Humanitarian Assistance and the perpetuation of poverty and inequality

 

Over the years, several humanitarian agencies and non-government organizations have been visiting and working in Ghana with the primary but gargantuan aim of alleviating poverty among the rural poor and vulnerable, especially women. For instance, CARE started operations in Ghana in 1994 and has since expanded to Togo and Benin. I find it interesting that their projects are funded through partnerships with local and civil organizations (care.org) who donate so much money, yet there is little evidence to support what the funds were used for. Of course, a one-off intervention (mostly food) passed through some ‘gate-keepers’ (who keep a lion’s share for themselves) cannot defeat poverty and achieve social justice as is boldly written on their website. A search on the revenue CARE generated through contributions and grants in 2018 revealed an amount of $602,938,894 (care.org). It is no wonder that Trauger and Fluri (2019) refer to humanitarian and development agencies as being in the “business of international development.” A business in which facilitators, development workers, and other business owners enrich themselves to the disadvantage of the intended recipients. 

Foreign aid: Are we really helping others or ourselves?

             Another international humanitarian agency working in Ghana is Global communities: Partners for good. Information on their website indicates they prioritize rural development. Yet, most of the ‘success’ stories they have on their website (globalcommunities.org) are USAID and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded programs that they supported to implement. Most of these over-hyped projects are in Accra, Ghana’s capital city, and not among the rural ‘poor.’

            Humanitarian and international development agencies hire celebrities to advocate and advertise their programs for fundraising purposes. These celebrities are seen lauding these agencies’ activities and praising them for improving the lots of vulnerable people in society through mainstream media outlets.  However, they (celebrities) are rarely seen discussing the root cause and driving force behind gender, sexuality, class, race, status, and other forms of inequality that exist within various geographical locations.

        As Trauger and Fluri (2019) justifiably observed, the CARE Ghana and Global communities’ websites are splashed with women and children who are posed as the most vulnerable and poor and used to persuade philanthropists and donors to continue funding projects that deepen inequality and aggravate the situation of these people. I repeat the question posed by Truager and Fluri (2019) here: If celebrities, wealthy philanthropists, government, and non-governmental organizations give and generate funds towards poverty alleviation, why do poverty and economic inequality persist?

Is it an issue about the approach adopted by these agencies in their aid provision, or is it just one of the adverse effects of capitalism?

References

Trauger, A., & Fluri, J. L. (2019). Engendering development: capitalism and inequality in the global economy. Routledge.

 https://www.globalcommunities.org/ghana

https://www.care.org/our-work/

Intersectionality in its Simplest Form

     As I read on intersectionality in the book Engendering Development: Capitalism and Inequality in the Global Economy, Trauger and Fluri (2019) states that the intersectional approach observes various forms of overlapping oppression. I was glad that the reading addressed this topic. Being a woman is one thing, but being a black woman is another. This week I came across a Ted talk by Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw, who defined intersectionality.

Intersectionality 

     She described the term as the overlapping of social dynamics such as racism and sexism that leads to multiple levels of social injustice. In her Ted talk, she gave an example of an encounter she had with an African American lady named Emma DeGraffenreid. Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw shared Emma DeGraffenreid’s story with the audience, explaining how Emma sought better employment from a local manufacturing plant. However, she did not get hired. Emma believed that this was because she was a black woman. She took it to court, but unfortunately, her case was dismissed by the judge. The judge argued that the reason for the dismissal of Emma’s case was because the employer hired both African Americans and women. Therefore, the case would have no stance for either racism or sexism. The judge was not willing to acknowledge what Emma’s actual case was about. She argued that the African Americans who were hired were all men and the women who were hired were all white. Emma was thereby facing a case of double discrimination, one being that she was a woman and the other being that she was black.

Social Dynamics

     In the world today, we realize how pertinent this issue is and its impact on society as a whole. Emma’s experience may just be one of many cases that are occurring around us on a daily basis. People may be losing opportunities each day because of such intersectionalities that involve multiple crossroads of social dynamics that may put them at the mercy of society. The problem occurs when society fails to recognize these intersectionalities and acts as though they don’t exist, just like the Judge who dismissed Emma’s case.

    In this Ted talk, it highlights the realities that women of color face each day. It hinges on the fact that their experiences are not the same as the white woman. Intersectionality thus urges society to consider all social dynamics at the crossroad that may lead to multiple overlapping forms of social injustices.

Video on Intersectionality

References:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWP92i7JLlQ

Trauger, Amy and Jennifer L. Fluri. (2019). Engendering Development: Capitalism and Inequality in the Global Economy. New York: Routledge.

Kiva and the Managerial Effect

“Relend your $48.36” reads the subject line. I open the email, click the bright blue “Lend your $48.36 now” button, and land on the Kiva site. This time the landing page shows “Crisis Support Loans.” Help moringa farmers in rural Ghana make it through disruptions caused by COVID-19 or help supply electricity and sanitation to those in rural Kenya?

 

 

 

I’ve been a micro-loan participant on Kiva for the past 4 years. Initially I was extremely uncomfortable with the platform. I still am, though the discomfort has worn down through repetition. What does it mean for me, a White, male, heterosexual, cisgender, 30-something, able bodied, cogno-normative American—i.e. someone at the apex of privilege globally—to search through listings of those in need, deciding who to allocate my small amount of money to? It’s an incredibly icky feeling that seems to reassert that privilege. Like in the Dave Eggers novel You Shall Know Our Velocity, in which the protagonist (similar to me in terms of identity) receives a windfall and travels around the world to hand it out to people, an existential payment against the vagaries of his youth. He can’t get over the grossness of picking, somewhat at random, who to give life changing amounts of money to, but it’s important to him to be taking on that giving himself, directly, rather than through an organization.

 

Of course, the amount of money I can lend is not life changing, and it’s routed through different agencies: first Kiva and then the field organization coordinating the loan (aside from less frequent direct loans from Kiva). I spent hours deciding on the first couple of loans I made due to anxiety over choosing “correctly” so as to do the most good (however defined). At times I let the money sit in my account to avoid the stress and time commitment of choosing. If that isn’t lazy privilege, what is? (I must not have been the only doing this because Kiva recently instituted automatic lending if money sits in your account for an extended period.) Eventually I set a few criteria to streamline the lending process and to keep the money out there, in the hands of others. Now, here in a Gender & Development class, it seems like a good time to reevaluate those criteria in light of GAD readings (from Kabeer in particular). Below are my historical criteria followed by an assessment in terms of class material, along with where these screenings lead today.

 

1.     Lend only to women, preferably a collective
I’m still comfortable with this. The GAD perspective as explicated by McIlwaine & Datta shows us that men may need to be part of the development process too, but Kiva doesn’t screen for feminist loans. They do, however, screen for women. I hope that the collective model allows for more good to be done, with more safety for the loan. When I click on this today, I see 10,822 loans to choose from.

 

2.     Avoid defaults
Of course I want my money returned so that I can lend it again. This is the managerial perspective at work. What loans am I missing that might be more impactful by screening this way? Potentially many thousands. Which actually becomes another reason for this screen: safety and a means for further reducing the number to consider. Like a harried manager with little time, I choose the screening option that shows the safest options that reduce the potential loans by the most. This criteria does not sit well with me. Kiva buries these controls under a light grey Filters button, then under another light grey button labeled “Advanced Filters.” I set the default rate to 0% and am down to 450 loans.

 

3.     Avoid risk
As with defaults, I want to avoid risk. See above for my reservations about this criteria. Kiva has a risk meter based on their assessment of the field partner coordinating the loan. At the lowest setting, 0 loans are displayed. I adjust until loans repopulate on my screen: 98 possibilities.

 

4.     Don’t leak money
A final advanced filter concentrates on the profitability of the loan. Again, my reservations are noted above under 2. Avoid defaults. I don’t loan to make money (if that were my aim, there are clearly efficient ways), but I also don’t want to lose money so that I can’t relend. The profitability bar ranges from -30% to 45%. I set this to 0% and still see 98 loans. At 3% there are no loans. All 98 loans offer a potential 1% return.

 

5.     What I don’t consider: delinquency rate, average cost to borrower, direct vs. partner loan
I should consider cost to the borrower. My goal isn’t to enrich the field partner. Doing so would be just performing my own role in a top-down development scheme. I adjust the bar and find that the lowest cost to the borrower is 20%. The field partner will make ~19% on my loan. Presumably this is the same partner because the same 98 loans, all in Senegal, are represented. I have trouble stomaching such profiteering. I go back and increase risk until I have a new set of loans, then reduce cost of loan to borrower to 0. Better to increase the risk of my entire loan than to charge the borrower more. Of course, that means the Senagalese borrowers are all eliminated. Are they less deserving? Are my qualms about the field partner enough to mean these people shouldn’t be considered? I now see 32 loans, all in Nicaragua. Sometimes I deliberately search by region but these steps usually limit loans to my target area, the Global South. One time I did lend within the United States. It’s the only loan that I’ve ever had default.

 

6.     Sectors, Attributes, Tags
32 loans. This is the sifting step. This is where class readings should come more directly into play. Support the group that wants to buy more soda to sell for their shop? The member who wants to buy coffee, corn, and a pig? I look for loans that bespeak empowerment, not just contributing to ongoing capitalist normalcy. Loans connected to education, green projects, or art catch my eye. One loan is marked “Female education.” I check the box and view “Recuerdo Group’s story” about a young woman and mother who works as a cook on a farm, sells food on the weekends, and is in the third year of a business administration degree. She needs funds to buy ingredients to support her college expenses and, eventually, to maybe own a grocery store in the underdeveloped region of rural northwest Nicaragua. I click the blue Lend now button and checkout, taking care to uncheck the automatic $3.75 donation to Kiva each loan usually includes. A message on the final page:

 

James, thanks to you, 1 borrower is closer to their dreams!

 

Is this the “most effective” loan to choose? I have no idea and I’m starting to think that that question is a red herring. I do know that my decision was uncomfortably guided by the managerial perspective, even as I tried to incorporate GAD considerations into the decision making process. The better answer may be to cash out my Kiva money that lets me enjoy a bullshit Global North sense of informed control, judiciousness, and agency, and to instead donate it directly to an experimental development group that doesn’t seek to repay me. What little money I can give I want to be in the right GAD hands, and I’m not sure Kiva is able to do that. Any suggestions for what to do with this $25 once it comes back to me in 16 months?

 

Women still in pre-WID era: The course for “ideal bride” in the 21st century.

The welfare approach or pre-WID was introduced in the early 1950s and 1960s designed to bring women into development as “better mothers” (Moser, 1993). The rationale was that women were passive recipients of development and emphasis should be on enhancing their motherhood and reproductive role. The “top-down” handouts tactic was implemented i.e. goods and services were provided without the participation of gender organizations in the planning process to achieve practical gender needs of women. These practical needs included family planning, family food provision, housing, and basic services.

Family Institute in Hyderabad, India recently released two posters promoting the “Dulhan Course” and “Dulha-Dulhan Course” i.e. “Bridal Course” and “Groom-Bridal Course" respectively. These training courses are based on ‘top-down” handout tactic designed by misguided male planners. They train brides to be a “better wife” and can be taken “pre/post-marriage”.  The training comprises of budgeting, sewing, beauty tips among various other classes on “how to live a successful married life”. Womenfolk is promoted to learn only “women’s work” (Moser, 1993, p.59) i.e. home management, mehendi, cooking thereby creating more dependency on men rather than become independent.  These classes foster the ideology of traditional gender roles in the 21st century where women are put down to the menial task of achieving practical gender needs. Thus, these courses reinforce the beliefs of women’s domestic role and men’s role as the head of the family and principal provider.

Both the courses and welfare approach do not challenge the subordinate role of women. The courses further stereotype gender roles, endorse patriarchy, and train 21st-century women to be more efficient housewives. The posters underpin the hegemonic view of women as “home-makers” where their job is to “win their husbands” and follow the “do’s and don’ts by husband”. Hence, it results not only in the oppression of women but also considers them as passive recipients in their marriage with the motto of only keeping their husbands happy. 

Moreover, these courses are problematic because they assume gender as a binary where cis-gender men marry only cis-gender women. It fails to address non-binary genders and other structures of marriages. They lack the dialogue of strategic gender needs encompassing equal participation of men and women in domestic labor and childcare.

Such pieces of training prove to be more harmful than beneficial as they advocate for the traditional role of genders and do not provide women any agency and power. These “family-oriented” welfare programs should be barred because they identify women as the problem instead of teaching them how to stand for themselves with educational training that will help them live independently and scrutinize traditional societal structures.

 

Link for the Family Institute website: https://familyinstituteindia.com/

 

References:

Kabeer, Naila. 1994. Treating Cancer with BandAid?: The theoretical underpinnings of WID. Pp 11-39 in Reversed Realities. New York: Verso.

Moser, Caroline O. N. 1993. Third World Policy Approaches to Women in Development. Pp. 55-79 in Gender Planning and Development: Theory, Practice and Training. New York: Routledge.

Family Institute Hyderabad India. (n.d.) Designed to rediscover the value and impact of family life. https://familyinstituteindia.com/

 https://www.google.com/search?q=dulha+course&client=firefox-b-1-d&sxsrf=ALeKk02OShXWQE0DWVOMqZGmNliF8PLxuA:1601090974093&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik6Y3W8IXsAhXhlHIEHYk0BS0Q_AUoAnoECAsQBA&biw=1408&bih=667