The Tyranny of Compassion
Non Governmental Organisations bear part Nicholas McBride explains why these well of the responsibility for the debacle of disaster intentioned initiatives go so disastrously relief in Ethiopia, Sudan, and Somalia.
WITH THEIR RELIANCE on demeaning oictures of starving children and the like, relief agencies descend into disaster pornography. Alex De Waal of African Rights argues that the very concept of founding action for famine on com-passionate charity is flawed, because it relies on viewing the third world as the "supplicating world". And yet, the vast majority of the citizens of the third world are economically self-sufficient people, who find it degrading to be seen as in need of charity from abroad. Of course, marketing is by no means the major problem with relief efforts. 20 years ago Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia had excellent anti-famine projects. They received huge infusions of foreign food. So why is it, asks De Waal, that they today seem to be in a state of chronic hunger and dependence on foreign food? The answer is that there is more than just a correlation between massive westernled relief efforts, and vulnerability to famine. FAMINES CREATED BY CIVIL WAR demonstrate this disconcerting reality. Take Ethiopia and Rwanda. Civil wars in both countries impoverished the countryside. And generals discovered that famine is an excellent counter insurgency measure. The Ethiopian dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam succeeded in fooling much of the world that the weather was to blame for the Ethiopian famine. And he found a strategic use for the humanitarian relief which arrived as a result. He diverted substantial quantities of food aid to maintain his army, and used food distribution points to lure people away from insurgent-controlled areas towards garrison towns. And all this time, he gained bogus humanitarian credentials by permitting the relief effort to operate. And as De Waal notes, "other military commanders, notably in Sudan, Somalia and Angola, have discovered they can supply their forces wrong. courtesy of the World Food Programme". Similar embarrassment has resulted from the relief efforts in Rwanda. The UN believes that more than $700 m. has been spent on refugees, including the killers, while less than $300 m. has been provided for the victims and their rehabilitation. One UN official was quoted as saying "the refugees — that includes the killers — have been much better provided for than their victims... We know that food goes astray, reaching even the former army. And numbers of refugees are hiked up by the camp commanders so that they can get more". Another charge is also causing red faces. "The international community has been employing killers wholesale" claims Rakiya Omar of African Rights. "In the panic to be seen to be providing, most looked the other way, asking no questions of those who turned up to be interpreters, cooks, drivers or guards. Even when lists of people implicated in the genocide were available, they turned away". CONSIDERING THE BAD POLITICS USED IN marketing the disaster, and the naivité they display concerning their own efforts, the growing role of Non-
Governmental Organisations and the humanitarian agenda in filling the geo-political vacuum in countries like Rwanda and Angola 1S worrying. It partly reflects Western disinterest and the failure of World
Bank and UN programmes. As De
Waal comments, "a handful of white nurses in a feeding centre has a higher public profile than $10 m. to support a national health system".
Relief agency personnel have relished this opportunity, keen to be seen lobbying the UN and speaking authoritatively on TV about human rights, and the prospective of cease- fires.
Their frequent lack of expertise is only one of the problems. A more serious issue is the way these NGOs end up dominating the debate on poor and marginal countries, giving the impression that their role goes beyond a minor contribution to social welfare, and that they can provide answers to the problems these countries face. In Somalia, this led to the call, by a handful of private charities, for intervention by the US Marines. The invasion, which was to protect relief agencies, privileged them in the warstricken country above the population, which became effectively disenfranchised. The resulting fiasco should not have surprised anybody. The recipients of this tyranny compassion are increasingly bitter and resentful. There is an increasing estrangement between African professionals and the international charities, which increasingly form a hegemony of humanitarianism, above all criticism. As De Wall points out, good intentions are their own justification. But why has no one been sacked for the failure of relief efforts? Why are no public inquiries made? The author is a member of the New Zealand solidarity organisation CORSO. This organisation started as a fairly traditional 'aid" body, but became increasingly crifical as it was confronted with the reality of "aid interventio ns in the "third world".
International Viewpoint n° 274 23
* Disasterous relief
REFORM IS NOT EASY. THERE WILL ALWAYS be unscrupulous NGOs who take advantage of the opportunity for a simplistic emotional appeal, and thereby justify their own existence.
Similarly, there seems little chance of a more constructive role by the Western press, who are too ready to avoid analysis by wheeling out the disaster pornography clichés and making heros out of white relief field workers.
In countries like Rwanda, the problems are so grave and so complex, it is so difficult to conceive of solutions, that we are grateful for anyone trying. However, the need for accountability and transparency is a vital first step to reform.
• Ultimately, De Waal favours an International
Famine Commissioner, scrutinise able to international social welfare and call its practitioners to account.
More useful would be an abandonment of any relief effort modelled on previous efforts, in favour of a coordinated and effective effort organised and conceived by the
"victims" themselves, who can be
"empowered" (a favourite NGO word)
to help themselves, rather than always be the recipient of philanthropic imperialism.
Relief efforts within the affected areas should not be underrated. Before the invasion, Somali groups worked alongside the more enlightened foreign
NGOs to provide effective relief outside the capital city, Mogadishu.
And perhaps the worse famine crisis of the last 25 years, in Maharashta, India in 1973, was averted by the efforts of government, facing democratic pressures from those who faced starvation - politicians faced losing their jobs if they did not provide food. The government implemented measures to provide income to five million labourers, and set up 30,000
"fair price" shops to sell essentials.
Failure to provide relief would have been a political scandal.
The Maharatshta example provides valuable lessons:
people can and help themselves in democratic environment where actions are accountable and decision makers can be judged. But valuable example heartening message is buried by the ubiquitous face of a starving black child standing next to the heroic white reporter or glamorous nurse. Another tragedy of western-led disaster relief.
*
Notes
Sources: Alex De Waal, "Compassion fatigue", New
Statesman and Society, 17 March 1995, and "Mixed blessings of Rwandan aid", Guardian Weekly, 9 April 1995.
For a discussion of "disaster pornography", see "Every picture tells a story", by A. Choudry, Overview, February
1995. This article is reprinted from issue 54 of Overview, the quarterly newsletter of the solidarity organisation Corso, PO box 1905, Christchurch, New Zealand. Phone: (03) 477 3395, tax 474 0736, e-mail <d.small @ educ.canterbury.ac.nz>
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