Bolotwa, South Africa by Randy OHC
On Sunday February 07, we had our second Human Rights Cafe Dialogue at Three Bananas. We had a fairly good turn out and an even better discussion. The cafe was really supposed to be a discussion of the book Dead Aid by Dambisa Moyo but alas, only 2 people really got more than 2/3rds of the book so the discussion was more on aid/development politics. However, the book did start the party and it was a good party!
For the most part, I think most of the participants agreed that Dambisa Moyo’s premise–that bilateral/multilateral developmental aid (aid that is provided to governments, usually through the World Bank or the IMF) is harmful. This system of developmental aid, basically enables corrupt governments to pocket most of the aid with less than something like 25% of it reaching its citizens.
We also had a really great discussion along the lines of holistic country-building, taking into the need for human dignity when working with communities on the ground yet looking beyond the immediate needs and small geographical areas towards building the entire nation, which requires a degree of sacrifice on the grassroots level (without forgetting that the poorest of the poor exist still). We also had a long discussion about meeting the Social, Cultural and Political pillars, not just the Economic one, as necessities in building a country. We also had a good discussion on various initiatives that have been tried (the value of micro-lending, for example) and whether or not most aid development programs are actually helpful or just charity in disguise (charity, which gives “hand outs instead of a hand up”, as one participant so eloquently put it).
I think the group agreed that charity is not the way to go since it does very little to foster sustainable community development. There is also an inherent harm to good intentions such as the clothing you donate to Value Village. This clothing, if it does not sell in Canada or wherever it originates, gets shipped to various African countries and are essentially resold to merchants who then sell it to the public for a cost. This has a negative impact on the community because these donated clothes now takes away the livelihoods of clothiers and tailors.
We also discussed extensively the need for foreign investment and foreign capital in African markets to jump-start the economy and to foster competitive innovation. There was also an idea floating around that African countries should have their own trading blocs (similar to ASEAN or NAFTA or even the EU in its original form).
Unfortunately, the discussion revolving around development in Africa takes a lot longer than 2 hours (and really, a lifetime) but Dead Aid was a good conversation starter. When I’m done reading the book, I’ll be doing a review of it and adding a few thoughts to it as well.
Next Human Rights Cafe: March 7th, same place, same time. Check out the Events page for more details.
