The Haiti Aid Debacle: A Case for Community Organizing

It is becoming increasingly evident that the lack of local engagement by large international organizations has resulted in a breakdown of relief efforts in Haiti.

There are numerous reasons why international organizations do not foster coordination with and empowerment of local actors. A primary factor is the time and expense involved in developing local community infrastructure. Efficiency and scale are the primary measures that agencies are judged by in the development industry. Furthermore, community organizing does not produce an emotional response in potential donors. In the typical marketing that HSP avoids when it comes to development and relief services, it is understood that a message needs to be easily communicated and pull at the heartstrings.

If we visualize the development and relief industry in traditional market terms, we would have to ask what is the supply and who is the demand. Understanding that the foundation of market relationships is meeting demand, that becomes the salient question. While we would like to imagine that development engineers focus on the needs of an impoverished community, the reality is that they must meet the demands of donors. Without the donor’s funds, the majority of programming activities simply would not be possible. Therefore, it becomes paramount to meet the donor’s ideological, political and theological world view.

Another factor is the corporate structure of international development, relief, charity and faith organizations. Semantically, the difference between a corporation and a cooperative is very small, but in practice this difference has a tremendous impact on programming. A corporation exists to make itself money while a cooperative exists to make its members money. Investors gain value with the growth of a corporation. In a cooperative, the entity exists to facilitate the growth of the member.

If we analyze the usual relationship of community members with international development agencies, we can see relationships akin to an investor in a corporation. The community members are passive recipients. A significant difference is that they typically do not have any voice and management policies as a shareholder would have in a private enterprise. Their benefit is dependent on how large the agency becomes. Increases in funding are typically directed towards growing the size of the agency. Staff and personnel allegiances are with the agency rather than the community and are compensated based on the growth of the agency.

The relevance of these issues are striking when considering reports like those on today's Democracy Now.

Sasha Kramer witnessed that aid arrived quickly but was not able to be distributed for lack of local coordination. She noted that when the big aid organizations do circulate around Port-au-Prince they are in large vehicles with their window sealed. They are not able to develop good relationships with the community and do not speak Creole. These organizations are that have worked in Haiti for decades, but do not have the local contacts or organization to go out in the communities themselves.

Catherine Lane commented on how the security concerns before the earthquake limited the type of interactions you would expect people to have after working in the country for a long time. She said this lack of connections in the community is the main reason they are not able to get things out quickly and that this is a major failure in the way larger aid organizations function and in general.

This underscores HSP's methodology in focusing on community empowerment and fostering agency with partner organizations. This reinforces our commitment in staying the course even though it is very challenging.