Now comes an article in Foreign Policy by Clare Lockhart and Johanna Mendelson Foreman suggesting an approach to better cooperation between NGOs and the Haitian government. They prescribe dialogue. Rick Cohen, an editor for the Nonprofit Quarterly responds with doubt about the possibility of successful dialogue. Both of these articles are linked here below.
I urge my friends reading this blog to take a look at these two articles. I have attempted in my blogging to distinguish between help and development that is toxic and hurtful, on the one hand, and the work of building community-based capacity in Haiti that can receive and sustain our well-intended aid to the Haitian people on the other hand. In doing so, I have observed and pointed to the mission and methods of Haiti Outreach as an example of how to do things better.
The Haiti Outreach difference is that it finds ways to work with local communities to develop the capacity of the intended beneficiaries of capital resources to maintain clean and life-giving water systems. They partner with local and national officials to establish community-based authority. They make sure all who have responsibilities carry out those responsibilities with integrity and transparency. That includes Haiti Outreach, whose financial records, for instance, are published right on their website. Their program staff is virtually all Haitian.
So with those kinds of principles in mind, take a look at these two articles below. They aren't that long or difficult. See what you think about how we in the NGO world might act to be more effective in Haiti.
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