such a highly stigmatised, invisible and underfunded area, is that actively including people in basic social and economic activities may not be such a crazy idea.

“I think all this silence is worse than all the violence”

A song all about self-censorship and speaking up that is worth watching and listening to – even if you do not agree with what Lupe says or believes.

[Skylar Grey]
It’s so loud Inside my head
With words that I should have said!
As I drown in my regrets
I can’t take back the words I never said
I can’t take back the words I never said

[Lupe Fiasco]
I really think the war on terror is a bunch of bullshit
Just a poor excuse for you to use up all your bullets
How much money does it take to really make a full clip
9/11 building 7 did they really pull it
Uhh, And a bunch of other cover ups
Your childs future was the first to go with budget cuts
If you think that hurts then, wait here comes the uppercut
The school was garbage in the first place, thats on the up and up
Keep you at the bottom but tease you with the uppercrust
You get it then they move you so you never keeping up enough
If you turn on TV all you see’s a bunch of “what the f-cks”
Dude is dating so and so blabbering bout such and such
And that aint Jersey Shore, homie thats the news
And these the same people that supposed to be telling us the truth
Limbaugh is a racist, Glenn Beck is a racist
Gaza strip was getting bombed, Obama didn’t say shit
Thats why I aint vote for him, next one either
I’ma part of the problem, my problem is I’m peaceful
And I believe in the people.

[Skylar Grey - Chorus]
It’s so loud inside my head
With words that I should have said!
As I drown in my regrets
I can’t take back the words I never said
I can’t take back the words I never said

[Lupe Fiasco - Verse 2]
Now you can say it aint our fault if we never heard it
But if we know better than we probably deserve it
Jihad is not a holy war, wheres that in the worship?
Murdering is not Islam!
And you are not observant
And you are not a muslim
Israel don’t take my side cause look how far you’ve pushed them
Walk with me into the ghetto, this where all the Kush went
Complain about the liquor store but what you drinking liquor for?
Complain about the gloom but when’d you pick a broom up?
Just listening to Pac aint gone make it stop
A rebel in your thoughts, aint gon make it halt
If you don’t become an actor you’ll never be a factor
Pills with million side effects
Take em when the pains felt
Wash them down with Diet soda!
Killin off your brain cells
Crooked banks around the World
Would gladly give a loan today
So if you ever miss payment
They can take your home away!

[Skylar Grey - Chorus]
It’s so loud inside my head
With words that I should have said!
As I drown in my regrets
I can’t take back the words I never said, never said
I can’t take back the words I never said

[Lupe Fiasco - Verse 3]
I think that all the silence is worse than all the violence
Fear is such a weak emotion thats why I despise it
We scared of almost everything, afraid to even tell the truth
So scared of what you think of me, I’m scared of even telling you
Sometimes I’m like the only person I feel safe to tell it to
I’m locked inside a cell in me, I know that there’s a jail in you
Consider this your bailing out, so take a breath, inhale a few
My screams is finally getting free, my thoughts is finally yelling through

[Skylar Grey - Chorus]
It’s so loud Inside my head
With words that I should have said!
As I drown in my regrets
I can’t take back the words I never said

SBS, an Australian public TV channel (sometimes known as ‘Soccer Before Sex’ or ‘Sex Before Soccer’, originally due to its high content of football matches and foreign films), is launching a very interesting initiative in the form of a 3-part series – Go Back To Where You Came From

“Go Back To Where You Came From – the world-first, three day TV event – is coming to SBS on 19, 20 & 21 June. This three-part series sees six ordinary Australians, of varying ages and backgrounds, who agree to challenge their preconceived notions about refugees and asylum seekers by embarking on a confronting 25 day journey. Tracing in reverse the journeys that refugees have taken to reach Australia, the series features unprecedented access to some of the most dangerous and desperate corners of the world”.

From having a quick look around comments posted in reply to the trailer, on Facebook and YouTube, there appears to be quite a positive response from Australians so far. Although, this series is not being aired on Australia’s more popular, commercial channels, and it can be suggested that regular SBS viewers are already concerned about and aware of refugee issues. That is, SBS is preaching to the choir.

But, is that being unfair to the wider Australian public? A number of recent surveys have shown positive attitudes not only to migrants, but also to refugees. The Australian Red Cross conducted a survey in 2010, which showed that of 1,000 respondents, more than 80% of them said they’d be willing to help a refugee settle into their community.

• 86% of people would flee to a safe country, if they lived in a conflict zone and were under threat.
• 94% of these people would use all their money and assets to get to a safe country.
• 31% know of someone who has come to Australia escaping persecution or conflict in another country.
• 83% agree that people fleeing persecution should be able to seek protection in another country.
• 83% are willing to assist a refugee in their community settle in Australia.
• 67% agree that refugees have made a positive contribution to Australian society.

So, what’s the deal? Is there a strong disconnect between the empathy of the Australian public and the very unsympathetic nature of public and political debate around asylum seekers and refugees? More precisely, is this disconnect found between the public’s different understandings of a ‘refugee’ and an ‘asylum seeker’? Dr. Bob Birrell, of Monash university in Melbourne, argues that there is a difference between the two in people’s minds:

“I think the controversy in Australia about refugees is, has to do with the undocumented arrivals on our shores who then claim asylum. There are questions there about who are these people, are they an especially privileged group because they have the money to come here. But I think overwhelmingly the key issue is the way they arrive. Instead of us choosing them, they are choosing us”.

This is perhaps further supported by results from another survey, from late 2010, which found that of 1,400 respondents, only 48% believe migrants should be able to maintain their culture without prejudice or disadvantage. Yet, 8 out of 10 in the same survey, believes that the Australian migration program has been generous towards migrants throughout its history. Clearly, 8 out of 10 are forgetting the White Australia Policy, which was essentially, in one policy form or another, in effect from 1901-1973 and restricted ‘non-white’ immigration. It was absurd which ever way you looked at it.

Clearly, there is a volatile mixture of xenophobia and empathy, misunderstanding and willingness. The purpose here is not to make a case for upholding human rights and Australia’s obligations (although a public education and awareness campaigns are perhaps needed) or to dissect the government’s immigration policies (see links below for far more capable and insightful commentators). I want to think about this distinction being held, between refugees and asylum seekers; between Australians and migrants. There seems to be very contradictory attitudes held by many Australians; an inner contest of values. And, our media and shared history, with migration and refugees, is standing in the way.

A quick Google search around perhaps reveals what is driving and feeding this misunderstanding. Boat people. This is the term that most commonly appears in newspaper headlines about asylum seekers and refugees coming to Australia. In The Australian, Sydney Morning Herald, Daily Telegraph, and The Age.

“Julia Gillard to send back boatpeople”

“Who’s afraid of 4500 boatpeople?”

“Fury at boatpeople `with dubious stories’”

“Boat people policy limbo”

“Record armada of boat people”

“Govt can’t say where boat people will go”

Australia has a shared history with refugees, written in the books, on camera and visibly evident in Australian society. Refugees are legit. Between 1976-86, post-Vietnam War, Australia accepted over 100,000 refugees from SE Asia. Since the events in Tiananmen Square 1989, Australia has accepted over 40,000 refugees from China. It is during this period, that the term ‘boat people’ originated, but very few actually arrived by boat. Those that did, were arriving in an unauthorised manner according to Australian law and successive governments began as early as the 1980s setting up policies and places for processing arrivals by boat and defining those that did as different from asylum seekers and refugees.

It was, and still is, about national sovereignty and maintaining top-down control. A country’s sovereignty is defined by many things, but in particular by geographical boundaries. Any unauthorised entry, whether by asylum seekers, fisherman, whalers, soldiers is an encroachment on that country’s sovereignty, an act of aggression. And, as the history of countless wars demonstrate, governments, kings, rulers are very, very territorial.

So, Australia now has a well-established, shared history with boat people, as defined by law, media and political debate. Australians associate ‘boat people’ with illegality, with queue jumping, with an identity that may not gel well with the Australian way of life. It is about the way asylum seekers and refugees arrive. This is what is causing the disconnection between asylum seekers and refugees: boats. Asylum seekers arrive by boat, they have dubious stories with no evidence or identity, they did not go through proper immigration channels, they are doing something illegal. Although none of the above is necessarily true, it is a matter of personal perceptions, knowledge and relative truth. On the other hand, refugees have suffered real, visible and known persecution. We know this from history classes, films and popular culture.

As Bob Hawke sensibly said, and perhaps channeling Lara Bingle, “We’re all bloody boat people…That’s how we found the place…These people have got initiative, guts and courage and Australia needs people like that.” Although that is how Australia was settled by both forced and willing migrants from the British Isles, it feels like within all this debate and proclamation of Australian values that something is missing. Australia is lacking a creation mythology (at least non-Indigenous Australians), a shared national identity that bonds and is almost irreproachable. The Americans built a creation myth after their struggle for independence from the British. Migrants, whether legal or illegal, to the U.S. have been able to buy-into the foundation myth, the ‘American Dream’, and the folklore of the Founding Fathers. The numerous and strong national identities of migrants that come to Australia do not have the same folklore to buy-into. It is the cause of much anxiety.

Ted Simon, who traveled around the world on a Triumph motorcycle in the late 1970s, perhaps hits a nerve when describing Australians:

“Like most people everywhere they spent most of their lives just getting by, but there was no collective dream or mythology that told them what it was they were supposed to be doing. In that respect they were far behind the aboriginals they had decimated and despised. Yet many signs indicated that the time might not be too far away when Australians would agree on a better reason for living than to eat a pound of beef a day. When that day came I thought this would become one of the world’s best places to be”.

Perhaps this explains the outrage Australians are demonstrating at the export of live cows to Indonesian abattoirs but are nonchalant about the transfer of asylum seekers to Malaysian detention centres. Are we closer to finding a better reason for living than to eat a pound of beef a day and creating an irreproachable national identity?

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Links dissecting the debate

New Matilda – You might get snakes, you might get ladders

ABC The Drum – Off the wall refugee policy

The Age – Malaysian deal a risky proposition

Centre for Policy Development – Trampling on human rights is expensive

ABC – Understanding the asylum seeker debate

I have spent the last three and half years working at an investment bank in Sydney.  During that time I’ve also studied development in a Masters program part-time.  Across both adventures I’ve come to meet some extraordinary people who have each, in their own way, profoundly influenced the way I see the world.  Straddling the fence hasn’t always been the most comfortable spot from which to learn about these two spheres, but it certainly has made for some interesting perspectives. While those perspectives have been as varied as they have been insightful, reflecting on my experience always seems to bring me back to the same realisation:

These two sides have more in common than they think.

When I first started in banking, I expected to find a collection of ruthless mercenaries desperate to squeeze every last drop of profit out of whomever they could exploit.  Instead, I discovered a group of surprisingly compassionate human beings – as overwhelmed by global problems as anyone – who found engagement, passion and purpose in their work.  They were thankful for their good fortune to have uncovered a career that they enjoyed so much that still provided security for their families (and for more than you’d think, an opportunity to give charitably). And they took pride in their place within an economic system they believe has provided the greatest amount to the greatest number of people in the history of civilisation.

Their qualities were unmistakably human. Moreover, the qualities of competitiveness, ingenuity, passion and dedication that I came to admire in my work colleagues started to look a lot like the qualities I admired among my growing set of development role models. Increasingly, the differences between worlds looked less and less ideological and more and more like a comparatively superficial disagreement on the best methods to realise the same desired outcomes.

With so much the same, time to reflect has left me with the sense that what differentiates us is little more than the random walk of our personal histories.  Through an innumerable collection of moments, events and people in our lives we have each come to believe what we believe and seek what we seek.  Certain behaviours and aspirations are reinforced while others are discouraged over the course of millions upon millions of interactions with other individuals, groups and environments.  While we retain the idea that we are consciously in control of who we are, it is the momentum of the emergent patterns of our history that have played the greatest role in leading us to our values, our passions and our careers.

While I do not believe that the reality of how we got here ever absolves an individual of responsibility for their actions, it is a powerful teacher in explaining the dissonance of bankers who inexplicably seem to behave like human beings.

The individuals who I worked with are not separated from their humanity any more than the UN worker on the ground in Haiti may be. They have merely travelled a different course to this point in their lives. While one parent may have stressed the virtue of sacrifice in service, another may have insisted that you cannot help the materially weak without starting from a position of strength. While one may have had the money to travel to the Cambodia after finishing university, another may have needed to start work straight away. While one may have had a passionate 7^th grade Social Studies teacher, the other may have found a compelling 11^th grade Economics teacher of their own. My futile list of contrived contrasts does little justice to the complex network of influences at play except to allude to the idea that one value or career choice is no more human than another.

OK, so we disagree on the optimal structure of organisation for capital, material resources and human energy. We disagree on how the decisions on such matters should even be made, let alone what they might be. Indeed, we likely disagree on much more. But, crucially, these differences are small compared to what have in common. Every human being still conceptualises collective problems along the same dimensions of incentive, empathy and hope. And in that common language of understanding there is a framework for solutions, awaiting the coherent, collective application of competitiveness, ingenuity, passion and dedication for their release.

Every individual is an agent of change provided that change is conceived in a way that acknowledges the dualism of our common experience. While we all walk the same conceptual road, our experience of the path is superficially very different. That duality of similarity and difference, on most days, may appear to be a worst-of-both-worlds bargain – we live in a reality where our fates are interlinked but we can agree on nothing. But on our best days? Our common humanity binds together the only collection of agents with the diversity of knowledge, capability and experience to meet our greatest collective challenges.  All of us.

Following successful negotiations with Malaysia, and interest from Thailand and Indonesia, Prime Minister Julia Gillard today announced a new deal to exchange asylum seekers travelling to Australia with refugees currently living in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).

“North Korea has exactly the sort of human rights record that we are looking for in this latest transfer deal,” Gillard said this morning from Kirribilli House. “Kim Jong-Il has personally guaranteed that the asylum seekers we send to North Korea will be treated no better than the average North Korean. I’m wholeheartedly encouraged by his assurances that they too will live in squalor.”

Under the new plan negotiated this morning, Australia would be willing to accept 5000 Sri Lankan and Afghans, who have been determined as refugees. In exchange, North Korea would accept the burden of Australia’s least wanted residents: 50 boat-arriving asylum seekers and Russell Crowe.

“By eliminating two crucial components of (private security firm) Serco’s role, this deal with save the Australian taxpayer 20 million dollars each year. Firstly, Serco will no longer need to deploy a unit of 15 men to control Russell Crowe every time he goes drinking in a New York bar. Secondly, we expect that we will see a noticeable drop in asylum seeker riots that have recently occurred after in-house screenings of Robin Hood,” Gillard said.

Asylum seekers display their anger after yet another unnecessary Hollywood remake.

The decision is a landmark moment in Prime Minister Gillard’s leadership, as it is the first time that Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has provided his full support for one of her propositions. Mr Abbott was typically coy this afternoon, in a press conference that contained many subtle metaphors and insinuations. Abbott himself wore his signature red Speedos, with the word “STOP” printed in capital letters over his groin and bottom, and held an oversized red stop sign in his right hand, all while standing atop a life-size papier mache replica of a 50 foot wooden boat.

“It has been said in the media that I instantly oppose proposals put forward by the Labor government, regardless as to whether they have merit or not,” Mr Abbott said.

“Quite clearly this is a fallacy, and the fact that I have now backed Julia’s 4,687^th proposal this year shows this. The media has also written that I mindlessly repeat brainless slogans whenever I give press conferences. I want to make a clear point that I absolutely stop the boats do not.”

Opposition leader Tony Abbott single-handedly stopped the path of thousands of boats last year by parading around in such swim attire.

Across the seas, there were wild celebrations in the central district of the nation’s capital, with many locals deliriously driving the country’s most recent and fashionable vehicles for hours on end. Deep into the night, North Koreans traversed up and down Pyongyang’s main street, hanging out of the side of their horse-drawn carts, and firing crossbows into the air with gay abandon. Earlier, celebrations reached a peak when it was mistakenly announced that North Korea had successfully completed a deal with Austria, not Australia, and they would be sending over one their most famous movie stars as part of the deal. However, when a correction was made over Pyongyang community radio that Arnold Schwarzenegger would indeed not be coming, there was much gnashing of teeth and wringing of hands, and many chambermaids sighed deeply.

It appears that this negotiation has come at a perfect time for Kim Jong-Il, who has been trying to distract attention from the behaviour of his erratic son, Kim Jong-Un. Local newspapers have reported that North Korea’s leader is unhappy with his son’s strange and unprecedented shift in behaviour. Sources close to the presidential palace have indicated that Kim Jong-Un has recently been locking himself in his room, for hours on end and refusing to come out for his daily torture session of small squirrels, as he previously enjoyed. Rumours abound that Kim Jong-Un is now addicted to the most addictive type of anti-social behaviour – Angry Birds. With such embarrassment surrounding him, his father is now looking overseas for a way to distract the often savage North Korean tabloids.

Child psychologists are concerned that Kim Jong-Il's son has been raised too closely in his father's image.

“Quite frankly, after seeing the deal Prime Minister Gillard cut with Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia, I couldn’t wait to get on it,” North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-Il said.

“It is a win-win situation for both our nations. Australia gets to rid themselves of the burden of following the UN Convention on Refugees, and in return we take a small number of refugees, and the gormless buffoon who continues to embarrass his home nation through drunken displays of poor behaviour. After years of entertaining Boris Yeltsin in the 90s, I don’t envisage this being a challenge at all.”

The continued success of these refugee swaps opens up the door for future deals between countries wishing to rid themselves of undesirables. Today Tonight’s resident swapping expert, Stephen Fantergan, had this to say:

“Could we see a future deal between Thailand and Singapore? Thailand could send over a boatload of Phuket-dwelling, overweight, middle-aged Westerners and in return, Singapore could send its entire supply of chewing gum? Or perhaps Australia could send the Gloria Jeans franchise back to the United States, in return for repatriating Rupert Murdoch? The possibilities are endless.”

“If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.” (Jesus in Matthew 15:13-14)

Australia’s new refugee policy and associated consequences for human rights in the region

Hot on the heels of the ‘planking’ fad, comes a new Australian craze: the asylum seeker shuffle! (Or for those who prefer a catchy acronym, let’s affectionately call it ASS). The general gist is that the Australian government sends asylum seekers who arrive to our shores via boat away to human-rights poor settings, and in return, the receiving country sends a few extra back our way. Re-set, breathe a sigh of relief, then play again! In fact, no need to limit the game to just two players… everyone is encouraged to come play the asylum seeker shuffle… come one, come all! The only rules of engagement are that you must NOT have signed the Refugee Convention and you must have a poor record on adherence to human rights. The other rules are… well… there are no rules!

Just like the planking phenomenon, ASS is in equal measure both inane and as(s)inine, and infinitely more dangerous. The policy announcement by the Gillard government on the 7^th of May that a bilateral agreement had been entered into with Malaysia, under which 800 new arrivals by boat would be sent into Malaysia’s unwelcoming arms and detention centres in return for our acceptance of 4000 pre-screened refugees, is mind-boggling. The evidence of Malaysia’s treatment of migrants and asylum seekers in detention centres and residing in the wider community is widely known, and severely disturbing.

In certain respects, the ASS bears similarities to ‘planking’: the government for all intents and purposes is lying prostate with its head in the dirt, while Malaysia does whatever it wants out of eyesight, and hopefully, earshot. See no evil, hear no evil. Forget political posturing, we now have political planking! By promising to remain in a supine position while the Malaysian government continues its atrocious treatment of asylum seekers unabated, Australia is tacitly giving its assent to the violation of human rights, turning a blind eye not only to this but to its own international obligations under international human rights and refugee law. In criminal law we call this wilful blindness. In international refugee law, we call it refoulement, the prohibition against which is provided for in Article 33 of the 1951 Refugee Convention, which stipulates that:

No Contracting State shall expel or return (“refouler”) a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his [or her] life or freedom would be threatened on account of his [or her] race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.[1]

Non-refoulement is a non-derogable obligation (an obligation from which no derogation is ever permissible) and has been described as the ‘cornerstone of international refugee protection’[2].  In addition to this, Article 3(1) of the Convention Against Torture, of which Australia is also a party, provides that: ‘No State Party shall expel, return (“refouler”) or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.’[3] Clearly someone forgot to send Australia the memo.

As one friend I know put it, we appear to be enduring an epidemic of idiocy in regards to migration policy in Australia at the moment. And stupidity is becoming contagious. It started with Malaysia. Then Thailand piped up and said it wanted a piece of the pie too. Now Indonesia is considering jumping on the bandwagon. What do these countries have in common? For starters, a renowned poor record in regards to the humane treatment of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees. This prompts me to ask: what kind of example is Australia setting for our neighbours in the region? Our supposedly highly developed country; a fair, free and democratic land to be differentiated and delineated from the morally obtuse in our region above all else.

Burma? Malaysia? China? North Korea? Oh no, we are head and shoulders above all of those shady characters. And yet, here we are, again setting a terrible example internationally for others states to replicate (this brings to mind the ominous international precedent set by the 2001 Howard-era Pacific Solution in regards to offshore processing, which shamefully served as inspiration for the UK, supported by Denmark, the Netherlands, Italy, Austria and Germany, attempting to implement a similar policy in 2003[4]). Countries with fewer resources mind you. So, is this a case of the blind leading the blind, or, more accurately, the politically calculating leading the morally pernicious? Should Australia be responsible for leading the way in the region? Are we hurting any chances that may have been open to us to convince our neighbours who haven’t signed the Refugee Convention to ratify it? And what is the real cost of this policy on the international human rights framework?

Australia is located in a dubious region when it comes to adherence to human rights principles. States in the region are underrepresented in terms of the ratification of major human rights treaties, and there is no regional human rights framework covering the Asia-Pacific such as those that exist in Africa, the Americas and Europe. As one of the most developed and democratic countries in the Asia-Pacific, we should be encouraging those around us to take human rights seriously. It is in our own interests, as well as clearly being in the interests of those who through no fault of their own find themselves within the borders of states who actively violate their human rights.

Indeed, Gillard’s new policy is entirely short-sighted and counter-productive. Considering that refugees by definition flee their countries to escape persecution, by turning a blind eye while countries such as Malaysia persecute human beings within their territory (citizen or no) with impunity, we thereby fail to address one of the root causes of the cross-border migration of peoples who leave in search of protection. Is this approach sustainable? No. Is it practical? No. Will it once and for all “solve” the “problem” of movement of peoples who fear for their lives? No. Will it encourage those with dubious human rights records to amend their ways? Most certainly not.

My firm belief that Australia should be leading the way in the region rather than engaging in a ‘race to the bottom’ perhaps derives from a lesson in childhood ethics 101: the lesson taught to us by our parents and teachers not to excuse our own behaviour by citing the poor behaviour of others (“But Mum, everyone was doing it!”). Or, as the lesson was commonly posed, in simple question format: “And if Joe jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?” The difference is that as children, while the temptation to take the low road, to do as others were doing even though we knew it was wrong, often proved too great, as adults it is far easier to understand the wisdom inherent in this advice. We understand that when we reduce ourselves to the lowest common denominator in order to secure instantaneous, however ultimately fleeting gratification, we lose out in the long run.

Australia is, unfortunately, acting like a child. It is shirking its responsibilities under international law for quick political gain. By refusing to take the high road, Australian society and the region in general thus loses out because human rights norms, where they are not adhered to, lose their impact. Where they are treated as fluid principles rather than a binding system of rights and correlative duties, the foundations become precarious and the whole point of the framework becomes muddied. We demonstrate to other countries that it’s okay to ignore human rights. We don’t take a stand. In fact, we take it one step further by engaging in ‘political planking’: lying down, rolling over and firmly burying our heads in the sand, and after we’re done performing said acrobatic manoeuvres, we get up, wash our hands, and deny any responsibility for the consequences of our actions.

The bottom line is – when states engage in such tactics, when they play new Great Games – they are playing with people’s lives. Every human deserves to be treated with respect, with humanity. Human rights, in the words of Jack Donnelly, are held ‘universally’, by all human beings, and against all other persons and institutions.[5] Australia has promised to protect and promote human rights at home and abroad, and it should do what it promised. And that, my friends, was a lesson from childhood ethics 102.

I was invited to speak at my alma matter last month. In preparation I jotted down some bits of advice for international development students and aid career seekers. Here’s a collection of those thoughts…

***

When I came out of grad school, I was programmed to think macro, think sustainability, to think that development economists had a clue (do they?). In other words, to think, think, think. Nothing in my training prepared me for what I would feel as an aid worker.

***

The mantra “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” comes to mind. And the trauma, the vicarious trauma, the loss, and the isolation that aid workers can face indeed may make you stronger. Unfortunately, what makes you stronger might also make you less sensitive, hardened, more disconnected, less caring. Thus with all of our conditioned tendencies to avoid suffering, self-critique and self-compassion must be your constant (and sometimes adversarial) companions.

***

The over-intellectualization of professional aid work is staggering to me at times. Yet I still often find myself wondering, in relationship to various projects, “What were they thinking?”

***

No matter how self-aware you come into this work, most people in the beginning will be operating from a worldview in which change in poor people’s lives is possible with our help and that it was something that can be “managed.”

In my mind, the jury is still out on this.

***

When I first saw this graph, I thought, “Gee, this would have been helpful” as I worked to discern my ‘calling’ from what the aid industry was requiring of me, i.e. think-think-manage-manage, and what was actually happening on the ground. The difference between helping, fixing and serving presented below is intended for health care providers, but I think it has real relevance for aid workers and do-gooders alike:

***

A quote I always keep nearby:

“If you believe if you’re going to…change the world, you’re going to end up either a pessimist or a cynic. But if you understand your limited power and define yourself by your ability to resist injustice, rather than by what you accomplish, then I think reality is much easier to bear.” (Chris Hedges)

***

Even when real changes in people’s life conditions are not imminently possible, our role can be to enable hope in the face of adversity.

***

What is required of aid workers to serve rather than help, is illustrated further by a concept my friend Silvia brought to my attention, that of “cultural humility.” She works in hospice in California, working with healthcare professionals to offer more appropriate and compassionate care to the Latino community. In healthcare settings, cultural humility involves active engagement in self-reflection, bringing power imbalances into check, relinquishment of the role of expert, becoming the student, and seeing a patient’s potential to be a full and capable partner in their recovery.

The most effective and inspiring development practitioners I’ve ever worked with embody cultural humility.

***

Do you have the courage to battle the modernist viewpoints, privilege and racism at the roots of international aid, as well as to question your own personal prejudices, stereotypes, and agendas? Be prepared to go deeper to examine your own beliefs, values, assumptions, and biases. Karen Armstrong describes the “hard work of compassion” as constantly “dethroning” yourself to challenge your own worldview.

***

Don’t take only my word on any of this. Other bloggers share their seasoned advice too:

-       Tales from the Hood’s posts on Motivation and Sacrifice

-       one from Satori Worldwide on whydev.org

-       one from La Vidaid Loca, and

-       another from The Principled Agent.

***

Maybe the title of this talk should be “What I had to un-learn from grad school.”

***

I do think there is room for aid workers and do-gooders to redefine our role as translators, between what people on the ground really need and that of the demands of donors. Not as providers of what people need. Not as enforcers of policy, or rules, or regulations. Not as helpers or saviors or martyrs.

***

Results, results, results. Yes, they are important. Results are not possible, however, without tending to “the process.”

You will have many bosses who do not understand this.

***

You will have to fight hard to not let the overly technocratic, abstractionist tendencies of aid work pull you under.

You will have to fight against “charitable” urges towards impoverished and marginalized people you encounter, which can ultimately debase their dignity.

You will have to fight to experience the full range of our human condition.

***

Anyone can identify what’s wrong. It will take much more skill and strength to wake up everyday and help identify what’s right, what’s possible, and where incremental changes can occur.

***

…Just a few of the things I wish I had known. What about you?

Westerners don’t like referring to themselves as immigrants because the word “immigrant” has such nasty connotations…An immigrant is an unwanted job-stealer, while an expat is a foreigner who could be leaving any day now. An immigrant is on a desperate search for a better life. An expat is on an adventure…Our usage of these words reveals a certain double standard. Whether you’re an expat or an immigrant depends not on your residency plans, but on the relative wealth of your native country. (Andrew Kureth)

Are you an expat or a migrant? In other words, are you a Greek or are you a Barbarian?

A Greek (Hellene) fighting a Persian (Barbaroi)

A tip of the hat must go to Lorenz Khazaleh, who wrote a thought-provoking post asking whether you are a migrant or an expat. This conversation is part of a larger trope, one found in language and which defines who we are as an individual and as part of a community. It spans the length of written history. The ancient Greeks, represented by independent city-states which were constantly in and out of alliances and conflicts with one another, defined themselves collectively against what Edward Said would call the ‘Other’. In this case, it was the ‘barbarian’ or ‘barbaroi’ in ancient Greek, which essentially means ‘anyone who is not Greek speaker’ or ‘one who spoke Greek poorly’. It was the antonym for civis and polis. Although, originally not pejorative, it took on the connotations of savage, uncultured, uncivilised, inferior, after the Persian Wars in the 5th Century BE/BC. Barbarians continued to be present in the mind of Greek and Roman authors, always on the periphery of modern society.

“Hellenes regard themselves as noble everywhere, and not only in their own country, but they deem the barbarians noble only when at home, thereby implying that there are two sorts of nobility and freedom, the one absolute, the other relative”. (Aristotle, Politics IV)

I find the attitude that Aristotle expressed about the Hellenes, the Greeks, and barbarians, present in our notions of expat and migrant. We, and by ‘we’ I mean the successors of Greeks, have this same attitude to migrants: they are only noble when at home. Expats are noble both at home and abroad. But, when the others are aboard, migrating, seeking asylum, they are to be feared; they are inferior; from the Third World. There is a strand throughout written histories, which carries this distinction, this attitude, of those who are not of the same ethnicity, culture, nationality as one’s own tribe. Today, you only need to look at any debate about immigration in Europe, the US , Australia and elsewhere. We will speak very highly of, and respect, other people’s cultures, traditions and customs when confined to their country. We travel far and wide to experience these other cultures as tourists and backpackers. But, when people from these places seek to move, migrate, they lose their exotic flair.

However, the etymology of the word ‘expatriate’ suggests that it has been appropriated recently to distinguish between those of different class and race. ‘By using a different term, a distance to “the other” is established‘. ‘Expatriate’ derives from Latin, and originally meant ‘to send into exile’ or ‘to be removed from one’s homeland’. ‘Migrant’ is also of Latin origin, an adjective that referred to someone who moved from one place to another. Both terms have undergone significant shifts in meaning and connotations.

The Barbarian who dreamed of political aspirations

If the notion and label of ‘expat’ separates and privileges, then the term ‘expat aid worker’ does one better and makes a clear distinction between those working in the sector and those who are receiving the work of aid. It builds on this notion that expats are somehow unique, more noble both at home and abroad. I don’t refer to myself as an ‘aid worker’, neither do many colleagues, friends and others I know in Australia. Do ‘local’ professionals and workers in the sector refer to themselves as ‘aid workers’?

This is helped along by the blog, Stuff Expat Aid Workers Like (SEAWL); a niche successor to the immensely popular Stuff White People Like, but of different authorship. Something about SEAWL strikes me the wrong way. Although the pretentious irony is deliberate, and the humour self-deprecating, it further reinforces the division, both in discourse and in reality, between us and them. Critical self-reflection is a need for many professions, but not to the point where it becomes conceited and more about satisfying your own needs, rather than that of others. As Weh Yeoh said of David Foster Wallace in a recent post (and I’m paraphrasing heavily): If one of the great literary writers of the 21st Century does not consider himself exceptional, then surely we can do the same and avoid ‘shitty development’.

“I don’t know how to put this but I’m kind of a big deal…I’m very important. I have many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany”. (Ron Burgundy, Anchorman)

It is no wonder we constantly argue semantics about such terms as ‘participation’, when we have created such a clear distinction between who is who. How can we truly facilitate participatory practices if there is already a deep divide between groups? We are ‘aid workers’, they are ‘recipients of our aid working’: consultants and beneficiaries; NGOs and local communities; facilitators and participants; Greeks and barbarians. There is an imbalance in the power relation and structure in such a distinction. We always need to divide; ‘west’ and rest; developing and developed; south and north. Make sure we know who we are and where we are, in relation to those around us.

“We are aid workers. We are expats. This is the stuff we like”. (About page of SEAWL)

It feels like we are trying to define ourselves as somehow different, unique and special. SEAWL also has a niche marketplace, where you can buy SEAWL branded T-shirts, just to further emphasise your differences in the way you dress. According to the site, the interests of expat aid workers include blogging for folks back home, smoking, sleep aids, jargon and personal drama. Sounds like expat aid workers are just like everybody else. I get the detached irony of the posts, the double hypocrisy. I enjoy the personal blogs of SEAWL’s creators, but SEAWL reminds tragically of hipsters.

I recently put aside half a Saturday to watch ‘On the Trail of Genghis Khan‘, a documentary about a journey by Tim Cope, beginning in Mongolia and ending in Hungary – on horseback. What was planned as an 18 month journey took three years. I was inspired by the way Tim approached the people, traditions and conditions he encountered over those three years. Despite the extreme hardships of loneliness, weather, and tragedy he was always incredibly humble when meeting others. He seem to truly feel a connection with just about everyone he met, never placing himself above them, and always open to receiving their wisdom, knowledge and goodwill. Despite the journey he was undertaking, Tim never seemed to think of himself as exceptional. David Foster Wallace. Tim Cope. Me. You. Those who work in the aid and development sector are not unique or exceptional. Just fortunate.

Tips:

• Don’t refer to yourself as an ‘aid worker’
• Don’t refer to yourself as an ‘expat’
• Read David Foster Wallace’s superb speech to Kenyon College grads in 2005
• Practice humility
• Watch ‘On the Trail of Genghis Khan’
• Avoid generalisations about cultures, people, history, and pretty much the entirety of human achievement (recurring tip)
• And, as always, be aware of Greeks bearing gifts

Update 18th May 2011

Since not everyone is on Twitter, I wanted to post the replies we received from the creators of SEAWL. We offered to post a full reply if they have one, but are still waiting.

Courtesy of a good friend of mine, I recently read this speech, by American author David Foster Wallace to graduate students at Kenyon College in 2005. If you have a spare 10 minutes, I wholeheartedly encourage you to head over and have a read. The central theme of Foster Wallace’s talk was that our “default setting” is to think that the world revolves around us, and therefore everything that occurs in our lives only happens because it has an effect on us. After all, we can only see the world through our own perspective, there are no other sets of eyes which we can use. However, Foster Wallace strongly advocated for the need to push past this, and to constantly remind ourselves that there are a whole number of other perspectives and lives going on, regardless of ours. Doing this, he felt, was a vital part of being a far better communicator, a far better writer, and most importantly, a far better human.

From a young age, Foster Wallace himself was tainted with the tag of “genius”. He was constantly praised for his achievements in class, on the sporting field, in his books. He wrote his first novel, The Broom of the System, at the age of 24. Ten years later, his second novel, Infinite Jest, was published, and it now sits in Time’s list of the 100 Best Novels since 1923, putting him alongside authors such as Hemingway, Orwell and Steinbeck. Foster Wallace didn’t complete a third novel, however. At the age of 46, he committed suicide by hanging himself with a belt. He had suffered through depression for more than 20 years, and it had finally gotten the better of him.

Although Foster Wallace may have been seen by many to be a modern-day genius, what he excelled in most was an absolute denial of this idea. He was exceptionally keen on the idea that he was really no different from anyone else, that he was not exceptional, and that the world continued to go on regardless of whether he was there or not. Listening to his own words, this realisation becomes immediately apparent:

“I gotta tell you, I just think to look across the room and automatically assume that somebody else is less aware than me, or that somehow their interior life is less rich, and complicated, and acutely perceived than mine, makes me not as good a writer. Because that means I’m going to be performing for a faceless audience, instead of trying to have a conversation with a person … I treasure my regular-guyness. I’ve started to think it’s my biggest asset as a writer. Is that I’m pretty much just like everybody else.”

David Foster Wallace addresses students at Kenyon College in 2005.

For me, I think you could replace the word “writer” with “development worker” and it would still have the same effect. As a writer, Foster Wallace was able to connect with his readers in ways that other authors couldn’t, because he was able to speak from an everyman perspective. For those working in development, the same attitude can be adopted. One of the most oft repeated lines in development is that for programs to work, we need to get away from the model of donor and recipient, and move towards a model of empowerment, a model that values the voices of everyone, not just those with Masters degrees. From a purely practical point of view, there is no point coming into an area and forcing your ideas on others, if, once you leave, those ideas are not accepted. I believe we can take Foster Wallace’s recognition that we are not inherently any more superior, or any more important, and apply it to our field too.

Many of us live in a world that could easily make us think that we are the centre of it. We are often praised for our achievements, we often excel in what we do, and we are often told that the world is full of boundless opportunities, if only we apply ourselves. Of course, praise has its place when deserved, and can serve an important purpose, but it can lead to losing sight of where we stand in the big picture. Although many of us are put in places of privilege, it is imperative to understand the true meaning of the word “serve”.

Perhaps the greatest exponent of that concept was Gandhi. In his autobiography, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Gandhi said (emphasis is mine):

“Service can have no meaning unless one takes pleasure in it. When it is done for show or for fear of public opinion it stunts the man and crushes his spirit. Service which is rendered without joy helps neither the servant nor the served. But all other pleasures and possessions pale into nothingness before service which is rendered in a spirit of joy.”

In a short piece entitled The Nature of the Fun, Foster Wallace speaks of a similar parallel in the world of writing. He speaks of how initially, people tend to write simply because they think it is fun, until they are (unfortunately) recognised as having talent. After this point, it can become more about trying to write for others; for recognition, for adoration or for respect. Foster Wallace doesn’t only believe that this primarily serves the ego and vanity, it leads to, as he puts it “shitty fiction”.

I believe that by ignoring the true meaning of the word “serve”, we too can fall into the trap of “shitty development”. The following table, courtesy of How Matters, adequately illustrates this point:

Image courtesy of How Matters

We live in a world where it is easy to fall into the trap of the “default setting” that Foster Wallace described when speaking to Kenyon College graduates in 2005. All around us, we see examples of vanity and self-centredness becoming the norm. A recent analysis of modern day song lyrics showed that words such as “I” and “me” are more commonly used than ever before. Our obsession with Charlie Sheen and his obsession with winning, while amusing for 3.5 seconds, is a sad reflection on the pervasiveness of our voyeurism and the value we put on self-praise and chest-beating. And finally, my favourite study of recent times, women (as compared to men), who posted more photos of themselves and had the largest social networks on Facebook, are more likely to value their self worth according to their appearance, and use social networking as a method to seek attention.

As development workers, what can we conclude from all of this, and what is the best way forward? I think it involves taking the ego out of the equation, and removing that temptation to think that we are perhaps smarter, more special and more insightful than others. As tragic as Foster Wallace’s death was, there’s still a very important lesson to be learnt in the way he lived his life.

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