The
following is in response to Emily Troutman's
First
of all, many cheers to Troutman for the insightful coverage of the outrageous
situation in Nepal.
Her
piece sadly outlines major mistakes (in some cases willful conniving) of an aid
industry motivated by high profits and high salaries with huge outlays of
resources—the aid industry swooped in after the quakes and has irreversibly
shaken Nepal by their mistakes (on top of decades of indefinite aid that has
warped society).
The
Nepali people by and large know that they are being conned or rather used while
they continue to suffer chronic poverty and marginalization and other
ill-effects up to the ultimate cost of death for the unwitting (to give them
the benefit of the doubt) crimes of an aid cohort in collusion with a
dysfunctional status quo.
The
people are not blind to the malfeasance of the government and pampered,
high-living, high-salaried aid entrepreneurs creating an aftershock of chaos Nepal. The aid industry and ruling class that they abet are benefiting off the weakened
backs of a disenfranchised people who are basically on life-support.
It
is astonishing that after a valid critique and pointing out massive complications and dilemmas in
the aid industry, Troutman then offers a list of suggestions….namely
suggestions for giving a green light to the continued aid boondoggle that she
has just revealed. That is, she admits deep troubles (troubles that have caused
a prolonged suffering, in some cases lethal suffering, for the people), but
rather than shut it down, she suggests moving ahead after the fixes.
As
far as I can tell, these suggestions are necessary but not implementable. They would
require among other things
a) transparency
top to bottom from aid agents on the ground up to the decision makers behind
the scenes and all people along a tortuous chain of implementation from ideas
to implementation
b)
honest, Nepal-savvy aid agents and liaisons
c)
trustworthy local counterparts and liaisons
d)
omniscient oversight
Without
all of the above elements improbably in place, then intervention will not have a chance
to be even remotely successful. In other words, the chances are still quite
slim to nil given the difficulty in implementing the above, particularly proper oversight.
Even
if possible, even under the best case scenario of all of suggestions neatly and
cleanly in place (which is a long, long way off from a great proportion of
groups trying to effect change in Nepal) aid would have to operate through a
dysfunctional status quo to be allowed the permission to attempt to change
her---this should be an immediate red flag and show-stopper—that is, going
through the very dysfunctional status quo underlying the problems means that aid
will itself be distorted no matter how well-intentioned it might be.
Perhaps this is the main concern and take away point that can neither be overlooked nor escaped while operating under a dysfunctional system: aid operates through the governing system no matter how dysfunctional and illegitimate.
That is, by working with and going through a dysfunctional
system in order to be given permission to be operational, the aid industry
takes an inescapable and unacceptable risk of being part and parcel of the very
system causing the problems. Thereby the aid industry becomes associated with those prolonging
a deathly suffering as they necessarily abet and collude with (knowingly and most often unknowingly) the dysfunctional
system that allows them to operate in Nepal.
As
2015 Nobel Prizewinner in Economic Sciences Angus Deaton
points out:
“Aid undermines what poor people need most: an effective
government that works with them for today and tomorrow.”
In
other words, "Poverty is not a matter of experts, it's a matter of
human rights", according to Economics Professor W. Easterly of New
York University. Unfortunately, aid violates both ends of Easterly’s vital
message. Aid sends in so called experts (curiously, many are illiterate about
local customs and language) and aid undermines human rights by working
with the ruling gang brutalizing it’s own people--a double whammy that
goes against the very poverty that the aid industry is striving to
eliminate. The local people are more than capable and talented enough to take care of their own needs and follow their own dreams--if given the chance.
With
all due respect, I am a firm believer that the greatest and most important
change and perhaps the only change that will ultimately start the momentum in
the other direction is that the ruling class get out of the way, in other words, a change in governance. Anything short of that, anything
else risks abetting and colluding with continued mal-governance causing the problems
that aid attempts to solve. Anything less leads to more of the same and is
harmful to the people under the yoke of unethical decision makers of the ruling
class and a misguided aid paradigm… not to mention the devastating effects on a
swiftly vanishing culture, too.
I
truly believe that the easiest (and paradoxically most difficult) answer might
be extraordinarily simple. Would that these aid agents and think tanks simply
quit Nepal--they up and left Nepal and Nepalis alone. As Troutman notes in her assessment, the
signals are clear and present that quake aid has severe problems. Why isn’t the aid
industry aware of and heeding the signals?
Although
even if the outsiders did pull out and stop interfering (as Troutman keenly
points out, intervening with scant knowledge of the issues, people, language,
culture and society that they are attempting to alter), even so, the elite,
entitled and empowered ruling class isn't about to cede any power. Still, at
least a source of major external funding would dry up and that might be a watershed first
step to make the ruling gangsters more answerable to internal forces and entities, namely the people, rather than
external entities and forces.
Unfortunately,
there is too much money and leverage already woven into the warp and weft of
the fabric of the power structure, and the quakes have allowed unethical
players to weave an even more entangling pattern.
When
I last was in Nepal in April 2016, it was the worst that I have ever seen it
there--from the spirit and morale of the people to infrastructure, state of
political and economic activities, the web of political and foreign
entanglements and money grubbing interplay…widespread disasters--perhaps the
country needs to totally bottom out before going the other direction –dismally,
that would mean more deathly suffering as collateral damage to a long
suffering, long-disenfranchised people).
The
Nepalese people and culture are not forever immune...the cultural ethos may be
soon lost if it hasn't been already--the 'bad guys' are winning big at this
point which means the people are losing big...not a few of them their health
and lives.
As Economist Dambisa Moyo from Zambia cries out "Let my people go!" in reference to the
indefinite aid paradigm that has decimated countries it has touched in
Africa. Her data-driven books Dead Aid and How the West Was Lost outline the incriminating evidence.
At
any rate, that's the looking glass through which I peer. Perhaps I am a
pessimist-- that might be an entirely accurate label of my cloudy outlook. At
least I hope to be somewhat of a realist, too. It is a pretty hard outlook regardless.
Cheers
for considering this response that is perhaps too long winded—too
impassioned about the effects of aid, corruption and exploitation on a country
and people whom I love and admire.
More reading about this topic can be found at Nepal's Lost Horizon (http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2016/07/22/post-quake-nepal-is-still-reeling-1-year-later-for-all-the-wrong-reasons/)
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