Good Intentions Are Not Enough

Pick up your local newspaper after any disaster and you’re likely to encounter a story about someone from your area saving lives, a photo of a movie star or other well-known person flying in shoes or clothes, or stories of international search and rescue teams pulling people from the rubble. Rarely will you see stories about local people, charities, or the government helping in the rescue efforts. Yet the majority of people rescued after every disaster are saved by family members, neighbors, by-standers, and local disaster response teams.

Our news coverage is so focused on Whites in Shining Armor that my sister-in-law, who is well-educated, reads two newspapers each day, and is an avid NPR listener, was surprised to learn that locally run charities exist outside of the Western world. Why did this surprise her? Because she never hears news stories about local non-profits. Yet there are locally run nonprofits all over the world, even in Myanmar with it’s military junta. When Cyclone Nargis stuck Myanmar over 500 local charities and community based organizations contributed to the response efforts, but they received little if any news coverage.

Why don’t news outlets cover the work of local organizations more? Nicholas Kristof, Op-Ed Columnist for the New York Times, provides some insight in his response to a question posed to him from the author of the blog Texas in Africa. The question was essentially why do “many of his columns about Africa seem to portray ‘black Africans as victims’ and ‘white foreigners as their saviors.’” Kristof admitted “That very often I do go to developing countries where local people are doing extraordinary work, and instead I tend to focus on some foreigner, often some American, who’s doing something there”. Why the focus on Whites in Shining Armor? Kristof says that having a foreign protagonist is the best way to capture the interest of his readers.

This is the same technique your local paper is using. If they were to print a story about an Asian charity doing work in their community somewhere in Asia the story would very likely not get many readers. But a story of a hometown boy or girl going to that exact same village to do charity work has a local spin and local interest. Thus the story line of Whites in Shining Armor is endlessly repeated.

Charitable advertising perpetuates this misperception as well. In order to get people to pick up the phone and give, charity advertisements show only the worst of the problem. They do not mention the work of any local organizations or the government as this would detract from the urgency of the message. The stereotype of Whites in Shining Armor is reinforced by the commercial’s main message – they are the only ones that can help.

Does your charity, social venture project, or news outlet perpetuate or break the Whites in Shining Armor stereotype?

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Articles linked to in this post:

A Numbers Game – Wanderlust

Support to local initiatives in the Nargis response: a fringe versus mainstream approach – Humanitarian Practice Network

the white man’s burden – Texas in Africa

Related Posts:

The Live Aid Legacy

Does your website inform or misinform donors?

Media’s Impact on Aid

Do Charity Fundraising Activities Hurt the Very People They’re Trying to Help?

I’ve long pushed for more honesty and transparency on charity websites. There is a critical need for more real information and fewer “happy stories“. Recently I’ve seen what I’m hoping is a new trend of charities working to educate their donors.

• Pepy Tours does a nice job with their blog Lessons I Learned. I appreciate the fact that Daniela delves into the issues surrounding voluntourism. I also respect that she is willing to admit her own organization’s mistakes and what they have learned from them. Read the rest of this entry »

I want to thank all of you that took a couple of minutes to fill out the survey for me. For people that meant to take the survey but never quite got around to it, here’s the link. While I’m still mulling over and processing the results, there were findings from the survey that I found interesting enough to share right away. Read the rest of this entry »

Although I think I have a pretty good handle on my readership, I could be wrong as there are many of you from whom I’ve never heard. This is your chance.

Please take a minute to fill out this survey and let me know who are you, why you read Good Intentions, and how this blog can be improved. In addition I am planning a variety of trainings starting late this fall and your feedback and suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Click here to complete the short survey – I’m especially interested in hearing from readers that have never been in contact with me. If you read but don’t comment – please take a few minutes to let me know a little about you.

Update: Thanks so much to the 107 people that have filled out the survey thus far. Your feedback has been extremely useful and much appreciated.

The Smart Aid Initiative has submitted a panel idea to South by Southwest for their 2011 Interactive session. Our idea made the first cut and is now out for public vote. If you’re interested in seeing this topic make it to South by Southwest please take a minute and vote for it on the panel picker. Here’s a summary of our proposed panel:

In April 2010 a project was launched to send 1 million used t-shirts to Africa. The project was well-intentioned, but it was also based on several classic aid mistakes. Its social media profile was high enough that it caught the attention of aid professionals who blog. Within the course of just two weeks over 60 blog posts were written about the project from an incredible range of people. The ongoing and heated debate finally lead to an international round table with people from 4 continents participating. It also caught the attention of TIME magazine who covered the debate in their online edition. Somewhere between a case study and a debate, the panel will discuss the outcome of the debate, and what was learned from it, from the aid blogger and social venture points of view. It will also discuss some recent initiatives attempting to harness the power of social media for social good.

Questions Answered

• What lessons did social venture projects learn from 1millionshirts?

• What lessons did aid bloggers learn from 1millionshirts?

• How can the power of social media best be used to provide feedback on ideas as they’re developed?

• How can social media be used to identify or solve problems in the field?

• What should you know before starting an aid organization or social venture project?

And here’s where you vote.

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Related Posts:

What aid workers think of the 1 million shirts campaign

1 million Jasons

Lessons not learned: The 1 million shirts guys are at it again

Jason Calls it Quits

Due to the flooding in Pakistan this article has is being reposted

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Do determine if the country is accepting international assistance
It may seem impossible that governments would not want outside assistance with photos and videos of the destruction all over the evening news. However, just because there has been a disaster does not mean that the local government and local aid organizations are not capable of reaching those in need. Before sending your donation find out what, if any, assistance the government is allowing. Check to see if the aid organization you’re considering donating to is offering that same type of assistance. Read the rest of this entry »

Donated Clothing

This photo was taken over a year after the 2004 tsunami. With no need for the donated clothing the government boarded up a parking lot to store it. The clothing, kept in black plastic bags, molded in the heat and humidity.

Donated Tractor

This photo was sent from J., author of Tales from the Hood.

The tractor was used until one small part went bad. The replacement had to be ordered from America. No one knew how to describe the part and it took forever to arrive. In the meantime people started scavenging parts from the tractor to use for other things. Years passed by. Now they just farm the old-fashioned way – with buffaloes that don’t need spare parts….

Do you have a photo of Donated Goods – Gone Bad? Send them to me along with a short history of what went wrong.

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Related Links:

What a Waste: Video of unusable donated medicine and machinery

A global Graveyard for Dead Computers – NYT

Related Post:

The worst in-kind donations

The subject of poverty tourism keeps resurfacing in the aid world. The general crux of the debate is whether it’s OK to pay to look at poor people/areas. Proponents state that visiting other areas helps us understand the world and become more compassionate and better donors. Opponents argue that it’s exploitative of poor people and really doesn’t add much to the viewers understanding of complicated issues.

The following is a list of blogs/articles that debate this topic. Please feel free to recommend others.

Recent posts

Our Most Important Job – How Matters – “A great article by writer J.B. MacKinnon last year entitled, “The Dark Side of Volunteer Tourism” grounds me. He wrote, ‘First, nothing is likely to stop the increase in person-to-person contact between people of the richer nations and people of the poorer. Second, there is much to be gained on both sides from this exchange. Third, those gains will be made through a series of small, personal, humbling errors.’”

Poverty Tourism: A Debate in Need of Typological Nuance – Staying for Tea – Toward a Common Language and Taxonomy of Poverty Tourism

On poverty tourism: my two African cents - Project Diaspora - “You really want change? Put down the camera, walk up to anyone in that slum, get to know them.”

Slumdog Tourism – NYT Op-Ed – “Slum tourism turns poverty into entertainment, something that can be momentarily experienced and then escaped from.”

Dilemmas – Dispatches – “Needing to see and understand poverty, even though we are not poor, is a dilemma we have to live with.”

Previous posts

The Pity Industry – LTO Cambodia – “Consider very carefully your real motivations before engaging in this sort of dubious ‘volunteer work.’ Those who are honest with themselves may very well find it’s more about the warm and fuzzy feelings generated in themselves by supposedly helping these children than by actually helping them.”

The Dark Side of Volunteer Tourism – Utne Reader – “First, nothing is likely to stop the increase in person-to-person contact between people of the richer nations and people of the poorer. Second, there is much to be gained on both sides from this exchange. Third, those gains will be made through a series of small, personal, humbling errors.”

A new brand of poverty tourism – Next Billion – “It’s easy to go on debating whether these tours are right or wrong, but it may be more practical to delineate aspects that make the tours more sensitive to and empowering for the local communities”

Poverty Safari – Aid Thoughts - “You too, from the safety of your 4×4, can get to experience the overwhelming poverty of the Rwandan people, only to escape back to your hotel in the evening.”

Slum Tourism in Kibera: Education or Exploitation? – Brain Ekdale – “While I do not pretend to speak on behalf of Kibera residents, I would argue there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to visit Kibera.”

Poverty tourism is getting a lot of attention lately – UN Dispatch – “Shifting modes from gawking guests to paying tourists makes it clear to host communities that they possess things of value.”

When is it appropriate for a donor to visit an aid recipient – Good Intentions are Not Enough – “Education, Not Titillation”

Development Tourism: thinking out loud… – Tales from the Hood – “Appropriate, structured cultural exchange can be a very positive thing.”

Development Tourism – Is It Good? – Lessons I Learned – “My thoughts are, it’s not black and white – it’s not ‘all good’ or ‘all bad’.”

Jeffry Sach’s Misguided Foreign Aid Efforts – Huffington Post – “On a brochure for a tour of Jeff Sachs’ Millenium Village in Rwanda, managed by one of Sachs’ Columbia University colleagues, Rule #1 is ‘Please do not give anything to the villagers — no sweets, cookies, empty water bottles, pens or even money.’”

Should starving people be tourist attractions? – Aid Watch -”I agree with Wade that it is dehumanizing that the villagers are just exhibits for tourists teaching them about abstractions like ‘poverty traps,’ and are also to be used as propaganda for the MVs’ ‘successful intervention.’”

Response from tourism operator to “Should starving people be tourist attractions” - Aid Watch – “Ms. Wade was totally misguided and misinformed, and used her personal grudge against the MVP to maliciously attack our tourism project and, thereby, our work as a whole.”

Response to MV tourism operator on “Should starving people be tourist attractions?” - Aid Watch – “Respecting the individuality, humanity, and dignity of every person, no matter how poor, is a sacred and fundamental cause.”

Giving tourists a look at gang culture – NYT – “A group of civic activists is preparing to offer bus tours of some of the grittiest pockets of the city, with profits funneled back into the community.”

Slum tourism: Visitors see the “real” Jakarta – CNN – “He said his tours were also about educating foreigners on real issues facing the country.”

And Now For Something Completely Different: Davos Features “Refugee Run” – Aid Watch – “When somebody sent me this invitation from Antonio Guterres, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, I thought at first it was a joke from the Onion.”

“Poverty Tours Travel a Fine Line” – Christian Science Monitor – “Does peeking at how the other five-sixths lives preserve culture – or commodify it?”

“On Paying Money to Look at Poor People” – To Africa from New York Blog – “If you didn’t pay to take a tour of Mayange, but instead drove out there yourself, brought a translator, and bumbled from homestead to homestead asking the same questions, would you be described as an exploitative voyeur?”

Disaster Tourism – Good Intentions are Not Enough – “What is interesting and educational to you may be intrusive and demoralizing to them”

Imagine walking into Wendy’s or Burger King (or whatever fast food restaurant you frequent) and insisting that you will only pay for whatever is actually on your hamburger. You’ll give them money for the cost of the bun, ketchup, hamburger patty, and pickles. But you refuse to pay for staff wages, building rental, electricity, the iconic golden arches, and certainly not a cent of your money should go to Superbowl commercials. Imagine what would happen if McDonalds attempted to run their business using only volunteers and selling their hamburgers out of whatever space they could get donated to them. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m traveling to DC and so won’t be writing any new posts this week. This is an older post that I feel is worth reposting.
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From the Kenyan newspaper the Daily Nation:

Mosquito net manufactures are teaming up with the provincial administration and village elders in several parts of Kenya in an effort to apprehend and prosecute people who use the products for purposes other than covering beds. Read the rest of this entry »