Hii Dunia

Girls to Women: Gendered Transitions to Adulthood in The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia

HiiDunia — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 12:54:38 +0000

The online version of this paper includes the Methodology but not the remainder of the paper, the Abstract, Abbreviations, Bibliography or Appendix. Please refer to the PDF Download for the full text.

Girls to Women: Gendered Transitions to Adulthood in The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. (64)

Author: Verity Powell

1. INTRODUCTION

The aim of this dissertation is to answer the question: To what extent does the construction of girlhood in Colombia contribute to girls’ decision to join leftist-guerrilla movements? The central hypothesis is that some girls in rural Colombia join leftist-guerrilla movements because of the limitations caused by the construction of girlhood in Colombia. As girls’ transition to womanhood, these constructions become increasingly restrictive and I hypothesise that in order to exercise their agency, some girls join FARC, attracted by their claims of gender equality, and the opportunity to experience adventure and freedom from gender norms and expectations.

To explore and expand upon this hypothesis, two separate literatures are systematically reviewed; firstly the literature regarding the conflict in Colombia and leftist guerrilla movements in Colombia, specifically The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Las Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, FARC), the use of child soldiers and gender within FARC, secondly the literature relating to gender equality and the construction of childhood, specifically girlhood, in Colombia. Then the two areas of literature are drawn together in order to answer the primary question: To what extent does gender inequality and the construction of girlhood in Colombia contribute to girls’ decisions to join leftist-guerrilla movements?

Outline of Chapters

The dissertation is laid out into several sections; a literature review, a methodology, three chapters and the conclusion.

The literature review starts by looking at the literature post-Cold War and the concept of “trauma” and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), followed by the development of the psycho-social and social-ecologies schools of thought. The literature exploring young peoples’ motivations for joining armed groups is reviewed, and finally an overview of the literature on child soldiers in Colombia.

The history of the conflict is explored in order to give a background to the conflict, and to explore how the conflict has shaped Colombian society, which is the backdrop to the research conducted.

The evolution of FARC is then chronicled. Despite there being several leftist-guerrilla movements in Colombia FARC was chosen for this dissertation as it is the largest, most prominent and currently active leftist-guerrilla group in Colombia (Gonzalez-Perez, 2006:321; Council on Foreign Relations, 2009). The chapter outlines how they grew out of the conflict in Colombia, the development of their political ideology and their involvement with the illegal drugs industry in Colombia. The role of child soldiers within FARC and gender within FARC is explored, including their claims of gender equality, the roles of female combatants and their status within FARC. The purpose of this chapter is to understand what FARC offers as an alternative for girls and why that makes it an organisation some Colombian girls want to join.

The final substantive chapter is the construction of girlhood in Colombia. This chapter explores how childhood is constructed in Colombia against a backdrop of endemic violence, a culture of machismo, large-scale internal displacement and limited access to resources. The purpose of this chapter is to identify factors that contribute to the construction of girlhood in Colombia.

The conclusion draws the dissertation to a close, bringing the chapters together and providing an analysis of the findings in order to answer the question: To what extent does the construction of girlhood in Colombia contribute to girls’ decisions to join leftist-guerrilla movements? Finally, I assess the validity of the hypothesis and find that the construction of girlhood is not the primary cause of girls joining FARC.

FARC has been labelled a terrorist organisation and a guerrilla movement, which raises the question, is there a difference between a guerrilla movement and a terrorist one? Guerrilla warfare is best described as a set of tactics used by a minority group within a state in order to oppose the government (Beckett, 1999:ix). Guerrilla groups are defined as “small groups who engage in unorthodox attacks on the state or its military apparatus, while terrorists target civilian populations in an effort to generate chaos and fear” (Gonzalez-Perez, 2006:314). Terrorists can employ guerrilla tactics and guerrillas can become terrorists if they attack civilians (Gonzalez-Perez, 2006:315). This is certainly true of FARC whose main aim is to oppose the government and do this by targeting military and governmental apparatus. However they have been known to commit atrocities against the civilian population.

Whether FARC is a guerrilla organisation or terrorist one is not very important to the hypothesis. I am looking at why girls in Colombia join leftist armed groups, and to that end the blurred lines of definition between guerrilla and terrorist groups are not what I aim to explore. However, I believe that FARC do terrorise the civilian population and that this is not an accidental side effect of their attacks on state apparatus. However, I will continue to define FARC as a guerrilla group whilst acknowledging that they have committed terrorist acts.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

Early literature on war-affected children
There is a substantial literature on war-affected children in the post-Cold War era. Kaldor (1999) describes these conflicts as “new wars”. Key characteristics of “new wars” are the lack of a clearly designated combat area, fighting occurring within states, the proliferation of small arms and the civilian population becoming viable targets for attack (Wells, 2009:143; Singer, 2006; Boyden & DeBerry, 2004; Kaldor, 1999). All of these factors increased the involvement of children in conflicts, as both victims and actors (Cohn & Goodwin-Gill, 1997:9; Ahlström & Nordquist, 1991:6–15).

The early literature focused on the effects of traumatic events and their psychological consequences as the primary area of interest for researchers and gave rise to a body of war-literature primarily focusing on “trauma” and specifically Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in war-affected children (Magwaza et al, 1993; Nader and Pynoos, 1993; Kinzie et al, 1986). This body of literature identified the effects of “trauma” and PTSD as negatively affecting the child not just during the time of trauma but as causing lasting, developmental deficits.

However, the research methods used to gather the data were later questioned because of the use of Western models of medicine and psychiatry and their failure to fully understand the experiences of war affected children, as well as cultural, racial, gender and class differences between children (Dyregrov et al, 2000; Garbarino & Kostelny, 1996; Hjern et al, 1991). The main critique of this area of the literature is that it identifies the child as an isolated entity and does not recognise the importance of wider societal relationships and the impact they have on the child and their rehabilitation. PTSD has also been identified by some as a Western social construct, following the war in Vietnam, and that its purpose was political in order to portray returning soldiers as victims rather than perpetrators of violence (Bracken, 2002; Summerfield, 2001). Despite this critique the concept of “trauma” and PTSD are still used in practice today.

Psychosocial and social ecologies
Moving away from the medical and psychiatric models established in the earlier literature, which focused on individual responses to events, the literature began to look at the wider societal impacts of war on children. Machel (2001) published a comprehensive review on the impact of war on children, exploring the many complexities surrounding war-affected children both as a direct consequence of conflict and the wider issues such as children being forcibly displaced, the impacts on children’s health and highlighted the importance of psychosocial recovery.

The Psychosocial and Social Ecologies school states that children are “shaped by the cultural, social and cultural contexts of their lives (Boothby et al, 2006:3). This model works on the central premise of “resilience”, focusing on “coping, resilience and recovery for war affected communities” (Boothby et al, 2006:11; Ager, Strang and Abebe, 2005; Strang and Ager, 2003). This literature puts great weight behind the importance of meeting basic needs in rehabilitation programmes, and of listening to communities when rehabilitating child soldiers, including the use of local practices and spiritual healing (Boothby et al, 2006; Honwana, 2006; Wessells, 2009).

Boyden and de Berry (2004) build on the concept of resilience and put forward the use of an ethnographic and anthropological perspective, moving away from quantitative data towards the use of qualitative data. As with the social-ecologies and psychosocial literature, they presented a shift away from the view of the permanently damaged war-affected child towards a perspective that outlines the resilience of human beings to over-come traumatic events (Boothby et al, 2006:9).

My critique of the psychosocial and social ecologies school is that, by focusing on resilience, they underplay the traumatic effects of war on children and communities.

Child Soldiers
Thus far the literature cited focuses on the war-affected child, we now look at more specific literature concerning child soldiers. Issues concerning the use of the term ‘child-soldier’, and whether all children involved with armed groups should be called “child-soldiers”, are discussed at length in the literature. This is due to the many different roles that children in armed groups fulfil, not all of which include direct involvement in fighting, and are as diverse as cook, porter, spy, sex slave, body-guard and medic (Wessells, 2009; Hobson, 2005; Mazurana and McKay, 2001). It is important to highlight the varied roles played by children associated with armed groups, because it is possible for a child to have been part of an armed group for many years without necessarily having fought on the front line (Specht and Attree, 2006). A possible reason for the widening of the term “child soldier” to include all children involved with fighting forces is to expand the numbers of “child soldiers” and thus gain greater attention to the issue. However, it could also be said that the reason for it being used as a catch-all phrase is that all children involved in fighting forces, whether they participate in battle or not, are likely to have similar issues to those that did fight, such as being unable to locate their families, being stigmatised by wider society and possibly having been treated badly by other members of the fighting force.

Brett and Specht (2004) also explore the importance of qualitative data in providing a fuller understanding of the motivating factors for adolescents voluntarily joining armed groups. The literature regarding child soldiers aims to encapsulate the experiences of child soldiers from before they join, the factors that contribute to them joining, what occurs during their time in the armed groups, how this differs from region to region (Wessells, 2009; Singer, 2006; Brett & Specht, 2004; Cohn & Goodwin-Gil, 1997).

A great deal of emphasis is placed on the importance of successfully rehabilitating child-soldiers. One way they identify of doing this is by identifying the factors that motivate them to join armed groups, so that rehabilitation programmes can attempt to fill the gaps in their lives that children fill by joining armed groups, and prevent them from re-joining (Wessells, 2009; Boothby et al, 2006; Singer, 2006; Brett & Specht, 2004).

Motivations for joining an armed group
As this dissertation is concerned with what motivates some girls in Colombia to join armed groups, the literature hypothesising why children chose to join armed groups is now explored. Brett and Specht (2004) look at the causes of children, specifically those in their teens, voluntarily joining armed groups. They identify the following motivating factors: war, poverty, education and employment, family and friends, politics and ideology, specific features of adolescence, culture and tradition.

The reasons girls join leftist movements, as opposed to paramilitaries, government or state military institutions is questioned by Cunningham (2003) who identifies several motivations for joining guerrilla and terrorist organisations. Only two of which are applicable to FARC; a belief in a political cause and social motivation, such as wanting to aspire to a high rank in the social hierarchy. Hudson (1999) identifies the reasons as poverty, social isolation and lack of opportunities (Hudson, 1999: 20), these correspond with the reasons children join any armed group. However, there is no straightforward explanation and whilst some girls may have deeply held political convictions, for others it may simply be a matter of opportunity (Graham, 2008:202), such as the guerrilla having a presence where they live whilst the military and AUC do not. This is especially applicable where the choice to join is based on fleeing a domestic situation, instead of a political decision and the nearest means to flee is taken.

This perspective requires that children and adolescents be recognised as independent actors with agency and is a clear shift away from the earlier literature of the child as a passive victim of conflict. Whilst the adolescents may have made a voluntary choice and exercised their agency in order to join an armed group, in many instances the voluntary nature of that choice is questionable due to the limited number of other choices (Brett and Specht, 2004).

Girls’ participation in armed groups
It is now acknowledged that within armed forces that use children, there are a large number of girls within the ranks. Female child soldiers occupy diverse and often auxiliary roles (Wells, 2009:156; Hobson, 2005). Although figures are difficult to gather and verify, estimates state that girls represent between 6 to 50% of child soldiers, dependent on region and conflict (Spellings, 2008). Two of the most prominent authors on the roles of female child soldiers are McKay and Mazurana (McKay et al., 2006; McKay, 2005a; McKay, 2005b; McKay, 2005c; McKay and Mazurana, 2004; Mazurana, McKay et al., 2002; Mazurana & McKay, 2001; McKay, 2000; McKay, 1998), working together and separately they have complied a comprehensive body of work. Their main focus is female, child soldiers in the African continent, but they have written on conflicts around the world. They also consider their findings to have cross-cultural relevance (McKay and Mazurana, 2004:13).

Because the focus of this dissertation is on Colombia, I have not extensively reviewed the literature concerning female, child-soldiers in other regions. However, there are conflicts globally that are comparable with the conflict in Colombia and the involvement of girls within fighting groups and a body of associated literature. The conflicts in Mozambique, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Eritrea, Sri Lanka and to a lesser extent South Africa all involved leftist, guerrilla movements that made claims to be egalitarian organisations and included girls in their military activities (Wells, 2009:156; Honwana, 2006; Singer, 2006; McKay and Mazurana, 2004:91; West, 2000; Shepler, 2005).

Girls in armed groups in Colombia
In Colombia it is estimated that girls represent a quarter of the child soldiers in fighting forces (Human Rights Watch: 2003). Kearins (2002, 2003), writing for the Quaker United Nations Office, examines the experiences of female child soldiers across the globe and in Colombia. The factors that Kearins (2003) identified as putting children at risk of joining armed groups correlate to those identified by Brett and Specht (2004) and they include; being poor and/or disadvantaged, inhabiting a combat zone and being separated from their family.

The experiences of girls in armed groups in Colombia are explored by Gjelsvik, (2010) and Kunz & Sjöberg, (2009), who question whether the experience is empowering or further entrenches women’s oppression in Colombia.

As previously stated, guerrilla groups and terrorist groups are not always easily distinguished and a single organisation may warrant both descriptions at different times. Some of the literature on girls in FARC is concerned with their decision join a terrorist organisation (Stanski, 2006; Cunnigham, 2003), as opposed to the state military, or paramilitary organisations.

The literature informed the hypothesis because whilst there is clearly a large body of literature on child-soldiers globally; looking at their motivations for joining, their experiences whilst in the armed group, and disarmament, demobilisation and rehabilitation once they leave, as well as the experiences of female, child-soldiers in Africa and some parts of Asia, the literature focusing on female, child-soldiers in Colombia is less prevalent.

The existing literature on female, child-soldiers in Latin America has tended to focus on whether the experience is empowering, or the result of oppression and victim-hood (Gjelsvik, 2010; Kunz & Sjöberg; 2009) or to pathologise them as terrorists (Stanski, 2006; Cunnigham, 2003). And whilst both approaches offer valuable insights, and refer to the gender-bias in Latin America, thThe theoretical framework used is feminism, drawing on two concepts; gender and girlhood. In order to do this, the constructs of gender and girlhood in Colombia are analysed. ey fail to address how constructs of girlhood in Colombia may result in the desire to join leftist-guerrilla groups.

3. METHODOLOGY

This chapter provides an explanation of the methodology used, taken to mean “a way of thinking about and studying social reality” (Strauss and Corbin, 1998:3), including the theoretical framework and feminist theory. Then the method used, “a set of procedures and techniques used for gathering and analyzing data” (Strauss and Corbin, 1998:3), is outlined.

Theoretical Framework
The theoretical framework used is feminism, drawing on two concepts; gender and girlhood. In order to do this, the constructs of gender and girlhood in Colombia are analysed.

Childhood Studies has drawn on feminism by presenting childhood as a social category, as feminism did with gender, rather than a biological fact (Butler, 1990, 1993). The ‘social construction of childhood’ is taken to mean that “children’s lives are shaped by the social and cultural expectations adults and their peers have of them” (Wells, 2009:1), and not just the biological aspects of childhood.

In order to define what constitutes a child in Colombia I will be using the age of majority as a general marker, whilst acknowledging that this is just one way in which childhood is defined. “The age of majority is a social, religious, cultural or legal device through which societies acknowledge the transition to adulthood” (Cohn & Goodwin-Gill, 1997:7). The age of majority in Colombia is 18, this is the age at which one can vote, buy alcohol, join the military, get married without parental consent and be considered as an adult in the judicial system. The only variant to the age 18 is the age of consent for sexual intercourse, which is 14. In line with the Conventions on the Rights of the Child, and the legal age of majority in Colombia, children will be defined as those under 18 years of age.

This “transition to adulthood” is recognised as that period when the young person is no longer a “child” but not yet an “adult” (Brett and Specht, 2004:29). This is the age at which people begin to form their adult identity (Erikson, 1968), and begin to project a future for themselves (Cohn & Goodwin-Gill, 1997:31). This is an age of contradictions, where the child has a sense of strength and power, as a result of their intellectual and physical maturity (Brett and Specht, 2004:30), which can result in impulsive behaviour driven by a sense of invisibility. But it is also a time of stressful transition, both physically and mentally, which makes them particularly vulnerable to recruitment by armed groups (Machel, 2001:12).

The girls discussed in this dissertation are in the “transition to adulthood”. This would suggest that terminology, other than “girl”, such as “youth” or “young person” may be a better description for those who are developing physically and intellectually into adults (Cohen & Goodwin-Gill, 1997:9). However that strips them of their gendered identity, which is central to my hypothesis. Therefore, for the purpose of this dissertation “girls” means girls and young women ranging from thirteen to twenty years of age, this is the primary age of child soldiers in Colombia (Kearins, 2003:7-8).

Despite the importance of this transitional age, there is little research that focuses on girls, in this age group, in conflict situations (Spellings, 2008:23; Kearins, 2003:1). This may be because “girls” and women’s experiences are not yet well understood and many girls transition into womanhood during armed conflict” (Boothby et al, 2006:92).

The other concept used for this dissertation is that of gender. In this dissertation gender is understood to be the “social construct of sexual difference… the way societies define and regulate femininity and masculinity” (Dore, 1997:9). Gender is “recreated and transformed through an inseparable mix of norms and behaviours that are cultural, economic, historical, sociological, linguistic, scientific and always political” (Dore, 1997:10).

The terms “empowerment” and “agency” are used throughout this dissertation. Empowerment is taken to mean “facilitating oneself or others to work towards or attain personal aims. In a feminist sense it is used to describe an enabling power to do something rather than a power over someone” (Humm, 1995:78). Agency is taken to mean that an individual actor has “the capacity to process social experience and to devise ways of coping with life, even under the most extreme forms of coercion, within the limitations of information, uncertainty and other constraints that exist” (Moser & Clark, 2001:4-5). This is especially pertinent when considering girls within conflict zones and the limited options available to them.

Feminist Theory
The epistemology used for this research is Feminist theory. Feminist theory is a development of Critical theory (Ingram & Simon-Ingram, 1992:ixx). Critical theory rejects the three basic principles of positivism: “an objective external reality, the subject/object distinction and value free social science” (Jackson & Sørensen, 2010:248). This means that the work in this dissertation rejects that there is an absolute reality that can be recorded and documented, that there is no real distinction between the analyst and the subjects being analysed, and that it is not possible for the research to be conducted without my own beliefs being brought into the work.

Feminist theory “critiques existing forms of domination based on … gender” (Ingram & Simon-Ingram, 1992:xxxii). Feminist theory identifies the ways in which dominant concepts and practices of knowledge systematically disadvantage women. This is done by excluding women from inquiry, denying them epistemic authority, denigrating “feminine” cognitive styles and modes of knowledge, producing theories that represent women as inferior and render power relations invisible, and producing knowledge that reinforces gender hierarchies (Anderson, 2011).

By applying feminist theory to this dissertation I assert that girls’ experiences are affected by their gender and that this results in their oppression within society, that this should not continue unaddressed and therefore warrants research. This was used to develop the hypothesis that there is limited scope for girls in Colombia to transition to womanhood free from rigid social constructions of femininity and masculinity and that FARC provides a space in which the transition to womanhood is more egalitarian than it otherwise would be in Colombian society.

Research Methods
The data used in this dissertation consists of existing research and literature on child soldiers, and female child soldiers in Colombia, as well as texts relating to the conflict in Colombia, the illegal drug trade in Colombia and Colombian society. In order to identify these texts I did a systematic search of the library book and journal databases at Birkbeck University, The School of Oriental and African Studies, London School of Economics, Senate House and British Library using the following terms:

Colombia
Child soldier
Female child soldier
FARC (abbreviated and in full)
Female child solider AND Colombia OR FARC
Female soldier AND Colombia OR FARC
Child soldier in FARC (abbreviated and in full)
Gender Latin America
Gender Colombia
Machismo

I also located several key texts relating to child soldiers globally, these are outlined in the literature review. From these texts I located other texts and resources that related specifically to Colombia.

I then organised my research, extracted themes and put them into groupings, including:

Background to the conflict
Actors in the Conflict
Evolution of FARC
Command Structure of FARC
Political Ideology of FARC
Membership of FARC
Drug trafficking and kidnapping in relation to FARC
Child soldiers in FARC
Gender in FARC
Transition to adulthood
Violence
Internal Displacement
Machismo
Gender

Having gathered and organised my findings into the categories above, I then set about testing the hypothesis by re-examining and analysing my findings in light of the questions posed by the hypothesis. I had not originally intended to explore the concept of machismo, but it arouse several times in the literature on gender inequality and eventually became an important part of my research.

The majority of the data I located was qualitative, and based on fieldwork and interviews with women in Colombia and adolescents who had been involved with FARC. There were also a number of quantitative sources, especially with regard to the number of IDPs, the length of the conflict and the number of youths involved in the conflict.

An interesting piece of data was the primary data interview transcripts included in the appendices of Kearins (2003) paper. The interviews had been divided into coded categories, but other than that the transcripts were unedited. The interview transcripts provided a wealth of information for me to draw on. Despite the small number of girls interviewed, only six girls met the selection criteria, the interviews with them went into great depth and provided information about how the girls had come to join FARC and how they felt about their time in FARC. The girls names were not disclosed, instead they are referred to as “Girl A” through to “Girl F”. In the other literature on female child-soldiers in Colombia I found the “voice” of girl soldiers was not a prominent feature, in Kearins (2003) paper I was able to read how the girls viewed their own experiences which enriched my understanding of their motivations for joining and how they viewed their own experiences.

Practical Problems and Ethical Considerations
As I did not conduct primary research or research with human participants the ethical considerations for my research were concerned with how the data was originally collected and the point-of-view of the researcher. There is also an ethical consideration in the way in which people are presented in research. As a researcher it is important to bear this in mind, as everything written about people and available in the public sphere has the possibility of influencing the way people perceive a situation and the people involved. In this instance it is important not to represent Latin American women as victims of violence, and Latin American men as perpetrators of violence, as this reductive view results in the perpetuation of negative gender stereotypes of Latin American people.

Although there is plenty of data regarding the conflict in Colombia, child soldiers and female fighters in Colombian fighting forces, there are issues regarding how the data was initially gathered. This needs to be considered when using it as secondary data. These issues include the relative inaccessibility of child soldiers for researchers’ due to the secretive nature of rebel groups, the reluctance of former child soldiers to openly identify themselves due to fear of reprisals and the denial of the use of child soldiers by all actors in the conflict.

It is also important to be aware of any bias on the behalf of the researchers who conducted the primary research. The validity of the primary data must be considered before drawing conclusions from it; the political and military situation in Colombia is constantly shifting and findings that were true a few years ago may no longer be relevant.

An unpredicted practical problem was the difficulty in finding publications by FARC. FARC had previously had a website on which they had posted propaganda, interviews with high-ranking officials and updates on their military and political ambitions. However, this website was hosted by a European provider who shut it down and FARC have been unable to find a new host for their website, therefore I was unable to verify the accuracy of sources citing interviews with FARC leaders and commanders taken from the website.

Limitations of Research
The main limitation of the research derives from the sole use of secondary data, whilst secondary data taken from academic journals and publications has a level of pre-established reliability from the process of being peer-reviewed, it does leave a lot of room for interpretation. The data I was accessing had already been read through a theoretical lens and interpreted according to the position of the researcher. I then read their research and applied another theoretical lens and brought my own interests to bear on the research. However, my work remains valid because of the systematic way in which the research was gathered and presented. I have already asserted that I do not believe that it is possible for research to be conducted without my own beliefs being brought into the work, but by being aware of this and making a full disclosure of what these beliefs are in my methodology I aim to present a balanced dissertation.

Girls to Women: Gendered Transitions to Adulthood in The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. (64)

On International Women’s Day Tanzanian women were still far from achieving a measure of equality

HiiDunia — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 19:24:07 +0000

Picture Credit – Global Giving
Written by Dorosella Bishanga

“With more women in the boardroom, greater in legislative rights, and an increased critical mass of women’s visibility as impressive role models in every aspect of life, one could think that women have gained true ” International Women’s Day.

While 8th March was a day to meet, gather, cheer and have fun for women in some parts of the world, in Tanzania one was left to reflect on the successes, failures and prospects for women. I take the Month of March to be the moment for reflecting and brainstorming on the situation facing women and where they are heading to in the next one or two decades.

Tanzania has a total population of 43,601,796 (July 2012 est) with 55.1% of the population aged 15-64 years (male 11,633,721 and female 11,913,951) (Source: the CIA World Factbook). This data shows that more women belong to the young and active age group with their number outweighing that of men. However the levels of participation particularly in the social, economic and political aspects of life in Tanzania still display a male bias.

Although there are success stories concerning a relatively small proportion of Tanzanian women who have socially, economically and even politically altered their situations, there are many more for whom the future still appears bleak. Whenever I’ve interacted with the majority of these women, I realized that they have potentials, desires and resources in them that only need to be tapped, recognized and systematically taken up to build up an empowered, intelligent and enlightened .

While much of research and reports on the gender gaps in Tanzania at national or local levels are not available or accessible, the global reports on gender gap show a significantly challenging outlook for women in Tanzania.

The Global Gender Gap Index 2011 report ranking indicates a widening gap between women and men in Tanzania. The 2011 results show that Tanzania gained seven places (because of an increase of women parliamentarians from 31% to 36% in 2011) but still there is much to contemplate. When looking at the Economic participation and Opportunity sub index of this report, the labour force participation results indicate that men still have more opportunities (91) than women (89).

Studying the number of legislators, senior officials and managers, the number of women stands at 16 and for men 84 with the ratio (0.20). Taking into account the number of professionals and technical workers, the number of women is 38 while that of men is 62, with the ratio (0.61).

Education is another important aspect for considerations. The report indicates that the literacy rate stands at 67% for women and 79% for men, (0.85 ratio), with an enrollment rate at primary education of 97% for girls and 96% for boys (ration 1.01). The report further shows that the number of women decreases as they progress through the education system. The data demonstrates that the Secondary education enrollment rate is 24% for girls and 28% for boys (ratio 0.87), and enrolment at tertiary education is 1% for women and 2% for men (ratio 0.48).

I consider participation in political activities by women being a key aspect of . On the Political sub index the report signposts that in Tanzania women in parliament comprise of 36% and men 64% with a ratio (0.56), women in ministerial positions is 27% and men is 73% with a ratio (0.37). At no point since independence has Tanzania had a woman as a Head of State. One might be indeed interested to know why?

The Human Development Report 2011 also has come up with unpromising results on gender in Tanzania. It states that the position of women is still low, comprising only 36% of all seats in parliament. On education the results are also discouraging. HDR 2011 indicates that the population attaining at least secondary education (ages 25 and older) stands at 5.6% female and 9.2% men. With regard to labour force participation, the data indicates that women still hold a lower rank, with female participation rate at 86.3% compared to male 90.6%.

I understand that gender inequality in Tanzania is embedded in people’s beliefs, traditions and culture, altitudes and even minds. It is taken to be the way of life by many. However, the key question that I still find disquieting is how to respond to these challenges of inequalities that have manifested in all aspects of Tanzanian life. At what levels should the government and other begin to readdress these problems? Have we applied a wrong approach to addressing gender inequality? How are we making everyone to be aware and to take up a role as a key in the general gender dialogue? Or is gender debate the business of a few; to mean donors, government and an elite group? Who is doing what in responding to gender inequality challenges?

Surely, if there was anything for Tanzanian Women to celebrate on International Women’s Day it was to be coupled with a reflection on new approaches to bring more women to the participation tables be it social, economic/business, political and education tables. Women must not be invited but organizers and action planners. I would not like to underestimate the importance of quality participation, but numbers are equally imperative, because I consider as long as many women as possible participate in social, political and economic spheres of life, diverse ideas will also emanate from them, and they will advance the common cause.

Let us, the women of Tanzania use International Women’s Day and other key local and international days and forums to reflect upon our situation, advance our cause and come up with an alternative means to change our circumstances. Gender must be seen at every angle of the social, economic and political aspect of life.

….it begins with women, it is everyone’s concern.

Dorosella F. Bishanga is Tanzanian and studying MA Democratic Governance and Civil Society in Germany. Her interests include democratic governance and citizen participation, gender equality and aid transparency and accountability. She can be contacted at db782001@yahoo.com

What contribution does feminist economics make to the understanding of gender equality?

HiiDunia — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 15:10:57 +0000

The online version of the paper does not include the Footnotes, Bibliography or Appendix. Please refer to the PDF Download for the full text.

What contribution does feminist economics make to the understanding of gender equality? (84)

Author: Maya Sethi

Economics is a key aspect of our society. However orthodox economics, which claims to be gender-neutral, is seen to negatively affect women, exacerbate gender inequality and undervalue the contribution many women make to the economy at all levels. This has led to the emergence of the body of thought known as feminist economics. Feminist economists argue that orthodox economists ignore the differing inputs that men and women make to the economy due to their focus on the productive economy and markets (Sweetman 2008). Feminist economic has made a significant contribution to understandings of gender equality in many different ways, the majority of which is centred around its emphasis on the recognition of women’s unpaid work, and women’s time-burden (often referred to as the double/triple-shift). Its contribution to understandings of gender equality has been instrumental in the context of Western countries and countries in the Global South. This paper will begin by exploring some of the contributions feminist economics has made to understandings of gender equality, including recognition of women’s role in economic development, the feminisation of labour, and the double-shift. It will then focus on the feminist economics contribution to understandings of gender equality within the context of globalisation and development. It will highlight the role feminist economics has played with regards to statistical gender indicators, before providing a feminist economic analysis of the informal economy found in many developing countries.

Essentially, feminist economists criticise orthodox economics for solely focusing on equality of opportunities. Feminist economics states that it is important to consider equality of outcomes alongside equality of opportunities, due to the fact that “systemic inequality in outcomes contributes to unequal power and, as a result, unequal opportunities” and vice versa (Berik et.al. 2009:5). Equality of outcomes needs consideration because a focus solely on opportunities ignores the gendered dynamics of many economic systems such as labour markets. So policies that ignore the possibility that outcomes can vary, end up perpetuating gender inequalities (Berik et.al. 2009).

Considerable feminist economics thought is based around the way in which gendered divisions of labour tend to confine women to domestic duties or reproductive work and men to productive or paid work. This gendered division of labour is shaped by both natural difference and social norms and institutions (Sweetman 2008). Therefore, reproductive work (such as care work), be it unpaid or paid, is seen as a feminine role. Furthermore, this type of and is undervalued in many societies. Feminist economists argue that domestic and care work contribute significantly to the economy. Feminist economics refers to unpaid work as social reproduction, because society and the economy would not function if this work was not carried out. Diane Elson provides a useful analysis of this relationship between productive and reproductive work, and their interdependence:

“The ability of money to mobilize labour power for ‘productive work’ depends on the operation of some non-monetary set of social relations to mobilize labour power for ‘reproductive work.’ These non-monetary social relations are subordinate to money in the sense that they cannot function and sustain themselves without an input of money; and they are reshaped in response to the power of money. Nevertheless, neither can the monetary economy sustain itself without an input of unpaid labour, an input shaped by the structures of gender relations.” (Elson 1994:40)

In addition to their reproductive role, it is increasingly common for women to undertake paid work; yet feminist economists argue that due to the universal perception of the ‘male-breadwinner’, the contribution women make to their households is perceived by many to be relatively insignificant. This “perpetuates inequality between women and men, because it fundamentally weakens women’s bargaining power in marriage and the family” (Sweetman 2008:1). Furthermore, this minimises women’s position within the labour force as their wage is not perceived a necessity for the family, this encourages employers to keep down women’s wages (Berik et.al. 2009). Additionally, the paid roles available to women are typically within the guise of reproductive work, in particular care and domestic work, and these roles are eminently undervalued and poorly paid (Himmelweit 2007). This recognition of the way in which certain roles are highly feminised and underpaid has significantly contributed to understandings of gender equality with regards to work and the gendered divisions of labour.

Feminist economists point out that families are becoming increasingly dependent on women’s wages and this has led to what has become known as the feminisation of labour. This phenomenon is noted by feminist economics as the process whereby women have rapidly entered the workforce, both in developed and developing countries. It also makes reference to the fact that heavy industries which typically employed men are gradually declining while there has been a huge increase in light industries, particularly assembly line factories, which prefer to employ women. Feminist economics argues that this is linked to the perception that women have certain ‘natural’ qualities that enable them to effectively carry-out certain jobs (Elson & Pearson 1981). Feminist economists note that reproductive work tends to be repetitive and so requires considerable patience. Thus, women’s ‘natural’ ability is in fact something they learn through the reproductive roles they are assigned to as young girls (Sweetman 2008). The assumption that assembly line type work comes ‘naturally’ to women allows factories to keep wages low, as there is no perceived skill needed. Nevertheless, this feminisation of labour is increasing the number of women providing the main wage, sometimes the only wage, for many families. Furthermore, there has been an increase over the last few decades in the number of women-headed households, which rely solely on women’s wages (Chant 2011;1997). Moreover, this apparent feminisation of labour is causing many men to feel threatened and to lose their image as ‘real men,’ which can lead “to increased violence against women and children within the home” (Sweetman 2008:2).

While more and more women are undertaking paid work, there is little evidence that men are doing anything to alleviate women’s reproductive duties. This results in women being burdened with what has come to be called the ‘double-shift’ of productive and reproductive work. Feminist economics brings this idea of the ‘double-shift’ to the forefront of development, arguing that the ignorance of this in orthodox economics policies causes gender inequality to be perpetuated (Sweetman 2008). Other thinkers such as Moser (1987) and Kumar (2010) note that the naturalisation of women’s reproductive role in the household, results in women being expected to participate in community work, such as organising or monitoring access to services and resources. This then adds to their time-burden to form the ‘triple-shift’. This can be exacerbated by many gender-neutral policies that encourage community participation, such as community forestry, which expect women to play a major part (Baker 2006). A lack of recognition of women’s unpaid work leads to a common perception that women have more time than men to contribute to community work. The awareness of the ‘double/triple-shift’ has also a push by feminist economics to advocate for recognition of time-use in measures of development, poverty, and inequality, in particular in the drafting of statistical gender indicators.

Based on the need to value women’s reproductive work and to consider factors such as time-use and social capital, feminist economists such as Amartya Sen (1999) and Martha Nussbaum (2000) developed the capabilities approach to highlight the way in which development should be seen as a multidimensional process that includes changes in well-being as well as income. “The capability approach is a broad normative framework for the evaluation and assessment of individual well-being and social arrangements, the design of policies, and proposals about social change in society” (Robeyns 2005:94). Central to this approach are: functionings– “the various things a person may value doing or being,” (Sen 1999:75) such as being educated, healthy able to work etc.; capability– “the substantive freedoms he or she enjoys to lead the kind of life he or she has reason to value” (Sen 1999:87); and agency– “the ability to pursue goals that one values and has reason to value” (Alkire & Deneulin 2009:31). The capabilities approach therefore argues for equality of outcomes through expanding capabilities (Berik et.al. 2009), emphasising the need to consider social capital alongside economic capital.

Specifically within the context of globalisation and the Global South, Feminist Economists have criticised orthodox economic theorists and institutions, such as the World Bank, who claim to be gender-neutral, for being gender-blind (Elson 2009). Arguing that “most mainstream theories frame globalization as gender-neutral …, [they] pay little attention to gender and underrepresent the experiences of diverse women in specific societal contexts, especially those in the developing world” (Chow 2003:444). By ignoring gender, orthodox studies of globalisation are ignorant of women’s rights as human rights and have a poor understanding of the multiplicity of gender inequality (Chow 2003). To combat this approach, feminist economists have introduced transformative studies on globalisation that centre on gender and look at globalisation with a gendered lens. The neoliberal macroeconomic restructuring policies such as Structural Adjustment Policies implemented by the International Monetary Fund during the 1980s were criticised for being extremely gender-blind, the austerity measures that they encouraged meant that the gap in social services had to be provided elsewhere, and it was often women who took up the slack, adding to their time-burden. Yet women’s role here was ignored by the large economic institutions who continued to encourage austerity measures, thus hindering development and advancements towards gender equality. Therefore, orthodox economics ignores the ways in which “globalization shapes gender relations and people’s lives materially, politically, socially and culturally at all levels and treat[s] its differential effects on women and men as similar” (Chow 2003:44).

Other feminist economic analyses of globalisation include, the idea that orthodox economics gender-‘neutral’ development and economic policies can themselves be affected and hindered by gender inequalities; critiques of the World Bank’s 2007 ‘Gender Action Plan’ that referred to gender equality as smart economics; and an analysis of global supply chains, in particular care chains. However, due to limitations, this essay is unable to discuss all these issues.

Feminist economics has contributed greatly to the measurement of gender equality through statistical gender indicators (SGIs), highlighting the difference between a gender indicator and a gender-sensitive indicator. Namely, that a gender indicator merely “provides factual information about the status of women” (Beck 1999:7), while a gender-sensitive indicator provides “direct evidence of the status of women, relative to some agreed normative standard or explicit reference group [commonly men]” (Johnstone 1985:233). So feminist economics argues that SGIs need to be truly gender-sensitive if issues around gender equality are to be taken seriously in development policies, because what gets measured gets addressed (Moser 2007). Therefore, feminist economics highlights the need for SGIs to measure factors that contribute to gender inequalities and are relevant to women’s lives (e.g. reproductive rights, time-use, violence), considering both equality in opportunities and outcomes. Many SGIs were constructed around feminist economic theories of capabilities so as to incorporate more of a holistic, well-being approach. The most prominent SGIs, introduced by the UNDP, are the Gender-related Development Index (GDI) and the Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM). However, while these indicators are influenced by capabilities, they are criticised by feminist economists for being gender-blind and not sufficiently considering the needs of women. For example, the GDI measures income but does not account for intra-household consumption and allocation dynamics, or the fact that for women an increase in income may be the result of an increased burden (Chant 2008). Furthermore, by measuring income, the GDI is also criticised because it means that low-income countries scores badly regardless of true gender equality. The GEM on the other hand is seen by feminist economists as a biased indicator that is more relevant to developed countries where factors like political representation are more pressing issues. Both these indicators have been criticised for ignoring important issues such as the informal sector where many women work, gender-based violence and the ‘double-shift.’

Feminist economics critiques of the GDI and GEM influenced the UNDP to introduce a new SGI in the 2010 Human Development Report, the Gender Inequality Index (GII), which measures maternal mortality, adolescent fertility, parliamentary representation, educational attainment (secondary and above), and labour force participation, illustrated in Figure 1.

As opposed to the GDI, the measures in the GII are not based on income and so low-income countries can still do well regardless of their GDP per capita, so several countries, including China and Rwanda, are ranked significantly higher on the GII than the GDI, while for others, such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the opposite has occurred. This shows how measuring income blurs gender equality. Thus the GII can be thought to be more gender-sensitive. Furthermore, the UNDP notes that the dimensions and indicators in the GII are complementary to each other and thus it recognises that “overlapping disadvantages are an important aspect of gender inequality” (UNDP 2010:90).

However, the GII is not without its flaws, and while it is more gender-sensitive than the GDI and GEM, many feminist economists argue that it has not gone far enough. While it has included reproductive health, the indicator of adolescent fertility can be seen to be a hetero-normative Western idea, which fails to indicate who counts as an adolescent. Furthermore in certain countries, if an adolescent mother is not married the birth will not be recorded due to the taboo of sex before marriage, regardless of how she falls pregnant. This therefore does not do enough to promote further the understanding of women’s rights. Additionally, the GII does not consider time-use and women’s time-burden, which is imperative to recognise when looking at gender equality, or pressing issues such as violence against women, ownership of assets, and decision-making, though the UNDP (2010) notes that these issues are significant but were not possible to include in the GII due to data constraints. However, the UNDP does not explain why the GII overlooks other pressing gender issues such as the gendered aspects of housing (see Kumar 2010) or women’s participation in the informal economy, the importance of which this essay will now go on to highlight from a feminist economics perspective.

As noted above, the feminisation of labour relates to an increase in both the number of women taking up paid employment, the number of industries with ‘feminine’ jobs. While the latter has occurred largely in the formal sector, the former has been very prominent in the informal sector, especially in developing countries. More women are entering into informal employment for various reasons. Work within the informal sector includes self-employment, waged employment in informal jobs, home-based worker, and sub-contracted production, amongst others (Chen 2008;Drechsler et.al. 2008). This sector has now become “a larger source of employment for women than for men in the developing world” (Chen 2008:6). As seen in Figure 2, which also shows how the feminisation of labour in the informal sector has occurred in jobs that are lower paid than those of men (see Costa & Sliva 2008).

The gender-‘neutral’ neoliberal economic restructuring of the 1980s influenced deregulation of many formal labour markets in the Global South which contributed to the expansion of the informal sector and thus informal employment (Whitson 2007;Kabeer 2008). This resulted in it being less favourable for women to work in the formal sector where they had limited rights and could not balance their time effectively (Chen et.al. 2005). Therefore, the best source of employment for many women became the informal sector as most of the work consists of being home-based work and being self-employed, enabling women to work in their own time. This flexibility allows women to participate in paid employment, so helping to alleviate poverty in their households, while still being able to carry out domestic ‘duties’. Many poor households depend on women’s participation in paid employment and issues surrounding female-headship intensifies the need for women to enter into informal employment. However, while this flexibility allows women to perform the double/triple-shift more effectively, it does not alleviate women’s time-burden, which in itself adds to gender inequality.

However, the feminisation of labour in the informal sector, its flexibility, and the low-paid jobs available in it has enhanced the gendered division of labour within the household. Furthermore, it has caused girls education to be neglected in urban areas due to women’s lower perceived earnings (Chen 2008). In addition to this, gender relations within the household remain unequal as women’s financial contributions to the household are limited, which prevents them from having decision-making powers over the distribution of resources within the household.

It is also necessary to consider the affects working in the informal sector has on men and how this can negatively affect women. The existence of the informal sector is fairly unstable and those working in it are susceptible to joblessness at any time. This vulnerability can have an adverse effect on men who place themselves in the socially constructed role as ‘breadwinner’. Thus a loss of job and a reduction in earnings for men is often perceived as a personal failure, which can seriously affect gender relations within the household (Heintz 2008).

The informal sector, and the highly gendered nature of it, is often overlooked by many SGIs, making them blind to the fact that while women may not be seen to be working in official statistics, many of them do work. This results in policies that use SGIs as a guideline ignoring many women’s paid work commitments, which leads them to add extra burden on women, for example through policies that encourage greater female participation in the community or the household. This illustrates the importance of applying a gendered lens to development and globalisation, as it brings to light certain issues that affect gender inequality that would otherwise be overlooked.

Feminist economics makes a great contribution to the understanding of gender equality. This essay has shown this with regards to the work of feminist economists in the context of globalisation and development. Feminist economics has been instrumental in its analysis and recognition of the contribution women make to society and the economy, an issue that was otherwise overlooked. It has played a fundamental role in drafting many SGIs, which allows gender-sensitive issues to be addressed. However, in practice, the theories of feminist economics have not been truly applied to SGIs. SGIs still fail to account for time-use which is a very important issue with most feminist economists. Furthermore, many issues such as informal employment (elaborated above) and gender-based violence are yet to be adopted by SGIs and so are still a long way from being formally addressed by many policies and institutions, particularly those from an orthodox perspective. The example of informal employment illustrated the way in which feminist economists apply a gendered lens to analyse issues in development and globalisation. The context of feminist economics examined in this essay however is merely a fraction of the work done by many feminist economists in contributing to understandings of gender equality. Within globalisation and development alone this essay could have illustrated this through examining global masculinities, global care-chains, macro- and micro-economics, and so on. Future analysis could consider the contribution feminist economics has made to understanding the role of gender in the 2008 Global Economic Crisis. Nonetheless, in light of the information provided one can conclude that feminist economics has made great contributions to the understanding of gender equality, yet there is still a way to go between theory and practice.

What contribution does feminist economics make to the understanding of gender equality? (84)

Victims of the Economic Crisis: Female migrant workers and the growing threat of exploitation, forced labour and trafficking

HiiDunia — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 20:15:57 +0000

This version of the essay does not include the Bibliography. Please refer to the PDF Download for the original full text.

Victims of the Economic Crisis: Female migrant workers and the growing threat of exploitation, forced labour and trafficking (107)

Author: Emma Forrest

Introduction

The term globalisation, though widely contested simultaneously impacts positively and negatively upon the global South. Labour migration is a fundamental reaction to the globalised world (Taran, 2000) as people move across national borders in search of employment and a more economically secure existence. To a large extent migration is complex and multi-faceted and it can be examined using different criteria; motivations, benefits, countries of origin and destination, child and adult migrants, etc, to name a select few. A significant divide within the migratory process is found along gender lines; between male and female movement, in addition to their potential differences, as they seek work. Women now comprise a large share of global migrants; ‘at no time in human history have as many women been on the move as today, [with] almost 90 million women currently residing outside their countries of origin’ (UN, 2005: 1) as a result of economic necessity.

Much academic debate surrounds the idea that female migrant workers, as opposed to their male counterparts, are more vulnerable to the negative aspects of migration. In accordance with anything rooted in economics, a period of recession can exacerbate the vulnerability of labour migrants; the relationship between employer and employee is strained, purchasing power is reduced and more people seek to join the workforce (Roberts, 1991). Demonstrated through examination of the 1980s financial downturn, Chant (2002) illustrates this; ‘crisis and restructuring have made ever more visible the interconnectedness of the formal and informal sectors, and…the dependence of the latter on the former for contracts, supplies and economic viability’ (Chant, 2002: 210). Previous patterns of risk and livelihood susceptibility such as that shown twenty years ago have every potential to be repeated in the current recession.

Shifting Economic Factors

Since the 1980s, the New International Division of Labour (NIDL), a product of globalisation, highlighted the move of developed nations towards a service-orientated economy and the shift of manufacturing to the developing world as a means of utilising the cheap subcontracted labour (Cho, 1985) and the creation of Multi National Corporations (MNCs). As the primary basis on which modern migration is founded, ‘gender jobs cannot be considered in isolation of these structural arrangements’ (Agustin, 1988: 24). The vast inequalities created as a result also allow one to critique the fairness of the global economy and its effects on the incomes of those driving it.

Set in the context of migration, vulnerability refers to one’s capacity for emotional and/or physical abuse occurring as a result of being away from home and to what extent an individual is unprotected or without defence against maltreatment and manipulation (Cox, 1997) in the labour market. General consensus points towards women migrants as being at most risk and this essay aims to explore the gendered view of migratory peoples. Unfortunately, vulnerability reaches every facet of the cheap labour economy and the formal and informal sectors, ‘unaccountable and unregistered activities’ (Potter and Lloyd-Evans, 1998: 172), sector of employment.

The feminisation of migration followed with the associated issues of vulnerability has, up until recently, remained virtually unseen in senior level policy discussion (Kofman, 2000: 194). Elson (1991) discusses the relevance of studying migration in development under the category of gender, saying ‘the emphasis…facilitates the posing of questions about the relative power or women and men’ (Elson, 1991: 1). Such irregularity in the outcomes of the development process is vital in fully understanding migration, clearly no female or male workers have entirely the same experience when in a new territory and the story portrayed by the lived encounters of both men and women allow a well-rounded analysis of the proposed contention. Further to this, study of the informal economy remains topically relevant as it comprises ‘well over half [of urban employment] in Africa and Asia and a quarter in Latin America and the Caribbean’ (Chen, 2001: Review). The new found impetus for women to migrate symbolises a partial shift in traditional ways of life and household survival strategies through the inclusion of remittances from abroad.

In addition to alleviating poverty and inequality as an outcome of capitalism and the new mode of production, Momsen and Townsend refer to McLouglin’s phrase the ‘frustration gap’ (Momsen and Townsend, 1987: 236). ‘Felt by an individual, family or even community where exposure to modernizing influences has brought a desire for an increased standard of living but [where] few or no opportunities of satisfying this want [are located in the developing world]’ (Momsen and Townsend, 1987: 263); further migration is generated in females as well as males, introducing the transient population to potential vulnerability outside their own country.

Slow change in roles

A total shift in traditional ways of life has not occurred. The unique, and perhaps disadvantaged, role of women initially lies in the culturally normal expectations of them as homemakers, wives and carers for other family members and those in their immediate community; this is especially apparent in the global South. Though exceptions do exist and the attitude that men can contribute equally in the home with additional household-based tasks is slowly gathering pace, it remains widely accepted that women are welfare providers first, income generators second. This is juggled with full-time paid labour and as Kofman et al (2000) points out, ‘the gendered nature of welfare provision…is heightened during migration’ (Kofman et al, 2000: 2). Their circumstance goes through rapid transformation, large distance is potentially travelled, stress increases and the consequent risk to migrant health is aggravated. I argue that often is the case that women end a day of paid labour only to begin a period of thankless, unpaid labour in the domestic environment; contributing greatly to the levels of exploitation experienced by female migrants. Statistically, in the global South, ‘a woman may bear as many as twelve children’ (Momsen and Townsend, 1987: 117), exemplifying the extra burden of women at work compared to that of their male equivalents. The patriarchal viewpoint of the family unit within developing societies causes women workers to be more vulnerable to long hours, fatigue and the inability to protest against exploitation simply as it is considered customary. If attitudes are not more balanced after migration and upon arrival in the host nation things can worsen.

This links to the common, though misleading, grouping together of ‘womenandchildren [expressed as one word]’ (Manzo, 2005: 393) into a single, thus, more vulnerable category. Deceptive assumptions like this reinforce the previously stated idea of the female being linked to the family unit to a greater extent than the male worker. This goes a long way to fuel media hype around the topical and contested issue of child labour as well as female vulnerability.

Gender and Economic Downturn

Fundamentally, men and women do not enter the recession from an equal standpoint; despite recent increase in women’s jobs, predominantly occurring over the past thirty years (Rake, 2009: 5), ‘the nature of women’s employment still remains markedly different from men’s [and often goes undervalued]’ (Rake, 2009: 5) and the caring nature of female employment upsets traditional male dominated ‘career-only’ working patterns. Interestingly, the upshot of recession and the effect on vulnerability occurs in the global North as well as South, as shown in Rake’s examination of the UK financial market. Not all female labour migrants travel from the developing world, despite the trend of the majority and inequalities are not limited to the less-developed world. In the UK for example, ‘the public has seen for themselves who holds power in [the country’s] major businesses, and they were the faces of white men’ (Rake, 2009: 3). Crucially, vulnerability is reflected in the predominantly male population who essentially caused the recession to the same extent as those who will have to deal with the fallout. To this end, male migrant vulnerability is as keenly felt as female vulnerability. There needs to be a change in the discriminatory attitude towards women among the international community (Huda, 2006: 36) and the unnecessary vulnerability it causes through the exploitation of women.

Returning to the migrant workers’ surrounding community, or social network; Evans (1996) insinuate that migrant with more social capital, i.e., capacity to rely and use to their advantage the relationships around them as aid in a crisis, lessen their vulnerability in recession (Evans, 1996: 92). The strain of poverty are made more bearable in such cases, however, protection networks have to be re-established in the receiving nation: this doubled with financial pressures increase vulnerability all-round as male and female migrant workers are exposed similarly. The time at which social resources are most needed is found at this time, but often is least likely to be useable.

Forced labour is another issue faced by migrants and includes debt bonded labour as just one type. Vulnerability to forced labour and exploitation is often related back to the New International Division of Labour (NIDL), associated Export Processing Zones (EPZs) and sweatshops. Highly feminised, this mode of employment was generated with the female labourer in mind (Scholte, 2005: 336). The textile and clothing industry provides an example. Haiti is such a nation and is a manufacturing giant (Bonacich and Waller, 1994). Hours are habitually long, wages below that expected in the developed world, there is the underlying risk of the footloose industry unpredictably leaving and this makes women migrants vulnerable. Male migrant workers, whilst not necessarily vulnerable to the same extent within the previously named industries, remain vulnerable in the construction sector for example. Shelley’s (2007) micro case study of two Polish migrants in the UK demonstrates this, ‘[they] were badly beaten after being moved from workplace to workplace, closely monitored and not paid’ (Shelley, 2007: 81). It can be seen that exploitation comparable to that faced by women migrants has occurred and should not be ignored. With regards to the recession, the construction industry itself is vulnerable to losses, as per capita disposable income is temporarily diminished; creating a double edged cause of vulnerability for some men labourers.

However, not all labouring can be perceived as exploitation or forced, as the benefits of these designated production zones for migrant workers are often forgotten. Positively they create ready-made opportunities for waged work – despite the seasonal and demand based variation for products – as well as giving women the prospect of saving money for educational attainment and the accumulation of monetary assests, breaking the cycle of inappropriate schooling and lack of vulnerability-reducing knowledge. Stereotypical views of the female gender also come back into relevance here, as the community/ group nature of labour conceived in the EPZs (whether in receiver or original nations), can present a social, structured and community orientated atmosphere for women migrants. Whilst extreme exploitation is a definite negative of labour migration, the NIDL moreover reduces vulnerability through tangible employment provision and the construction of previously stated indispensable social capital networks.

Human trafficking is more often than not associated with the sex industry and the worst forms of exploitation faced by migrant workers, including enslavement (Shelley, 2007: 109). As in Huda’s study of Lebanon (2006), there is prejudice and confusion of the basic terms of human trafficking and ultimately these culminate to prevent effective policy solutions and increase vulnerability all round. The Lebanese Government, along with many others no doubt, act unaware that persons can be trafficked despite having valid visas for example (Huda, 2006: 36). Further confusion on the topic is seen as, regularly, the idea that men and children are just as vulnerable to trafficking, and not always into prostitution, is not given the attention it deserves. This is not to take anything away from the exploited females, as they are without doubt at risk just as much during recession as any other period. It is a call for equality in the approach of gender and migration.

One instance in which trafficked women may be more at risk to physical abuse is when they repeatedly change hands from one ‘owner’ to another; inconsistency in the possession of females arguably increases the ‘scope’ (Lee, 2007: 16) and possibility for maltreatment. Again it remains the same could be said for a man being trafficked in a similar situation; ‘his’ potential for greater physical strength and aggression, arguably, being the only means through which to reduce vulnerability in comparison to the women. This corresponds with what Mattilla (2000) calls ‘bargaining power’ (Mattilla, 2000: 54) and the comparative lack to which women are able to negotiate successfully with employers in the informal sector as a manifestation of their perceived physical appearance. Leading on from this, vulnerability of female migrants in the global economy is undermined by a lack of authoritative protection. The case of Thai prostitutes typifies this as the local police act not as protectors of the public but as enforcers to control the so called ‘slaves’. ‘Here the brothel owners send the police to beat us…if we flee they go after us’ (Bales, 2000: 5). Most disturbing is that globalisation and the quest for modernisation have perpetuated corruption within official bodies. As Thailand is a nation partially dependant on its sex trade, the constabulary are attempting to protect their own livelihoods as they see no alternative to suppressive capitalism as it stands.

Assesing Vulnerability

Modern slavery, or human trafficking, is focussed to a less extent on ownership and as with many features of the new global economy, allows people to ‘get rich…[a]nd when they’ve finished with their slaves, just throw these people away’ (Bales, 2000: 4). The ‘disposable’ nature of labour markets is a direct cause of reduced job security for migrants and is keenly felt in recession when work scarcity is highest and employers aim for economic efficiency through cutbacks and redundancy. This attitude is not exclusive to female vulnerability, nor to human trafficking and prostitution, but is arguably most apparent in this sector as women labourers are notoriously major participators here.

Contrary to the contention that female migrant workers are more vulnerable to exploitation, forced labour and human trafficking in the current global crisis, Surtees (2008) shows a classic example of how male vulnerability is regularly overlooked globally but most notably in Europe. With particular reference to Belarus and the Ukraine, it is explained ‘the generalized notion of female vulnerability [means that] female migrants are conceptualized as trafficked’ (Surtees, 2008: 13) but in the same situation, male migrants are viewed as merely irregular migrants. Questionably this lack of male inclusion in the debate over vulnerability can be more damaging, escalating vulnerable potential, as methods of protection are not examined and created in response to academic and/ or state investigation.

Upon examination of this vulnerability, it is essential to keep in mind that there is a severe lack of data, a ‘dearth’ (UN, 2005: III), on women migrants and this limits the extent to which the effects of migration can be fully assessed in academia. The very nature of migration, with the potentially secretive and unofficial practice of those moving for work, makes statistical data gathering difficult. An all-encompassing picture cannot be achieved and at this present time a complete answer cannot be formulated as a degree of uncertainty will remain no matter how well informed one may be. In their article ‘Describing the Unobserved’, Tyldum and Brunovskis (2005) propose that future research into human trafficking and exploitation should ‘move beyond static descriptions of typical or extreme case [and rather examine] the great variation in forms of exploitation, recruitment, and rehabilitation’ (Tyldum and Brunovskis, 2005: 31). Moreover, the current recession is the latest topic under analysis and the time lag between research and publication prevents a large amount of literature from being available immediately.

The issue of passivity versus active agency in women also needs to be considered amongst the debate. Agustin (1988) recognises women as influential in their work practices upon all associated lives, from their partners and close families through direct economic benefit to wider society as they demonstrate independence and forward thinking outside the restricted nature of their previous existence, ‘they are contributors to improvements in the lives of both men and women and are instigators of change’ (Agustin, 1988: 18). Especially with regard to the sex industry, women migrants are ‘constructed as passive’ (Agustin, 1988: 11 and Doezema, 1999) and forced to work in ways against their wishes but in my opinion however, any vulnerability should be assessed whilst paying attention to this fact – women, and it cannot be forgotten that men too, are as in charge of their own destiny as their will and circumstance allows them to be.

Returning to the belief that proliferate capitalism is the principle fuel behind forced and unforced migration among the world’s marginalised population, it can naturally be argued that the removal and alteration of the neo-liberal economic system is one of the few ways to combat future vulnerability among all migrants, not just the females. In addition – not as a standalone measure (Kaye, 2003) – government policy makers need to implement legislation banning all forms of trafficking as stated in the UN Trafficking Protocol and ‘ensure that trafficked people have access to the protection and support’ (Kaye, 2003: 24) to facilitate finding an escape route away from trafficking. ‘Seen in this light, promoting transparent legal channels of labour migration, ending the use of traffic labour by employers, and protecting workers’ rights in the context of internal and cross-border migration, may be crucial to tackling the trafficking trade’ (Lee, 2007: 7). Rather, the improvement in the socio-economic status of the population, particularly through the education of girls, is likely to lead to reductions in its worst forms of exploitation (Skeldon, 2000).

To expand, an alternative view to that of globalisation and the imposed capitalist economy is presented in Madeley’s (2003) refreshing examination of viewpoints taken from the global South – i.e., those being exploited in the name of globalisation and Northern development. In turn, Antrobus (2003: 62) Bello (2003: 63) and Tripathi (2003: 72) call for ‘a new social contract that acknowledges the rights of people to be protected from the rapaciousness and greed of unrestrained capitalist exploitation’, ‘a flexible mode whereby countries can relate to one another so that if the global economy goes down, everybody does not go down’ and a people-orientated approach, ‘giving the poorest a voice’. Certainly, an alternative world system, with substituted power holders could be the key to eradicating vulnerability and exploitation on its many levels, for both genders. Reinforced by Mies (1998), who seeks the removal of the underdevelopment and dependency created by the present dualistic (Lewis, 1955) economy – one which features subsistence agriculture alongside the production of goods for the international market – and for it to be replaced with ‘greater autarky’ (Mies, 1998: 220) and a self-sufficient economy that does not look beyond the reaches of its own borders.

Conclusion

Generally women migrant workers are more vulnerable to exploitation, forced labour and human trafficking; with regard to cultural suppression, multi-level responsibilities and greater exposure to risk as participants in the sex industry for instance. Geographical location and individual circumstance affects such potential for vulnerability but what need to become more central is the realisation that men are also vulnerable to exploitation, forced labour and human trafficking in the recession; though to a lesser extent. Only through effective policy implementation in the vein of the International Labour Organization’s (ILO’s) ‘Special Action Programme to Combat Forced Labour (SAP-FL) [which] has commissioned a dozen studies on trafficking and other forced labour outcomes of migration’ (Andrees and Linden, 2005: 55) and a fundamental shift in the global economy in its entirety, can vulnerability, irrespective of gender and circumstance, have a fighting chance of being reduced and eventually eradicated.

Victims of the Economic Crisis: Female migrant workers and the growing threat of exploitation, forced labour and trafficking (107)

Under what circumstances are NGOs unable to gain access to vulnerable populations? What are the implications for aid policy?

HiiDunia — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 19:15:28 +0000

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Under what circumstances are NGOs unable to gain access to vulnerable populations? What are the implications for aid policy? (78)

Author: Hannah Taylor

Introduction

Gaining access to vulnerable populations is frequently a difficult task. Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) face many circumstances where they are unable to gain access to vulnerable populations, as well as fierce criticism when they fail in their relief efforts. As with much of aid and development, the story isn’t wholly negative and there have been significant technical innovations recently that have facilitated improved access for NGOs. NGOs continue to operate in remote, unpopular and hostile environments and the challenges they face should not be overlooked. The aim of this paper is not to criticise what is already widely regarded as a flawed sector within the aid industry; rather it is to constructively contribute to the debate on access. I will draw out two main thematic areas under which NGOs are unable to gain access to vulnerable populations, namely: technicalities and hostile conflict zones. Following on from that, I will explore the idea that these circumstances mask deeper factors in providing relief; strategic interest and convenience. These influences are indicative of a shift in aid policy which I will discuss in an analysis on the implications of ‘access’ on aid policy in terms of conceptual, political and practical implications.

At this juncture, it would be wise to clarify some the key terms used here. When referring to NGOs in this paper, I am largely referring to specialist emergency NGOs who relief agencies who provide assistance. Access applies both to NGOs in terms of their access to vulnerable people, as well as to people in terms of their access to assistance. This paper will only look at NGOs’ access to people, but it is still important to recognise the duality of access in understanding it as a concept. Access ‘enables an impartial assessment of, and response to, people’s needs’ (Mancini-Griffoli & Picot 2004:12). I have taken vulnerable populations to mean those that are prone to suffering conflict, sustained poverty or emergencies such as famine. For the purpose of this essay I will be focusing on access issues relating to man-made disasters and humanitarian crises as opposed to environmental disasters.

Under what circumstances are NGOs unable to gain access to vulnerable populations?

NGOs attempt to provide assistance and relief to any person who is in need of assistance and unable to receive it from their own state. The four Humanitarian Principles developed by Henri Dunont of the Red Cross; Impartiality, Neutrality, Humanity and Independence, form the modus operandi from which NGOs operate. In consultation with the literature, I have drawn out two main themes that occur in accounts of when NGOs are unable to gain access. Though there are different circumstances of denied access in the literature, for brevity’s sake, I will illustrate the thematic areas of technicalities, and conflict zones as the main overarching circumstances as to why NGOs are unable to gain access to vulnerable populations.

Circumstances of technicalities

NGOs often find themselves unable to gain access to vulnerable populations because of bureaucratic regulations and a lack of accurate data leading to ‘forgotten populations’. These circumstances represent challenges to NGOs and have important policy implications. The bureaucracy surrounding NGO registration in Bosnia and Iraq serves as a good illustration of where NGOs are unable to gain access to the vulnerable because of technicalities. Bolton and Jeffrey argue that NGO registration was a tactic employed by authorities to control relief efforts and NGO access, adding that ‘the legislation in Bosnia and Iraq acted as a barrier to entry to organisations that were small, underfunded, or had significant political differences with the international authorities’ (Bolton & Jeffrey 2008:604). The implications on aid policy of this was that the NGO registration process became a deeply political matter and NGOs found themselves having to either disregard the law or identify themselves with a ‘side’. Another illustration of bureaucracy came from the Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) where it reported that in January 2000 there were ‘seventeen locations which were made inaccessible by air due to flight restrictions imposed by the government’ (Marriage 2006:481).

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) conducted a survey in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) which was ‘invaluable for documenting the plight of forgotten populations … in desperate need of assistance’ (Herp 2003:142). Whilst it is true that these surveys are typically only conducted in broadly accessible areas, it is worth noting that there are regions so remote and rural in the world that many NGOs would be unable to gain access to the vulnerable simply because they did not know they existed. These ‘forgotten populations’ are conveniently identified through these surveys and NGOs are able to implement their programmes.

Circumstances of conflict and hostility

Areas consumed by conflict and hostility are, by far, the most commonly cited circumstances of NGOs being unable to gain access to vulnerable populations. Conflict in the DRC, Iraq and Afghanistan are recent examples of countries where NGOs have repeatedly struggled to gain access to vulnerable populations due to hostility and insecurity. In 2003, NGO workers in Iraq were affected by a profound sense of insecurity and experienced numerous assassination attempts against personnel (Bolton and Jeffrey 2008). Rebel held areas in the DRC remained hostile to NGOs, and ‘between December 1999 and July 2000, MSF was forced to suspend activities in Kimpangu due to insecurity’ (Herp 2003:143). Even in areas not directly affected by the conflict, MSF found that in some provinces there were huge numbers of refugees but ‘roads and bridges throughout … have literally disappeared, making many areas practically inaccessible’ (Ibid.:144).

Under the surface of these circumstances lies a stark reality that in some (but not all) circumstances, insecurity can be linked back to the way that NGOs are operating. ‘They should be asking whether aspects of the way they are imposing their own formulae on the local reality could be leading to this kind of misunderstanding’ (Harragin & Chol 1998:37). Whilst this is not particularly constructive in the debate on terms of access for NGOs, it further iterates the point that NGOs consistently give reasons for not being able to access the vulnerable without studying the real causes of hostilities. Almost all circumstances, whilst often legitimate, are masking deeper motivations by NGOs for gaining access to and providing relief for vulnerable populations. Access based on strategic interest and convenience, provides us with two alternative explanations of why NGOs are really unable to gain access to the vulnerable.

Securing Strategic Interests

One of the biggest questions facing aid workers and policy makers alike is why NGOs push for access in some countries despite obvious security restrictions in order to assist vulnerable populations (such as in Iraq and Afghanistan) and why they remain apathetic to crises of monumental proportions (for example the famine experienced by the Dinka in South Sudan in the late 1980s, see Keen 1991). Indeed, during the 1980s there was little regard for the law or ‘hostile environments’ on the moral grounds that people were suffering and had needs that could be met. Despite involving crossing into a sovereign territory illegally, in the 1980s, 200 NGOs were involved in a discrete cross-border relief operation carrying much needed aid into war-torn Afghanistan (Duffield 2007:73). Along with numerous unglamorous tales of taking risks, this is testament to the commitment of aid workers the world over to get access – and ultimately aid provision – to those who need it most. And those who need it most generally tend to be the least accessible (a logical deduction). However there is often more at stake than acting on what is morally ‘right’, and the pressures on donors to act according to their home political environment and ensuing strategic interests are great. One study succinctly illustrates the importance of strategic interest and safeguarding regional security by comparing the humanitarian crisis in Kosovo (which resulted in a large scale humanitarian intervention), next to the relatively unpublicised and unassisted protracted crises in both Angola and Sudan (Olsen 2003:118).

As we can see from the following data, aid recipients are rarely the countries that need aid the most; instead countries of strategic importance to the big donors of the West tend to receive the biggest aid flows. The data was pulled from the OECD database, and to act as a useful comparison I have listed the ten countries with the lowest Human Development Index (HDI) rank. The data is illustrative for this purpose but a much more thorough analysis comparing the use of such different data sets is beyond the scope of this essay.

Figure 1. Top Ten Vs Bottom Ten

Source: OECD www.oecd.org/dac/stats, UNDP http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/data/

Furthermore, we can understand that ‘assuaging the conscience of the industrialised world’ (Harragin & Chol 1998: 60) is also important to agencies. In this way, NGOs are not targeting the vulnerable based on requests from the vulnerable themselves, rather as a way of proving to the world that they are assisting the needy (Ibid.:60). In this way, we can challenge the framing of the ‘vulnerable’ in the pledge of NGOs to provide humanitarian assistance by realising that the targeting of the vulnerable – though central to the self-image of aid – might not be the best way of reaching those in need, or of providing relief full stop (Ibid.:61).

Whilst this could easily lead us on to a more considered discussion of the motivations behind the giving and receiving of aid and the framing of access, this will not be done here. What we can conclude though is that the moral basis for gaining access to vulnerable populations is not a good enough method by which to understand access; whether or not a donor country has strategic interests in an area is more indicative of whether or not an NGO will then gain access or not (Herp 2003; Whitman 2005; Olsen 2003; Hendrickson 1998). In their paper on the determinants of levels of assistance, Olsen convincingly argues that the degree of political interest can help explain why NGOs gain access to some humanitarian crises and not others (Olsen, Carstensen & Hoyen: 2003).

Implications for aid policy

In order to properly evaluate and assess the implications of the aforementioned issues on aid policy I will look at conceptual, political and then finally, practical implications.

‘Rather than moral terms, the need for post-interventionary development is now based on security grounds’ (Duffield 2007:81). A key impact on aid policy is revealed here; we have entered a new era of conceptualising humanitarianism whereby security factors must be taken into account when considering access and assistance. Though these sorts of shifts are not new (example: the shift in aid policy in the 1980s that saw a diminished role for the state and a new powerful role for NGOs; Duffield 2008), they are dually significant; intra state conflicts have risen in the past 20 years, and, the distance between military and relief responses has shrunk considerably leading to combined efforts in humanitarian crises. This does unfortunately come with its own set of problems, though there is not space to explore these here.

Another conceptual implication which consistently links back to themes discussed here and elsewhere in the literature on access is the framing of access, and the role of denial in sustaining assistance; facilitated by a language of rights and principles (Marriage 2006:479). The ‘responsibility to protect’, for example, and the authority that NGOs have claimed without any real legitimacy is an illustration of this. Unfortunately there lies a large gap between the conceptual universalist claims proclaimed by NGOs and relief agencies, and their practical failure to provide assistance in accordance with their defining principles. Marriage uses the example of OLS to highlight this gap, and the practical challenges that NGOs encounter in trying to relieve humanitarian crises whilst also trying to maintain funding and favour.

In the Save the Children study on vulnerability in South Sudan (i.e. a reputable agency and a widely cited publication), the authors explicitly describe Western agencies presenting themselves as the ‘solution’ in situations requiring humanitarian assistance, framing the situation from a Western perspective. ‘Overseas aid is a western solution, but the problem lies as much in its being seen as a ‘solution’ as in its being ‘western’’ (Harragin & Chol 1998:33). These issues have an impact on aid policy in the sense that NGOs feed on rhetoric and labels, framing humanitarian crises in terms that favour them and their ‘solutions’. These actions go on largely unchallenged by governments or authorities and so continues to shape aid policy as NGOs exert significant influence on future policies on how to manage and respond to humanitarian crises.

The growing body of literature on access and emergency relief is indicative of the influence that academic research has on aid policy. That is to say, as NGOs have historically failed or succeeded to gain access to vulnerable populations, academics have increasingly researched on the whys, hows, and whos, of emergency assistance and access. ‘The study has shown that it is possible to do [anthropological] research in a war zone and that has practical relevance for relief programmes’ (Harragin & Chol 1998:60). The studies and literature inform policy makers directly; when it is funded by official bodies such as the Department for International Development or Save the Children (as with the South Sudan Vulnerability Study), and indirectly; by informing future leaders and policy makers.

In terms of political implications, the sovereignty of states has historically been absolute, but a growing number of armed interventions into sovereign states such as Iraq in 1990 and Kosovo in 1999 are indicative of a shift in sovereignty. The erosion of state sovereignty as a principle that is no longer absolute happens at a time when the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ is becoming a normative feature of aid policy. ‘If a State fails to protect its populations or is in fact the perpetrator of crimes, the world must be prepared to take stronger measures’ (RtoP www.responsibilitytoprotect.org). The idea of ‘contingent sovereignty’, which emerged through the practise of negotiated access in the 1980s, has implicated a shift in aid policy; ‘humanitarian emergency demanded of Western politicians new ways to act directly in support of civilians, irrespective of their location or side in a civil war’ (Duffield 2007:75). The idea of contingent sovereignty therefore is important to understanding the political implications of NGO access to sovereign states, and how these changes have resulted in changes in aid policy. This idea can be developed and further understood in terms of practical implications through the militarisation of humanitarian interventions.

The growing involvement of the military in relief activities has led to a tangled web of government, military and aid agencies, making it unclear whose means and what ends are being pursued; not to mention the moral dilemma imposed from working in collaboration with an agency so close to the armed forces (as with the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq), and the ‘growing tendency of key donor governments to manipulate relief aid in pursuit of narrow military objectives’ (Hendrickson 1998:283). The experience of NGOs in Iraq represents a shift in the way that relief work is carried out and by whom.

Western military operations in the twenty-first century are largely strategic in securing Western interests (Iraq for securing regional security and oil interests, for example) and by looking at the militarisation of humanitarian interventions we can understand why NGOs are sometimes unable to gain access to vulnerable people. We can see that NGOs – when backed by a military mandate – are able to access areas of extreme insecurity . As NGOs were able to gain access to displaced Kurds in Northern Iraq in 1999 with the help of a 20,000 strong US-led coalition force (Bolton & Jeffrey 2008:594), we can also understand the broader context of NGOs failing to gain access to vulnerable populations in Rwanda and in the DRC because there was no military support (and minimal strategic interest) in providing assistance. So not only has increased involvement of the military impacted aid policy, but it has helped NGOs to shape their future responses to humanitarian crises to include an unprecedented role for the military.

The rights and principles that define NGOs (to be universal, to provide assistance to all and to protect the vulnerable) tell us how to interpret what is wrong and right. It follows then that the reasons given by NGOs for not being able to gain access are likely to shape aid policy so that NGOs are enabled to gain access in the future, based on the logic of right and wrong and learning from previous shortcomings. Further to this, Slim describes four areas of moral value for NGOs and relief agencies; the preservation of human life itself, human rights, justice and staff safety. Staff safety, (necessary in the context of NGO operations in hostile environments) obfuscates the first three as it appears to value the particular lives of some above all other lives (Slim 1997:248). The implications on aid policy here are clear: in prioritising the safety of staff to enable access, NGOs face a challenge to their moral values and universality.

Conclusion

Access and assistance to vulnerable populations by NGOs is a contested area for debate, with many interrelated issues which demand closer attention. I have used two thematic areas to illustrate some of the key issues and circumstances that prevent access; firstly, lack of data and bureaucracy from local authorities prevent NGOs from accessing the vulnerable because of technicalities; secondly, operating in areas of conflict and hostile environments prevents access and this is illustrated with the examples of the DRC, South Sudan and Iraq. This paper has analysed the underlying explanations for accessing the vulnerable; assistance according to the strategic interests of donors (and the sources of NGOs’ funding) as well as convenience for the NGOs themselves. We can draw conclusions that NGOs often claim reasons for inaccessibility because it suits them, in addition to the alarming correlation between assistance provided to crises in areas of strategic interest (like Iraq and Kosovo) versus a lack of assistance provided in areas of minimal strategic interest (as in South Sudan and Angola). The implications on aid policy are complex and best understood through conceptual, political and practical terms. Conceptually, we can understand that firstly there has been a move from moral responses to security based responses and secondly, NGOs and the West conveniently frame themselves as providing the ‘solution’ to crises. Politically, implications stem largely from the erosion of territorial sovereignty in favour of contingent sovereignty, and practically the implications of the militarisation of humanitarian interventions on aid policy are substantial.

There is need for further discussion as to how aid policy might shift in the future, and how the global community will continue to respond to humanitarian crises; according to need and/or according to strategic interest. It will take many more years for us to see the true successes and failures of humanitarian interventions in remote, inaccessible areas and for that reason conclusions cannot be drawn definitively.

Under what circumstances are NGOs unable to gain access to vulnerable populations? What are the implications for aid policy? (78)

Inter-Organisational Cooperation of Haitian NGOs in Education – A Haitian Perspective

HiiDunia — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 20:53:42 +0000

This version of the Report does not contain the original Executive Summary, Table of Contents, Acknowledgements, References or Appendices. To view Report in its entirety please download the PDF file.

Inter-Organisational Cooperation of Haitian NGOs in Education – A Haitian Perspective (149)

Report Author: Marike de Kloe

1. Aims and objectives

After the devastating earthquake in Haiti (January 2010), a lot of funding was pledged by different donors to build up the country. This is an enormous task, facing many challenges. Presently thousands of national and international civil society organisations are involved in different activities for humanitarian relief and development (USIP, 2010).

- One of the challenges in this process is the cooperation between all actors involved, such as government and non-governmental organisations, companies, international organisations, religious organisations and movements.

- Another challenge is the ownership of the Haitian community. This is for example addressed by a network organisation that is concerned about how decisions for reconstruction were taken: ‘We believe that the Haitian government and civil society must determine their own future and therefore should have a leading role in establishing the proper structures to make this happen’ (COE-H, February 2011).

In this project I want to address these two challenges, particularly for the development of the Haitian
education sector.

The aim of the project is to provide insight in aspects and factors that promote or hinder interorganisational cooperation for educational development in Haiti. This insight will be given, based on experiences and opinions from Haitian leaders, involved in the education sector.

Expected outcomes are:

- An overview with information about existing trajectories of inter-organisational cooperation for educational development in Haiti, including aspects and factors that strengthen or hinder cooperation between NGOs and NGOs with the government. This information can be used by civil society organisations (e.g. the Haiti Country Alliance) and donor organisations, in order to facilitate inter-organisational cooperation in Haiti and advocacy for relevant policies in education.

- Of particular interest for development management is the Haitian perspective about interorganisational cooperation, as this is scarcely available in present literature.

2. Introduction and background

This chapter provides an introduction and background information about Haiti, its education sector and the problem of inter-organisational cooperation that is addressed in this project.

2.1 Country situation of Haiti

Haiti is located in the Caribbean Sea and occupies the western third of the Island of Hispaniola (see figure 1).

Figure 1 Map Haiti

Source: CIA 2011 The World Factbook https://www.cia.gov/

Haiti was the first state in the world that proclaimed independence by defeating France in a slave rebellion in 1804. But according to Winters (2008), Haiti moved ‘to a society with a rigid class structure’ (p. 285). For decades the country has suffered from extreme poverty and inequality. Competition between elite groups generated social and political instability. Most Haitian political leaders did not serve out their full term (Schuller 2007, p.70), including Jean-Claude Duvalier and Aristide. Since 2004, UN mission MINUSTAH is present in Haiti to work with the national policy for overall security. A number of country key figures are provided in table 1.

Table 1. Key figures Haiti

Haiti was severely hit by an earthquake on January 12, 2010, leaving more than 200,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands homeless (government of Haiti PDNA, 2010). This earthquake has damaged an already extremely weak public system, including education and health sectors. A second disaster at the end of 2010 was a cholera outbreak, which has already affected more than 122,000 people from which at least 2,600 died (Oxfam, 2011). Haitian authorities lack capacity to provide sufficient services to its population.

An example of the resilience of Haitians is that ―despite the rubble and the ruin there was a timid sense of hope in the capacity of Haiti to overcome in the very first weeks after the quake (UNICEF, 2011). The way how Haitians deal with disasters is described by Nicolas, Schwartz & Pierre (2009). They stress that an understanding of the cultural strengths of Haiti (e.g. community connections and religion) is essential for organisations involved in service provision.

One year after the earthquake, Haiti is in a transition phase from relief activities towards structural development of the country. At present, there are critical concerns about the reconstruction process, for instance: ‘Many aid agencies continue to bypass local and national authorities in the delivery of assistance, while donors are not coordinating their actions or adequately consulting the Haitian people and key government ministries when taking decisions‘ (Oxfam 2011, p. 3). Also a perceived lack of consultation with Haitian civil society organisations by the Haitian government fed a sense of marginalization’ (Progression, 2010, p.8). This is a risk, as based on lessons learnt, participation of local civil society is necessary for an effective disaster response (ALNAP, 2009).

2.2 The education sector

Schools in Haiti are mainly operated by non-public organizations (around 90%, see figure in annex 1). Since the 1930s, the relative share of the public schools has declined (The World Bank, 2010). The number of non-public schools has grown and includes for-profit private schools run by entrepreneurs, schools run by churches and community schools. NGOs are involved in supporting different interventions in education at local and national levels (Wolff, 2008).

Data for education in Haiti have to be interpreted with caution, due to lack of reliable monitoring by the Ministry of Education. Table 2 provides a number of key figures in education.

Table 2. Key figures education in Haiti

Table 2 shows an increase of primary education enrolment in previous years. The low completion rates for primary education are partly due to high drop-out rates and the presence of a large number of students who are over the normal age for their grade (The World Bank, 2010).

Present most significant problems in education are related to enrolment (reconstruction of schools after the earthquake), teacher training, salaries and teacher’s status, weak school management, lack of information about quality standards, overall weak governance and low relevance (Woord en Daad, 2010). In a survey of the education sector, Mérisier (2010, p. 8) stresses the importance of improved information sharing and institutional development of organisations active in education.

Many problems in the education sector cannot be solved by individual schools that are dealing with the weak government capacity. But in general there are concerns about the coordination and cooperation between national and international NGOs and the government (e.g. by the prime minister, NPR, 2010). Michaëla Jean, special envoy for UNESCO (2011, p.4) states: At the present moment, there is an incredible number of scattered educational projects, but there is no coordination.‘Notwithstanding, initiatives for coordination and cooperation in education exist. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has set-up a coordination systems with clusters, after the earthquake. The Education Cluster includes about 200 organisations (UNICEF, 2011, p. 11). Also many of the non-public schools are part of one or more networks (Woord en Daad, 2010).

2.3 Problem description

From the description of the general context of Haiti and its education sector, it becomes clear that the situation is complex, with:
- A context of extreme poverty;
- Weak public and democratic structures;
- Many different organisations involved in education;
- A transition-phase from humanitarian relief activities to development programmes;
- Influence of international organisations in national policy decisions and implementation.

Messages about large budgets pledged by the international community for relief and development in Haiti are accompanied by:
- critics about the coordination of to be financed projects;
- concerns about the way of involvement and ownership of the Haitian community.

In this environment the project is addressing the problem of inter-organisational cooperation in the Haitian education sector. There is a need to get more insight in the existing trajectories and structures of cooperation, and in aspects and factors that influence cooperation and coordination, from a Haitian perspective. This could be relevant for policy makers and donors.

The project is in particular addressing a need of the Haiti Country Alliance, including four Haitian NGOs and one Dutch NGO (see also paragraph 4.3). Since November 2010, these organisations have started working as an alliance2 and decided to explore further opportunities for cooperation, internally as an alliance and externally with other actors. More insight in different types of cooperation could help these organisations to take the right steps on the way forward.

3. Nature of the problem

This chapter provides a description of inter-organisational cooperation for educational development from a theoretical perspective. This exploration leads to a number of research questions (paragraph 3.5) for the problem as addressed in this project..

3.1 Inter-organisational cooperation: why?

Why is inter-organisational cooperation in the education sector of Haiti desired? The ‘usual general aspiration’ for inter-organisational cooperation ‘is the achievement of some form of collaborative advantage’ (Vangen & Huxham, 2003, p.6).

A commonly used institutional framework makes a distinction between state, civil society and market (Robinson, Hewitt & Harriss, 2000, p.5). The actors of this framework can also be distinguished in the education sector in Haiti: the Ministry of Education, the civil society organisations in service delivery and advocacy, and the market, which includes the connection of graduates with the labour market and the ‘market for schools‘ (The World Bank, 2010). This institutional framework is often combined with three ways in which organisations relate to each other: the ideal types coordination, cooperation and competition (Robinson, et al., 2000). Nevertheless in reality all sort relationships seem to exist and ‘there are numerous situations in which different types of organizations are working together in various arrangements, to resolve collective problems‘ (ibid., p.5). In this regard it should be noted that division of responsibilities and funding between the government and civil society in Haiti is a sensitive political issue (see also Francois, 2011). A current global trend is that Education sector policies in almost every country now call for some form of partnership between government and these [civil society] organizations’ (UNESCO Global Monitoring Report 2008, p.173).

Hewitt (2000) mentions a non-exhaustive list of ‘reasons for setting up inter-organisational
relationships:
- Gains in scale and scope (in research, products, service delivery, etc.);
- Meeting flexibility of demand;
- Information sharing;
- Building complementary skills and resource synergy;
- Strengthening competitive position;
- Access to new technologies and/or new markets;
- Protecting an existing resource base against competition;
- Strengthening a group of organisations as a political lobby’ (p.53).
The key commodity is knowledge. Depending on the form and context ‘inter-organisational relationships offer advantages that transcend reliance on either the market or the hierarchy, or improve their functioning’ (ibid, p.54).

3.2 Inter-organisational cooperation: how?

How do organizations cooperate and which factors influence inter-organisational cooperation? A number of theories help to explain cooperative relationships. Hewitt (2000, p.60) listed:
a) Transaction cost economics: cooperation is motivated by transaction cost efficiency. Forms of governance are asset specificity, uncertainty and frequency of transactions.
b) Resource dependence view: cooperation is driven by strategic and social factors and focuses on needs and opportunities.
c) Inter-organizational relationships: collaboration has advantages for allocation and strategies to cope with imbalances and dependency in the environment.
d) Network theories: emphasis on access to and use of information, learning and social capital. Smith, Caroll & Ashford (1995) add: ‘Network theory explains cooperation in terms of the position of cooperating partners in a network of relationships’.

From each theoretical perspective, there is another emphasis on how cooperative trajectories are influenced or can be strengthened, such as:
a) Economic factors
b) Available specialised expertise
c) An unsure political environment
d) Obligations based on trust.

Generally, the importance of a shared vision for working in a collaborative partnership is mentioned by Penrose (2000, p. 255), based on lessons learnt.Brett (2000, p.20) explains that ‘peaceful interaction is only possible where each agency respects the right of all of the others and where viable institutions exist which embody and enforce the rules which allow them all to exchange scarce goods, services and payments on a secure and equitable basis’. He also emphasizes the importance of ‘a strong motivation rather than formal systems’ or certain skills or resources for organisational performance. Besides he mentions that effective results for development only can be produced if the theories about inter-organisational cooperation are ‘combined with a detailed knowledge of the local situation’ and ‘cultural expectations’ (ibid. p.48).

In their research programme Vangen & Huxham (2003) use a number of issues ‘that are repeatedly raised by practitioners as causing anxiety or reward in collaboration’:
- Aims and objectives
- Accountability
- Commitment and determination
- Compromise
- Appropriate working processes
- Communication
- Democracy and inclusiveness (membership)
- Trust
- Power

Ranade & Hudson (2003, p. 33) also suggest a list of ‘necessary conditions for success in co-evolving partnerships’ (adapted from Pratt et al., 1999).
- Building relationships : need of time to explore purpose
- Changing mental maps : people see themselves as a whole and stop shifting blame to other parts of the system
- Diversity : mix of people to enable new possibilities to emerge
- Expectations : not just money, but also passion and energy for change
- Iteration : try and try again
- Leadership : facilitate common ownership and responsibility for the whole
- Future: incentives which enlarge future possibilities

From this paragraph it is clear that a lot of different conditions (e.g. respect), means (e.g. communication) and external factors (e.g. institutional environment) play a role in inter-organisational cooperation. Specific research data from practitioners in the Haitian (education) context could not be obtained.

3.3 Interaction patterns in network cooperation

The previous paragraph provided different theoretical explanations for inter-organisational relationships. Within the network theories, Wielinga and Zaalmink (2008), have developed the ‘ecological perspective’ and FAN approach (Free Actors in Networks), with a focus on energy and connections to steer things along. According to the ecological perspective, ‘networks of people behave like ecosystems. They form complex structures which enable a division of tasks and specialisation. This enables benefits of scale, as long as the network participants are interconnected‘ (Wielinga & Zaalmink, 2008, p.9).

One of the tools in the FAN approach (used as inspiration) is the circle of coherence. This instrument focuses on two dimensions of interaction. The content dimension shows what we know and want, from differences to similarities. The relational dimension involves the relationship between me and we, from my interests, ability, influence, etc. to our interests, ability, influence, etc. These two dimensions provide four interaction patterns. Between the extremes is a vital space in which mutual trust develops (ibid., p.20).

Figure 3. Circle of Coherence

Source: MDF Consultancy (2011)

http://www.mdf.nl/page/MDF-SERVICES/Facilitating-Processes/Training-Courses/

Figure 3 shows the dimensions and quadrants:
1. Exchange: Will this network be worthwhile for me personally? Do the returns balance my
investment?
2. Challenge: Which position can I take in the network? Is my effort valued enough? Is it
challenging enough?
3. Structure: How do we organise ourselves? What is the best task division? How do we
maintain the structure?
4. Dialogue: What motivates the others? What lessons can we learn from each other?
Each of the four patterns requires attention for a healthy interaction. Normally the start is in quadrant 1, but after a while patterns alternate. When participants go outside the circle, they come into non-vital patterns, such as escape (quadrant 1), fight (quadrant 2), resignation (quadrant 3) or adaptation (quadrant 4). Interventions can be done to stimulate the vital patterns (ibid.).

This model could be useful when analysing interaction patterns in inter-organisational cooperation of NGOs for educational development in Haiti. It can also provide recommendations for improvement, as a facilitator (free actor) could intervene to break through barriers and recover connections.

3.4 Trust and inter-organisational cooperation

Previous paragraphs already mentioned the development of trust in a cooperation. This section explores two different categorizations from types of trust.

Harriss (2000), who also refers to other authors, states that cooperation and networking depends on the existence of trust. He distinguishes the following types of trust (Zucker 1986, in: Harriss, 2000, p.238):
1. Process based trust – associated with past or expected exchange
2. Characteristic-based (or ascribed) trust – associated with personal characteristics e.g. family
3. Institutional-based trust – associated with formal societal structures
With regard to cultural differences, Harriss (2000) concludes: ‘Trust relations can be built op, or
destroyed. These processes may be influenced by social values and norms which are part of the
culture of a society, but they are not absolutely determined culturally‘ (p.241).

Dietz, Gillespie & Chao (2010) wrote a chapter in a book about a cultural perspective on organizational trust. They work with a definition of trust from Rousseau et al. (1998, p.395): ‘a psychological state comprising the intention to accept vulnerability based upon positive expectations of the intentions or behaviour of another’ (ibid. p.10). Moreover:
- Trustworthiness beliefs inform the decision about trust. They are a set of beliefs that the trustor has about the other party.
- Propensity to trust is a person’s predisposition towards trusting other people in general. It is understood to be a facet of personality influenced by early developmental experiences, and by cultural background.
- Trusting behaviour in work contexts has two categories: reliance (relying on another party’s skills, knowledge, judgments or actions, including delegating and giving autonomy), and disclosure (sharing work-related or personal information of a sensitive nature with another party). Trusting behaviour is the likely outcome of trust, but not guaranteed as other contextual factors can influence trust behaviour.

Central for trust development is the quality of evidence gathered about the other party and the quality
of the interpretation of this evidence (ibid.).

In the same book, Bachmann (2010, p. 93) argues that the nature and quality of trust varies over different cultural and institutional environments. He distinguishes:
1. Interaction based trust – assumes frequent face-to-face meetings and developing some
familiarity.
2. Institution based trust – gives more emphasis to institutional regulation and generally
accepted rules and structures of a business community.

Normally both categories of trust play a role, but one is more dominant than the other, depending on the culture and context. For instance interaction based trust is prevalent in many UK business relationships, while institution based trust is stronger developed in German business relationships. Another example about cultural differences is that a formal contract in America tends to precede trust by underwriting it, while in China strong trust seems to be a pre-condition of signing (Dietz et all, 2010, p.21).

These theories and examples show that it is interesting to find out how specific aspects and conditions for cooperation and trust are perceived in the Haitian culture and context.

3.5 Research questions

The exploration in the previous paragraphs has addressed a number of aspects that are relevant for inter-organisational cooperation. These aspects are included in the following research questions that should be answered in the investigation.

1. Why do organisations enter and participate in inter-organisational cooperation trajectories for educational development?
a. What are (written) objectives for cooperative relationships?
b. How are the understanding and perception of objectives and interests and is this different from the written objectives?

2. How do organizations cooperate and which factors influence the inter-organisational cooperation for educational development?
a. What are conditions and criteria for inter-organisational cooperation?
b. What are interaction patterns and means for inter-organisational cooperation?
c. What are factors that promote and/or hinder cooperation?
d. What is the role of trust and trust building in cooperation?

Answers will also provide information for recommendations about how to strengthen effective and efficient inter-organisational cooperation for educational development in Haiti, between NGOs and with the government.

Definition:
Inter-organisational cooperation trajectories refer to the practice of NGOs (and other institutions) to work in common (e.g. in a network, consortium or alliance), with commonly agreed-upon goals and possibly methods, instead of working separately in isolation.

Note: in this project, ‘inter-organisational cooperation’ can include all different types of collaboration
between an NGO and another institution and does not necessarily exclude aspects of the ideal types of ‘coordination’ and ‘competition’.

4. Research methodology and design

This chapter provides a description of how the problem and research questions are investigated in the project. The sections describe the methodology and provide an overview of the participants and their organisations.

4.1 Methodology
The research questions as defined in paragraph 3.5 are about ‘why’ and ‘how’. For answers to these questions, semi-structured interviews can be used as a methodology of investigation (Potter and Subrahmanian, 2007). Collected data will not be used for quantitative generalisations, but gives insight in the variety of aspects and factors that play a role in inter-organisational cooperation for educational
development in Haiti.

For the interviews a semi-structured interview guide is constructed, see annex 2. The guide is based on the research questions, but also very open. For the data collection, a focus on practical knowledge from experiences of the respondents is desired (to avoid unrealistic ideas). Therefore the interview guide starts with an open question to explain about a cooperation trajectory in which the respondent is or was involved in. Based on this practical story, other questions can be added and related to practice. Also the questions about examples from respondents of ‘good’ and ‘weak’ cooperation give room for a lot of practical experiences. The sequence of the questions in the interview guide can be different per interview, depending on what is mentioned by respondents. In all cases, the interviews end with the same last question.

During the interviews, giving suggestions to the respondents about the content is to be avoided. For example, one of the research questions is about the role of trust in cooperation. But respondents are only asked about relevant ‘means and factors’ in cooperation trajectories. In case the word ‘trust’ is mentioned, an additional question can be asked to explain this aspect.

The selection of ‘key informants’ was done with the aim to collect a wide range of different viewpoints (Woodhouse, 2007, p. 164). I restricted my selection to ‘respondents with a Haitian nationality, related to NGOs that are part of an inter-organisational cooperation trajectory in education’. I could not talk to a representative of the government, due to the election period. I also did not select people who are not involved in inter-organisational cooperation trajectories, but probably the hindering factors for interorganisational cooperation were sufficiently known by the involved respondents. I included the rinciple of triangulation by involving more than one person (maximum three) per organisation. I have also chosen to talk to people from different ‘levels’, e.g. the director of the network and a member organisation.

17 interviews with respondents (3 female, 14 male) were organised and planned in a two-week visit to Haiti (February-March, 2011). I started with contacting the partner organisations I already knew from my professional network. They informed me about contact details of other related networks and organisations and were intermediaries in arranging appointments and office space.

The interview lengths vary from 30-40 minutes and they are audio recorded and transcribed. After the first interview I made some minor changes in the questions, mainly ‘wording’. In total 6,5 hours of interview data are collected. 12 interviews were in French and 5 in English, depending on the preferred language of the respondent.

Additionally from the organisations or networks involved in the interviews, documents (grey material) are collected about their objectives and activities.

By arranging and having the 17 interviews, similar challenges were experienced that are evident for cooperation trajectories, in the area of communication and logistics. Only 5 out of 17 interviews were exactly on the initially planned time and place. Other interviews were postponed, varying from an hour till some days. Transportation was not easy, due to situation of the roads and the traffic in Port au Prince.

I has been tried to contact three extra respondents per email, but there was no response, so their input
could not be included.

4.2 Respondents
The selected respondents were connected to 6 cases of inter-organisational cooperation trajectories that I knew from my professional experience. Details of the trajectories and numbers of respondents are provided in table 3.

Table 3. Inter-organisational cooperation trajectories and respondents

The respondents from the 6 different cooperation trajectories were also involved in other trajectories and these experiences were discussed in the interviews as well:
1. COSPE is member of the education cluster (strategic group) and related to FONHEP and FEPH.
2. CRECH is partner of the Haiti Country Alliance and related to COSPE and FEPH
3. The Education Cluster has COSPE en FONHEP and FEPH as members
4. FEPH is involved in FONHEP, COSPE, CRECH and the Education Cluster
5. FONHEP is related to COSPE, the Education Cluster, FEPH and satellite partner of the Haiti Country Alliance
6. One member of the Haiti Country Alliance is member of FEPH.

Table 6 in Annex 3 provides an overview of the number of interview fragments related to each cooperation trajectory.

Draft findings and conclusions (answers to the research questions, based on the data analysis) are
communicated per email with the respondents, to ensure that the information is correctly understood.

5. Analysis and findings

This chapter provides an overview of the findings from the data collection in Haiti.

5.1 Data features and analysis

Firstly information from the 17 transcribed interviews that was not relevant for responding the interview
questions was marked (estimation: less than 5%). The remaining text was divided into small fragments that could be categorized. After a try-out with 4 interviews, the labelling was reviewed and done for all interviews (with Microsoft Office Excel). In this process, some additional labels were added and at the end some categories could be combined and subsets made. The final categories with numbers of fragments (total 463) are included in Annex 3.

All interview fragments received 1-4 labels from the categories ‘goals and understanding’ (paragraph 5.2 and 5.3), ‘conditions and criteria’ (paragraph 5.4), ‘interaction patterns and means’ (paragraph 5.5) and ‘factors that hinder and promote’ (paragraph 5.6). Fragments have numbers (number respondent from table 4 + extra number), which are used for referencing in the respective paragraphs of findings. For the interpretation also subsets of information were made, about ‘good or weak cooperation’ and ‘hindering or promoting’, as mentioned by the respondents. Paragraph 5.7 and 5.8 describe other subsets about ‘trust’ en ‘international organisations’.

As response to the final interview question about an enabling environment for inter-organisational cooperation, people elaborated about positive conditions, means and factors that are included in the respective descriptions of findings.

The French interviews were analysed in French, but citations in this text are translated to English.

The collected data provides a wealth of information about perceptions and experiences with six
existing inter-organisational cooperation trajectories in the education sector in Haiti, from national level to school level. 76% of the respondents worked for the protestant sector (average 30-43% est., based on Salmi, 2000), the remaining 24% were Catholic or non-religious. Therefore the situation of the protestant sector is possibly somewhat more highlighted, but this is not very different from the other private schools.

5.2 Objectives
The inter-organisational cooperation trajectories COSPE, CRECH, Education Cluster, FEPH and FONHEP have written objectives:. The Haiti Country Alliance is working on this aspect (present objective is only general). Written objectives are an important step in the cooperation, according to respondents. Specific contents of objectives are already included in table 2 of paragraph 4.3

5.3 Perceptions and interests
Respondents shared perceptions about the six cooperation trajectories from their own perspectives. The described objectives are mostly known and clearly explained. Table 4 provides specific strengths and weaknesses as perceived by respondents.

Table 4. Perceptions per trajectory

A number of member organisations in the different cooperation trajectories have a strong focus on financial interests of the cooperation, while this is not the main objective of the networks (5.23). Perceptions are mainly linked to concrete results of a cooperation trajectory in practice and not to a certain structure or process. For partners with a strong financial interest, the perception is less positive if income from the cooperation trajectory is relatively low.

Working complementary to each other is a strongly desired goal and simultaneously a challenge of each cooperation trajectory. The added value of cooperation is clearer if partners are specialised in a certain domain (12.7).Only financial interest is not sufficient.

In the coordination objectives, the attention for community schools is lacking.

5.4 Conditions and criteria
Most prominent condition is a shared vision or initiative. This vision can be developed, but there needs to be a shared idea: ‘We basically agree that we want to work towards the quality of education‘ (11.6). The ‘vision’ can include a problem description (1.12), common goals (16.2) and shared (Christian) values (6.21).

There is a wish to have a strong vision for the development of Haiti (17.18). Then organizations could
work together within the framework of one vision.

Only with participation, forms of inter-organisational cooperation can continue. Organisations should be willing to participate in meetings (see also under time). Member organisations participate ‘by paying the annual fees, by giving suggestions, by praying for the organisation, by buying the products that are developed for your organisation‘ (6.10).

Transparency is another strongly emphasized condition. The Education Cluster is dealing with the challenge of increased transparency: ‘In [my organization] we do that, if we have been at a school, we say we have collected and we have spent X amount of money. We are accountable for the money we receive. (..) But not all the institutions, I don‘t know if there is a problem of security, sometimes they are reluctant‘(8.11).

Even though transparency is a essential, people always need to be respectful: ‗You cannot force him. If he has valued reasons not to share this information, you need to approach and they may tell you‘ (8.12).

Mutual respect for the own strategy of organisations, for religious differences and freedom to express your ideas (15.4) are important for respondents. In a respectful environment, people can talk easily with each other (17.22).

Ultimately cooperation is an issue of attitude and mindset. Egoism and ‘a spirit of division‘ (10.13) lead to concurrence and hinder cooperation. It is in our flag: Unity makes Strength [L'Union Fait la Force] (..) but it seems that everybody works for his personal benefit‘ (2.21). We should ‘be a least curious to trust each other so that we can try and see what we can make out of it‘ (11.17). A feeling of solidarity is positive for cooperation. Also the attitude of ‘don‘t care who gets the credit‘ (12.17) is beneficial.

Saying is doing is a condition for fruitful cooperation. A consequence is that goals should be realistic, otherwise expectations cannot be fulfilled (2.13). Four respondents explicitly mention the Ministry of Education as an obvious example from ‘saying is no doing‘. The Education Cluster has been criticized from outsiders for ‘more talking than doing‘ (9.24).

Availability of time and investments of human resources are necessary in an inter-organisational cooperation trajectory. ‘We sacrifice our time for going to invitations from other schools and other organizations.‘ (2.30) Moreover people need to create a momentum, to get better results (1.23). If you cooperate with other professional institutions, this can lead to a project. ‘Then money follows‘ (11.14).

Organisations and people need to have no fear and feel safe, to be able to share and exchange. This is the case if you can talk as freely in an office of a partner organization as you can do in your own office (17.21). The negative effect of fear is also addressed: ‘This issue, I could count at almost every meeting it would somehow come in. It‘s more like a sense of protection, an instinct‘ (12.15).

To cooperate without fear, the independency (or autonomy) of organizations needs to be accepted. Especially when there are big and small organizations in a partnership: ‗it could happen that the small organization disappears, loses its visibility and identity. It must be able to (..) have a good definition of the domain of cooperation‘ (13.21).

Legal requirements are also to be taken into consideration in certain circumstances. This can include recognition by the Ministry of Education (8.16).

One person mentioned language as reason for non-participation, as English was spoken in some (Education) Cluster meetings (instead of French or Creole), just after the earthquake (3.38).

5.5 Interaction patterns and means
Respondents indicated different types of communication and interaction as means for cooperation. It was possible to categorize these in the four patterns as distinguished by Wielinga & Zaalmink (2008): 1) exchange, 2) challenge, 3) structure, 4) dialogue (see paragraph 3.3).

Many respondents (82%) mention exchange as a first step in a cooperation: Sit down and share our ideas and share what we are doing now in our organization. This is number one‘ (15.16). Another respondent mentions the identification of shared problems (1.14). ‘One of the first factors that could hinder a good cooperation is the lack of understanding’ (2.22).

The importance of challenge was explained in an interview: ‗Your interests are not mine, even if we think we speak about the same thing. We all work for quality education. And then when we sit down to spell out what qualitative education is, we could end up fighting and screaming (…) We have to hush it out and then find a common ground (11.6). Good cooperation is a bumpy road‘ (11.10). This open way of discussing is addressed by 59% of the respondents. One person refers to the way people buy things in Haiti: they do not automatically accept things. ‘You must argue, explain and convince. And you will see soon in the dialogue what the real price is. It is 5 dollar, but they say 10 dollar. (…) Also our meetings have rich discussions.‘ (3.17). Ultimately you will come to consensus.

All respondents have mentioned the interaction pattern of structure in their interview. They mainly talked about:
- Meeting schedules and communication procedures;
- Organisational structures (consortium, alliance, network organisation, informal cooperation);
- Criteria for members or partnerships (including financial participation);
- Statutes and operational plans;
- Tasks of the different organisations involved.
If someone does not adapt to established standards for cooperation, this person has to quit (6.20). Three people explicitly point at the importance of signing for commitments: ‘for a good cooperation (…) you need signatures. With a document and signature there is much more chance that they will respect you’ (16.12).

In many cases, a dialogue (mentioned by 71% of the respondents) is understood as a desired phase in a cooperation trajectory, which is not yet realised in practice. Making use of the expertise of others is crucial. People want to motivate each other and to learn from each other. Dialogue needs a safe environment and it can be stimulated via a structured meeting schedule. Respondents regret the lack of vital platforms in Haiti for sharing, learning and coordination on community level, regional, national and international level.

Shared actions or activities for implementation of plans are very relevant in a cooperation trajectory. Actions will bring results, and make visible that saying is doing. They motivate people. Also if an organization has problems, in a cooperation trajectory you could help a bit, just very little, but this shows already that you understand the problem (1.26). For networks (e.g. CRECH or FEPH), the delivered services demonstrate to members if their participation is worthwhile or not (7.21; 10.14). Many people do not believe in institutions because they see it as people who seek personal interest: make collective benefits of actions visible (2.31) and communicate clearly about results.

Capacity building (of members) is also addressed as means for strengthening cooperation. These activities include for example training (6.3) and policy advice (9.12). It is also possible via modelling, e.g. ‘The General Assembly meeting of COSPE is a model for the member organisations‘(1.6). Two people mention the role of a facilitator, who can freely connect, either between people with innovative views or between different religious groups, for example when FONHEP started with a facilitator that brought the Catholics and Protestants together (10.2).

Budget is an important factor for the scale of activities and results in a cooperation trajectory. However, by the majority of the respondents financial means are not emphasized as a condition for cooperation, but as a relevant means when the cooperation is started and actions are planned. ‘The
budget part will come (…) that‘s what‘s going to be another level‘ (11.8). Within a cooperation trajectory, the question how to get funding can be addressed (4.21). In any case it is advisable to have
diversified funding, to spread risks (10.7).Network organizations prefer that donor organizations work through or with them, instead of directly to schools.

Specific attention was given to the importance of good leadership. Without leadership, the cooperation will remain weak (1.14). A number of networks have grown under good leadership. Moral values are very important in this regard.

All respondents talked about communication and interactions, but it was also explicitly emphasized that information via emails or a website is not sufficient. Personal contact, through visits and calls is important. ‘You should communicate a lot.(..) It is not the big, the email with a lot of tabs. (…) I depend a lot on the telephone. I write, and then I call: This is very important‘(1.17).

5.6 Factors that hinder and promote
Respondents mentioned 10 factors which hinder or promote inter-organisational cooperation.

a) Challenging institutional context
The lack of credibility of the government and civil society organisations hinders the interorganisational
cooperation (1.40). One respondent is complaining about the government: they don‘t hear, they don‘t see, they don‘t think’ (17.11). Also ‘communities are not very structured’ (5.17). Advocacy and lobby is difficult in this environment, but still necessary. A well-functioning Ministry of Planning is desired. The Ministry of Education should start-up working via l’Office National du Partenariat en Éducation (ONAPE) to strengthen the cooperation with the private education sector.

Moreover many organisations are weakly organised (1.3) and lack capacity (3.28). A focus on strengthening institutions is needed: national and regional networks, community structures, school associations and parent associations.

Specific in the private education sector it is difficult that there are schools with a ‘profit mentality‘, which cooperate ‘in a non-profit body’ (10.9).

b) Continuity
Cooperation takes time to bring results (1.42). Many projects are just financed for 3 months till 3
years. This period is often too short. Staff change positions, which hinders cooperation if this is mainly based on personal motivation. Policies should not only be linked to people (e.g. government leaders) and when a new person comes a completely new plan is made.

c) Available expertise
It promotes good cooperation if people are qualified and have sufficient knowledge about their profession (the education sector). Unfortunately baseline information from the Ministry of Education is often not available (1.36).

d) Education
The low level of education in the Haitian society could contribute to a weak culture of cooperation. Education can contribute to mindset change (17.12) and provide relevant skills.

e) Donor policies
Donor organisation can stimulate inter-organisational cooperation through funding strategies and guidelines for partners. Moreover they should promote co-funding of programmes. A negative influence from donors is visible when they prefer to implement their programs directly with schools instead of working via networks or associations (2.16).

f) Economy
Organisations have to deal with unexpected economic changes in the context and this influences also their cooperative actions.

g) Religion
Cooperation within groups with a similar religion (e.g. FEPH or CRECH) is mostly strong. It is possible, but more difficult to cooperate between organisations with different religious backgrounds.

h) Image
It is important for an organisation to have a good image. Then others want to cooperate with you and it is easier to obtain funding. Blame letters are a big risk.

i) Logistics
Lack of means for transportation and internet facilities are practical hindrances for communication.

j) History
One respondent was convinced that there are historical reasons for difficulties related to cooperation, coming from father Duvalier: the way he was leading the country, he tried to divide you, so he could rule better’ (15.3).

5.7 Role of trust
Two respondents explicitly elaborated on the role of a trust in cooperation as very important. Mutual trust means that you can ask a question to someone and you can expect that this person is going to help you if he has the capacity to do that – and also vice versa. Both of you do what you say (2.10). This shows that in the condition ‘saying is doing’ (see paragraph 5.4) could be labelled as an aspect of trust. To build trust ‘you have to have a thick skin, because you have to attempt many times‘ (11.29).

5.8 International organisations
There are good and bad experiences with cooperation between national organisations and international NGOs. International organisations do have much more funding available than Haitian organisations. Unfortunately international staffs do not always have sufficient knowledge about the context. Three people criticize the international officers in the (Education) Cluster(s): ‘All of them are suddenly experts on Haiti (…) but they should investigate what is already on the ground’ (10.18). Differences in vision about the role of the Ministry of Education also hinder fruitful coordination and cooperation. For the education sector it is a risk that the available expertise in Haiti is not fully used, when mainly young international staffs with humanitarian backgrounds are involved in the coordination.

6. Conclusions, implications and recommendations

In this chapter, based on the findings, answers are formulated to the research questions. These conclusions are further discussed in the paragraph about implications and lead to recommendations.

6.1 Conclusions
1. Why do organisations enter and participate in inter-organisational cooperation trajectories for educational development?

1 a) What are (written) objectives for cooperative relationships?
All organisations have an overall aim to work on improved quality and access to education. In general the cooperation trajectories as investigated in the interviews have the following specific objectives:
1. Improved coordination and avoiding duplication of activities in the education sector;
2. Increased effectiveness of interventions through experience and knowledge sharing;
3. Development and sharing of technical capacity in education and curricula for schools and training;
4. Strengthened processes of research and informed policy development;
5. Be a strong voice in advocacy towards the government (Ministry of Education);
6. Increased income from fundraising.

1 b) How are the understanding and perception of objectives and interests and is this different
from the written objectives?
Mostly staffs and stakeholders know about the contents of the objectives for cooperation trajectories. Table 5 gives an overview of perceptions per objective as mentioned above.

Table 5. Perceptions per objective

People’s perceptions are mainly based on concrete results. Especially as effects are on long-term, or not directly visible for each member (e.g. on national level), this is a challenge. The factor of religion (shared Christian values) is important for a positive perception.

In summary: it can be stated that there are no main difference between the written objectives and perceptions of people about these objectives. Only big differences in perception about financial gains should be avoided. In practice not all objectives have already led to clear results.

2. How do organizations cooperate and which factors influence the inter-organisational cooperation for educational development?

2 a) What are conditions and criteria for inter-organisational cooperation?
1. It is crucial that partners have a shared vision. In the beginning this is not always completely clear, but there need to be a common initiative from the beginning.
2. It is essential that there is a willingness and ability to participate. Therefore time and human resources need to be available.
3. Inter-organisational cooperation needs a positive attitude and often a change in mindset.
4. Saying is doing for each organisation. Moreover transparency is a condition for fruitful cooperation.
5. Organisations and people need to act in according to the value of respect towards each other, and towards the independency (or autonomy) of different organisations. Cooperation needs openness for sharing without fear.
6. Legal requirements need to be taken into account.
7. Lack of communication in the French or Creole language hinders cooperation.

2 b) What are interaction patterns and means for inter-organisational cooperation?

1. Four interaction patterns as distinguished by Wielinga & Zaalmink (2008) are addressed:
- Exchange is normally a first phase which asks for curiosity.
- Challenge is crucial: ‘cooperation is a bumpy road’. Without challenging each other, a cooperation trajectory will fail.
- Participants mostly mentioned the element of structure. Sometimes they give even more attention to structure and task division than to the other patterns.
- Dialogue is strongly related to learning. People see the advantage, but therefore cooperation needs to be somewhat mature already. Platforms for sharing and exchange do not always exist.
2. Shared actions are mentioned as objectives for the cooperation, but also as means to strengthen inter-organisational cooperation. Finally the results from actions count.
3. As a means in the cooperation trajectory, an organisation can give attention to capacity building of itself or other involved organisations. This is part of the process.
4. Shared implementation of programmes needs a certain budget. On the one hand the budget influences the scale of the cooperation activities; on the other hand the strength of the common vision and planning of the cooperation trajectory influences the possibilities for fundraising.
5. A cooperation trajectory can grow and bear fruits under good leadership.
6. People need personal contact for a smooth communication and cooperation.

2 c) What are factors that promote and/or hinder cooperation?

1. The institutional context in Haiti is challenging due to a lack of credibility for organisations and political instability. Developments in the history of Haiti have influenced this situation. At present institutional capacity strengthening and advocacy are recommended. Improvement of the ministry of Planning and the ONAPE office of the Ministry of Education is desired.
2. To show results from cooperation, a long time is needed. Often continuity is lacking due to financial constraints and personal changes in positions.
3. The available expertise in the country should be fully used and needs to be strengthened to promote cooperation. International organisations should also build on existing experience in Haiti.
4. With more education, people tend to develop a positive attitude and skills for cooperation.
5. Depending on the policies of donors, cooperation can be promoted (e.g. through donor criteria for proposals and donor-coordination) or hindered (e.g. preference for directly supporting schools instead of networks).
6. Economic developments can lead to difficulties in payments (of e.g. fees) or hinder the
implementation of shared projects in a cooperation trajectory.
7. Religion can both strengthen or hinder cooperation (shared religious values within a similar religious group, but there are bigger difference between religions).
8. A good or bad image of an organisation can promote or hinder cooperation.
9. Practical logistical constraints for transportation and communication can hinder interorganisational cooperation.

2 e) What is the role of trust and trust building in cooperation?

Trust and trust building is essential for cooperation, although the name of the concept is not always
mentioned explicitly.

Types of trust as distinguished by Harriss (2000):
- Example of process based trust: you work on a better cooperation if you are involved in shared actions with shared results.
- Example of characteristic based trust: preference for cooperation with people from the same religion
- Example of institution based trust: organisations should fulfil to certain legal requirements.
Respondents emphasize to build process based trust: show your results to the stakeholders and this will develop your cooperation.

The importance of personal contact in cooperation, the problem of continuity when people change positions and remarks about lacking credibility of institutions possibly indicate that interaction-based trust is stronger developed than institution-based trust in Haiti (see also Bachmann, 2010).

6.2 Implications
The aim of this project is to provide insight about aspects and factors that influence interorganisational
cooperation for educational development in Haiti. People and organisations active in Haiti can work on the improvement of inter-organisational cooperation by addressing the conditions, means and factors that influence cooperation as mentioned in the answers of both research questions. Some of these aspects are relatively simple to address, while especially some external factors cannot be changed easily. Aspects are related to each other. Possibly a focus on positive attitude change and shared values (incl. respect and transparency) will make other external factors less hindering.

From the conclusions it is clear that respondents have addressed a lot of relevant aspects from their experiences. An implication is that these Haitian people and organisations should be taken seriously and invited for active participation in the further development of policies for the country. Some recent publications about education in Haiti (e.g. The World Bank, 2010; McNulty 2011, UNESCO 2011) do not mention any inter-organisational cooperation trajectory in the education sector and reports from international NGOs mainly address the efforts of the international community. To overcome the problems in Haiti, more attention for the vision and insights from a Haitian perspective and existing cooperation trajectories in education is needed.

Conclusions are in line with outcomes of the sector analysis of Mérisier (2010) who also mentioned the importance of research, advocacy (and ONAPE) and institutional capacity building. Most elements of the theory in paragraph 3.1 and 3.2 are addressed as well. The elements of ‘power’ and ‘types of structures’ for inter-organisational structures have received less attention in the interview and this project.

In the findings, the categories from the Circle of Coherence (Wielinga & Zaalmink, 2008) were distinguished. It is possible to use this model for further development of healthy cooperation trajectories.

Conclusions about ‘trust’ are still in an initial phase. More analysis and research is needed to explore which and how elements of the conditions, means and factors can be related to the concept of trust and trust building.

The situation of the education sector and inter-organisational cooperation in Haiti is complicated and proposing oversimplified solutions will not work. A well functioning state apparatus is a major bottleneck which cannot be substituted by civil society. But on the contrary this can also not be substituted by the international community. This is to be taken into consideration for the recommendations.

6.3 Recommendations

For COSPE, CRECH, Education Cluster, FEPH, FONHEP, Haiti Country Alliance
1. Continue to build the 6 different inter-organisational cooperation trajectories and the process to (further) develop a shared vision. Moreover make your results from actions visible for the Haitian public, the Haitian government and international donors. This could increase credibility and chances for funding.

2. Focus more on the interaction patterns of ‘exchange’ and ‘challenge’ (Wielinga & Zaalmink, 2008) and avoid spending too much time and energy in ‘structure’.

General – for civil society organisations
3. Explicitly address the issue of mindset change and good leadership in interventions for education.

4. Be transparent and make others aware of the importance and advantages of transparency about activities, budgets and results.

5. Develop specialised expertise and look for cooperation trajectories that are complementary and have a specific added value. Only financial interest in an inter-organisational cooperation trajectory is not sufficient.

6. Make sure how advocacy and participation in policy development for education in Haiti is integrated in your strategies, directly or indirectly (e.g. via networks).

7. Explore how community schools could be integrated in network organisations and related to the Ministry of Education.

For the Haitian government
8. Improve the coordination of the Ministry of Education with the national and international NGOs involved in education and (via ONAPE) the private sector in education.

International donors
9. Strengthen initiatives for coordination and cooperation via donor criteria for proposals and provide
support to schools with involvement of associations and networks.

10. Be a model for inter-organisational cooperation through co-funding and harmonisation of donor efforts.

11. Make sure that ownership of the Haitian community is guaranteed in to be funded programmes.

Suggestions for further research
1. Action research of a specific cooperation trajectory, about the development of the trajectory and the interventions that can be used from the FAN approach of (Wielink & Zaalmink, 2008).

2. A broader quantitative research about the aspects and factors as distinguished in this qualitative
research, to find out specific priorities and be able to generalise findings.

3. In-depth research about the concept of trust in the Haitian culture.

Inter-Organisational Cooperation of Haitian NGOs in Education – A Haitian Perspective (149)

Cash or Food Aid? Assessing the role of resource-based transfers in achieving female empowerment and gender equity in social protection programmes

HiiDunia — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 21:29:44 +0000

This version of the paper does not include the Abstract, Bibliography or Appendix. Please refer to the PDF Download for the full text.

Cash or Food Aid? Assessing the role of resource-based transfers in achieving female empowerment and gender equity in social protection programmes (162)

Author: Shefali Shah

Chapter One

1.1 Introduction

The end of an era of structural adjustment policies by the nineties marked a discursive shift within multilateral institutions that oriented towards a renewed focus on global poverty. The tendency to associate women and female-headed households as the poorest and most vulnerable has had the effect of making women synonymous with poverty alleviation (Razavi, 1999). However in alluding to a “female face of poverty” across developing economies, this has been to the detriment of a contextual understanding of gender roles and relations at a household and community level (Walsh, 1998:na). It is the purpose of this research to assess the relative merits of cash and food aid in mediating intra-household gender relations and power asymmetries, and the wider impact on female empowerment. As social protection programmes gain momentum across the developing world as a means for poverty reduction, the ways in which household dynamics shape poverty is fundamental to understanding how far resource based transfers strengthen the position of one gender over another. It is this authors view that food and cash transfers as complementary aid instruments reduce intra-household gender conflicts over scarce resources whilst augmenting household welfare.

Despite the UN’s international commitment to gender justice from the mid-Seventies, progress for women has been contradicted by a growing ‘feminisation of poverty’ (Jahan, 1995). This research applies the analytical framework devised by Rounaq Jahan to the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper that guided the formation of Nicaragua’s Conditional Cash Transfer in 2000. The purpose of this is to assess how far women have been integrated into or set the agenda of development policies at the international level. The importance of this is to contribute to a better understanding of how gender issues at the macro level have been mirrored within social protection programmes on the ground. The view presented here argues international policy has followed an integrationist approach to gender mainstreaming.

Conditional Cash Transfers have grown in popularity since the success of Mexico’s Oportunidades (formerly Progresa) that became a model for replication across Latin America and developing economies. Whilst gender equality was made a key feature of programme design specifically through targeting women with cash, the wider goals of CCTs have sought to change the behaviour of poor households. Evaluations of Oportunidades have been criticised for the risks to women as a result of their explicit focus on investment in human capital. Yet the continued proliferation of such programmes particularly for low-income economies lacking institutional capacity is a cause for concern where programme design fails to promote gender awareness (Molyneux, 2006; Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008). This research thus draws on Nicaragua’s Red De Protección Social, a conditional cash transfer modelled on Oportunidades in promoting poor families’ investment in human capital. This is related to Ethiopia’s Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP); a Public Works programme providing cash or food for labour, whilst the humanitarian Food and Cash transfer (FACT) initiated in Malawi assesses resource-based transfers within a development and emergency context.

In contributing to a limited literature this study seeks to demonstrate in what context cash over food aid or indeed food aid over cash can promote female empowerment and gender equity. Empowerment is defined as women’s “choice, agency and power” to challenger their subordination (Kabeer, 1997 in Razavi, 1999: 419). It is the purpose of these case studies to provide an in-depth contextual understanding of how resource transfers can define gender relations across Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America and thus emphasise the study’s reliability. Whilst the case of Malawi reflects a humanitarian emergency initiative, the value of its conclusions has the potential to revolutionise the design of social protection programmes in both development and emergency contexts.

This study is organised as follows. Section two provides a conceptual and empirical analysis of cash and food aid and intra-household dynamics arguments, followed by a background to women in development and the meaning of empowerment. Section 3 adopts a case study analysis of the social protection schemes of Nicaragua and Ethiopia and Malawi’s Food and Cash Transfer in addition to a broader analysis of gender awareness in development policy. Section 4 concludes.

Chapter 2 – Resource Transfers, Household Dynamics, and Gender Equity: A Theoretical Background

2.1 Cash Transfers or In-kind Transfers?

Debates over the relative effectiveness of in-kind food aid as a tool for poverty reduction and food security has led to a decline in its “absolute value and relative importance” since the mid-nineties (OECD, 2006: 11). Critics questioned the cost-effectiveness of food aid and its ability to reach the poorest, whilst empirical support for cash transfers was ascertained by poor families’ tendency to exchange in-kind aid for cash, indicative of households’ preference for non-food items (Barrett and Maxwell, 2005). The fact that foods form a basic human right and cash a means of livelihood security lends support for the implementation of cash and food transfers in both development and emergency situations. Research on the benefits and limitations of cash transfer programmes has grown since the implementation of Latin America’s Oportunidades, though less is documented about the role of food and cash transfers in poverty reduction or mediating gender tensions. Whilst the adoption of cash in development situations has been widespread, there remains little conclusive evidence of the benefits and limitations of cash transfers (Kebede, 2006). Further whether cash or food is responsible for changes in behaviour or this is attributable to conditionality is equally inconclusive. Nonetheless a greater understanding of the benefits of cash and food as complementary aid instruments in promoting female empowerment and gender equity is fundamental to increasing the effectiveness of social protection programmes. To speculate, the limited literature in this area could be attributed to the lack of attention to monitoring intra-household gender dynamics at programme implementation. This was the case in RPS where less evaluative reports discussed progress than that of Oportunidades (Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008). It can be further argued that the explicit attention to human capital and results-based evidence has been to the corollary of gendered analyses.

The economic logic behind food aid purports to its role in protecting families’ investments in the health and education of their children (Barrett, 2002). Critics contend it has a negative impact on local food production, greater potential for misuse by intermediaries, delays in reaching beneficiaries, a cause of heightened aid dependency as well as poor targeting (Gelan, 2006; Barrett, 2002). Food aid was similarly labelled as paternalistic in that it gave less choice to families as consumers whilst cash could be rapidly delivered, involved low administrative costs and offered households greater diversity and choice in terms of expenditure (Standing, 2007). Further it promoted investment and the accumulation of strategic assets at the household level with greater potential for sustainable poverty reduction (Devereux et al., 2006). In Ethiopia, cash transfers generated multiplier effects that benefitted not only recipient households but also market producers and sellers who did not qualify under the social protection scheme (Gelan, 2006). However the potential for cash to be misused based on stereotyped assumptions of men as irresponsible lends support for food aid where evidence points to a higher marginal propensity for poor households to consume food transfers than to spend cash transfers on food (Devereux et al., 2006). Similarly, growing concerns over the efficacy of cash transfers in increasing food price inflation have questioned their ability to mitigate the impact of adverse shocks (Sabates-Wheeler, 2009). The global food price crisis of 2007-08 increased food insecurity in Ethiopia where cash stipends were not increased with rising inflation (Ibid.). The insecurity of cash as a means for survival within unstable developing economies, and particularly within a fragile global economy has important connotations for the effectiveness of CCT schemes.

Though limited, the research on food aid and female empowerment has stressed the benefits accruing to children where mothers are food aid beneficiaries (Khogali and Takhar, 2001). This was further supported by household expenditure surveys that indicated women are more responsible and inclined to spend resources on their children (Walsh, 1998; Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008; Soares and Silva, 2010). However like cash transfers, the effect of this on women’s own welfare and their existing obligations has implications for their power, agency and choice. Walsh argues that allocations of food aid must complement women’s work and their responsibilities as a means for alleviating their burden (1998). Similarly, even where women receive food aid there is inconclusive evidence on the equality of its distribution amongst children (Ibid.). In Mexico’s Oportunidades higher incentives were given to promote girls’ enrolment in school, but girls remained more likely than boys to drop out (Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008). How far food transfers succeed in improving the status and subsequent empowerment of women within the household and community is important for the application of these models to other contexts.

Studies have affirmed women’s preference for food or food-for-work schemes as it supplements their role in producing and preparing food. However these trends have been context specific, in Bangladesh female-headed households (FHHs) favoured cash over food aid as they had freedom of control over it (Walsh, 1998). On the other hand, where women had limited access to employment opportunities there was a greater need for cash over food aid (Ibid.). Sen asserted if the control of and access to resources was linked to the individual who contributed most to the household or held most power, women would accrue greater bargaining power from being food aid beneficiaries (1989 cited in Walsh, 1998). Yet in Indonesia the Program Keluarga Harapan (PKH), a pilot conditional cash transfer initiated in 2007, had no significant impact on altering the gendered division of labour or intra-household gender relations by making women cash beneficiaries (Arif et al., 2010). This challenges the assumption that cash would empower women as recipients (IADB cited in Bradshaw, 2008a). Similarly the priorities of poorer families were less oriented towards the education of children than to immediate household needs (Arif et al., 2010).

Food aid in social protection programmes has had the effect of emphasising traditional gender roles such as women’s role in food production (Soares and Silva, 2010). The fact that social norms inform gender roles suggests the need to challenge social stereotypes. Women in Oportunidades reported greater autonomy, status and self-esteem from cash transfers (Latapi and de la Rocha, 2009), however these analyses point to concerns over the dubious assumptions in which giving cash to women have been made, as well as the context to which they have been applied. Whilst food aid has been found to reinforce stereotypes and cash aid increases women’s voice, applying these models to developing economies requires attention to women’s existing roles within the household and society as well as intra-household gendered power relations. As Luccisiano found the attendance required by women at social talks represent social activities and may affect the way women are perceived in society (2006).

2.2 Intra-Household Gender Relations

Addressing the ways in which resource-based transfers can strengthen or weaken the position of women over men has been paid little attention within CCT literature that can be arguably attributed to the limited monitoring of intra-household dynamics in safety net programmes. However to assert this is an easy task would oversimplify the ‘subtle negotiations’ that occur between men and women at the household level (Razavi, 1999:420). Moreover as Dijkstra contends measuring the attainment of bargaining power within intra-household literature remains a significant methodological and empirical issue (2011). Nonetheless without strong contextual analysis, the gendered relations that shape individual experiences of poverty within countries and societies are susceptible to contentious generalisations that do little to augment female empowerment.

Research stipulates the potentially negative impacts of cash transfers on gender relations being; a reduction in women’s ability to control cash in contrast to in-kind aid, and the increased susceptibility of cash to ‘anti-social’ expenditure (Slater and Mphale, 2008:1). In Slater and Mphale’s gendered assessment of World Vision’s cash transfer programme, initiated in Lesotho in 2007, their findings purported to the role of cash in reducing gender conflict (2008:10). This was attributed to Lesotho’s history of migrant labour that has been responsible for women’s management of cash incomes. In the situation of cash transfers, household’s use of a ‘whole wage system’ has meant that women control income regardless of whose name it is in, and have been accepted by men (Ibid.). However the reliance of households on remittances has contributed to increased gender tensions directly relating to men’s redundancy from mining companies and subsequent disempowerment (Slater and Mphale, 2008). This has been paralleled with an increasing trend for women’s entry into paid factory work that has tilted power back towards women. Whilst this has not created new conflicts, it highlights the significance of a contextual understanding to women’s empowerment.

The difference in coping strategies of men and women particularly at times of crisis further implies the necessity of a gendered analysis. Where men reduced their level of consumption to provide for their children rather than their wives, women tended to consume less for the benefit of both their children and husbands (Slater and Mphale, 2008). Whilst all women agreed gender tensions increased during adverse shocks, evidence showed that cash could significantly reduce gender conflict where it allowed for the purchase of food and other needs. Where men are reported to waste cash on alcohol and cigarettes, this was not supported in Lesotho. Instead the differences in coping strategies were more likely to be a cause of tension as men objected to women’s tendencies to share food with their neighbours (Ibid.). Because women controlled resources this was to men’s dissatisfaction (Ibid.).

Research into intra-household dynamics has important implications for the assumption that making women cash or food beneficiaries will automatically result in the equitable distribution of resources. In Vietnam, giving cash or food to households reduced tensions because it alleviated pressure to obtain food and meet other needs (Holmes and Jones, 2010:22). However in India cash transfers to women had no effect on preventing domestic violence, whilst the conditional entry of women into employment increased household tensions where men resented women’s inability to perform their household duties (Ibid.). In the context of a patriarchal society, this emphasises how women’s empowerment is significantly influenced by the social and cultural norms that may perpetuate female stereotypes. It is interesting no less that in Peru’s Juntos programme, a CCT based on human capital investment, where women and men were incorporated within community meetings to inform both of their rights and reduce domestic violence, women’s enhanced agency, power and reduced dependence on men stemmed directly from their participation in community talks rather than the cash itself (Holmes and Jones, 2010:24). The varied role of resource transfers in heightening women’s autonomy contends to the fact that targeting women in social protection programmes has been based on limited evidence (Dijkstra, 2010). Be it food or cash, each plays a significant role in reducing intra-household tensions were resources are scarce. However where cash is provided to men this can increase conflict particularly where women have greater agency. This would suggest the potentially positive outcomes of conditional employment programmes where men and women both contribute to the household.

2.3 Women and Empowerment

Since the 1960s as women’s movements challenged the social stereotypes that perpetuated their disadvantage in developed economies, economic and efficiency arguments for women’s inclusion across the developing world promoted their productivity as key to their integration (Razavi and Miller, 1995). The United Nations declaration of 1976-85 as the Decade for Women institutionalised the promotion of women’s rights and status within the global community, a turning point in achieving gender equity and female empowerment. However by the early Eighties Ester Boserup, an influential feminist thinker, challenged the welfare approach under development agencies and NGOs that continued to depict women as mothers or wives (1981). Giving rise to the Women in Development (WID) movement, women were promoted as ‘agents and beneficiaries of development,’ such that economic change was central to female empowerment (Jahan, 1995: 12). Proponents argued that the subordination of women in society stemmed from their barriers to the productive sphere (Razavi and Miller, 1995). This was critiqued however for its depiction of women as an already marginalised group that should be added into development policy (Porter and Sweetman, 2005).

Similarly for Goetze, efficiency arguments for women’s integration into development discourse stressed what development required from women, rather than women’s needs within development (1994). Such a view has not been far removed from CCT programmes nor international development policy mandates, whereby women continue to be “working for development,” (Chant, 2008 in Molyneux, 2008:190). Feminists alike concurred that integrating women into exploitative and unequal systems did little to challenge their subordination, emphasising the need to address the social construction of men and women’s roles within development agendas. By the end of the ‘Decade’, gender mainstreaming in development represented a paradigmatic shift from integrating women in development to putting them at the centre of it. Though how far development policy and practice has moved in line with this shift has been central to women’s gains within social protection programmes.

The UN Economic and Social Council define gender mainstreaming in development as a method of making “women and men’s concerns integral…to the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programmes” (1997 in Porter and Sweetman, 2005:2). This was supported by Gender and Development (GAD) discourse that argued gendered hierarchies restricted women’s opportunities and access to resources (Sharma, 2008). However Elson states the implementation of GAD in development policy has been in addition to existing policies rather than dictating it (2004). Rounaq Jahan conceptualised two distinct approaches to gender mainstreaming to challenge the claim that women’s empowerment and gender equality were at the centre of development policies (1995:12). Her pivotal study offers greater substance to the present analysis of CCT programmes in understanding how far women benefit under social protection programmes in terms of their status, autonomy and decision making power. In her gendered analysis of the macroeconomic policies of the World Bank (WB), United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD) she argued that the means for addressing WID and GAD had been incorporated within the project frameworks of both Canada and Norway, yet the WB had not prioritised gender at each level of programme design, monitoring or evaluation (1995:68).

This paper uses Jahan’s work to apply her framework to the context of Nicaragua to assess how far the incorporation of gender issues into development policies and programmes has followed an integrationist approach or an agenda-setting approach (1995: 13). Under gender mainstreaming, an integrationist approach reflects the framing of gender issues within development policy so that women are a feature but not a primary goal. An agenda-setting approach would imply the re-conceptualisation of development policy entirely from a gender perspective, prioritising female empowerment through directly targeting women’s decision-making power (Jahan, 1995). Donors and policy practitioners claim to have adopted both an integrationist and agenda-setting approach to mainstreaming gender, prioritising integration and mainstreaming before gender equality and women’s advancement. This they contend is based on the need to ‘set the agenda’ [through women’s integration] before changing it (Jahan, 1995: 21). To interrogate this view, an integrationist approach implies women have been treated solely as “participants and beneficiaries in development policies,” (Jahan, 1995: 24) rather than decision-makers through their enhanced agency, voice and power.

To strengthen the integrity of such an argument this study incorporates the analytical framework of Molyneux and Thomson (2011) to examine how decisions at the policy level dictate programmes on the ground. They assert that sensitivity to gender in CCTs would imply the allocation of resources “directly seeks to strengthen women’s capabilities; social and economic empowerment is an explicit goal; family-friendly policies that account for women as care givers; promote gender equity by sharing responsibility amongst men; women’s voice in the programme design, implementation and evaluation” (Molyneux and Thomson, 2011: 199; Molyneux, 2008). As the PRSP that guided Red de Protección Social pertained to being “country owned, designed through national participatory processes with the assistance of the WB,” (Bradshaw, 2008a: 196) it would be expected that gender is a higher priority particularly as it is modelled on the gender aware Oportunidades. The inattention to gender no less would give credence to the contention that RPS has been based on an integrationist approach to mainstreaming gender in development. With the replication of CCTs based on existing, successful models such as RPS this analysis at the micro-level permits a greater understanding for the universal applicability of CCT schemes to other developing economies. A limitation to Molyneux and Thomson’s framework arises in the subjective definition of empowerment, thus its meaning here is discussed in 2.2A. The extent to which women’s positions within safety net schemes has been an outcome of a gender blind political economy has important consequences for women’s empowerment.

2.2a Defining Female Empowerment

Empowerment has become a buzzword within development discourse and policy circles, alluding to notions of enhanced self-esteem, self-actualisation and status with participatory governance. However as Jahan argues, self-empowerment or improving women’s access to resources is not a suffice means of challenging the structures that perpetuate gender inequality in the first place (1995). Women must become their own agents of change rather than the “passive recipients of welfare” stereotyped under the Women in Development discourse (Razavi and Miller, 1995: 4). The shift to GAD re-conceptualised the definition of empowerment as a ‘process of awareness raising and struggle’ to challenge gendered hierarchies (Sharma, 2008: 7). For Rowlands the ambiguity in the term power itself has connotations for the way in which empowerment is conceptualised and addressed within development programmes (1999 in Campbell, 1999). Kabeer similarly identifies it under categories of power; disempowerment and empowerment arguing individuals cannot be empowered without having been disempowered (2001). Rowlands adds to this where the definition of power is thus conceptualised as a means of challenging oppression and inequality, only then can empowerment be realised (1999).

Sharma debates the neoliberal conception of empowerment as a de-politicization of poverty versus a means of re-establishing power where it belongs, the former viewing poverty as something to be technically managed (2008: xx; Ferguson, 1994). For her, empowerment represents a governmental strategy to control and direct the behaviour of women towards specific ends (2008). The UNDP specifically works to ensure gender equity and women’s empowerment is met not just as a human right but a means of eradicating poverty as part of the Millennium Development Goals. This is based on the idea that women’s access to education can reduce fertility promote growth and poverty reduction. However this views women as a means to an end within development circles rather than an end in itself, with little concern for women’s welfare (Jahan, 1995). This supports the contention that definitions of empowerment within international development agencies have not sought to give power back to women but instead promoted a ‘feminisation of poverty alleviation’ (Chant, 2003 in Bradshaw and Viqeuz, 2008: 827). The expression of empowerment used within this paper expands on these author’s contributions in affirming the view that empowerment is not something that can be “done ‘to’ people or ‘for’ people…[but must be] undertaken with women,” (Rowlands, 1998 in Sharma, 2008: 7). Empowerment from here on is thus defined as power, agency and choice (Kabeer, 1997 cited in Razavi, 1999); the ability of women to challenge their subordination through self-actualisation, bargaining power and decision making power.

The claim that CCTs empower women in any given context has been a strong mechanism in gaining international support for conditional cash and food transfers. Giving cash directly to women is justified by the rationale that women are more responsible than males and subsequently more inclined to spend the cash subsidy on their children (Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008). Such imperatives have been reinforced without question by programme designers, based on an economic rationale that argues the investment in the human capital of children is key to economic growth (Fiszbein and Schady, 2009). However whilst one cannot dispute promoting the welfare of children across developing economies, there has been a level of criticism directed at the negative impact upon women. Molyneux defines what has emerged as a ‘maternal model of care’ that reinforces the gendered responsibilities of women as caregivers and within the household (2006: 22). Women in Mexico reported greater status and self-esteem as a result of their participation within Oportunidades yet Latapi and de la Rocha’s ethnographic study found women’s attendance required at talks and meetings, their participation in activities in addition to family and work obligations was a burden borne solely by mothers (2009). This suggests women gain from being cash beneficiaries but such benefits are negated by the conditions attached to cash. Importantly can any feelings of empowerment reported by women in CCTs truly equate to those felt given the opportunity to earn such money within the labour market? (Molyneux, 2006).

Critically, the assumption that men are irresponsible in terms of their use of resources has only heightened the burden placed on women to meet the conditions of cash transfer programmes. Evaluations of Oportunidades have examined the objectives of children’s enrolment in education and health programmes, overlooking the effect on women and in transforming intra-household gender relations (Adato et al., 2000). Where the male role of ensuring their household’s survival is threatened, this has contributed to increased tensions (Molyneux, 2006). However whilst the burdens placed on women have forced dropouts, the low rates of attrition in Oportunidades suggests a recognition by women of the value of CCT programmes (Latapi and de la Rocha, 2009). Nevertheless this strand of thought alludes to the reality that CCT schemes are not a one size fits all and fail to account for the complex structures of households that do not conform to stereotyped perceptions.

The intra-household allocation of resources as part of food and cash transfers has its roots in the theory behind household dynamics. The unitary approach argues that households operate as an independent decision-making body such that targeting resources by gender has little impact on programme success (Haddad et al., 1997). The collective approach on the other hand endorses a gender perspective that stipulates cash beneficiaries play a distinct role in how cash is utilised allocated (Khogali and Takhar, 2001). Whilst CCTs pertain to a collective approach in giving cash directly to women this has come only as a result of their stereotyped image as more inclined to their children’s welfare. Furthermore it does little to suggest that women’s individual needs were built into programme design, being seen as instruments in development only. Latapi and de la Rocha argue that households cannot ‘be reduced to [a] nuclear/non-nuclear dichotomy ,’ though they function best under nuclear structures (2009). Similarly the distribution of resources within households has been influenced not only by gendered power relations but social and cultural norms (Barrientos and de Jong, 2004). It follows that where decision-making power is dependent on the income contributed by a member of the household, women have greater potential for empowerment. However in Ecuador’s Bono de Desarollo Humano CCT, women had no opportunity to contribute to the decision-making process in programme implementation or reflect on how they were being affected (Molyneux and Thomson, 2011). Furthermore it is contradictory in itself that CCTs promote women’s needs and choice whilst constricting them with conditionality. Adato argues there is difficulty in ascertaining whether women’s enhanced autonomy can be attributed to the programme itself or rather the absence of males due to out-migration (2006 cited in Molyneux, 2006). A fundamental concern within conditional cash transfers is the extent to which families have been convinced of the need to invest in their children’s education or whether receiving the cash has been a greater incentive (Molyneux, 2006).

Chapter 3 – Social Protection, Gender Equity and Female Empowerment

This chapter is divided according to two main areas of analysis. First is a critical assessment of the country specific case study to determine the relationship between cash and food aid and intra-household dynamics. This is analysed in relation to their capacity to augment women’s power, agency and choice and with it gender equality. Section 3.2 examines Nicaragua’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper as a means of assessing at a broader level, how gender issues have been recognised and addressed within development policies. Significant attention is paid to RPS because as an advance on Mexico’s Oportunidades, it suggests the extent to which these models have acknowledged and redressed gender bias.

Ethiopia’s PSNP draws on the literature of Devereux et al., (2006) and Holmes and Jones (2010) and their analysis of the successes and limitations of the public works programme through a ‘gender lens’. The PSNP has been accorded a highly gender sensitive design, thus it is the intention here to relate this evidence specifically to the role played by cash aid in mediating household tensions and increasing women’s empowerment. As a cash for work scheme it provides a better understanding of the role of employment in increasing women’s status. Malawi’s unique food and cash transfer programme facilitates the assessment of food and cash together as a modality for equalising intra-household gender relations and gendered power asymmetries, particularly where conclusive evidence is lacking.

3.1 Empowering Women: Cash, Food, Food and Cash?

Ethiopia’s Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP)

The Government of Ethiopia with the support of donor financing, initiated Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest safety net programme in 2005 with the objectives of alleviating food insecurity amongst the ‘predictably food insecure’ and creating assets at the community level (Devereux et al., 2006:1; Gilligan et al., 2008). Diverging in design from traditional CCT programmes, the PSNP centred on the view that ad-hoc appeals for food aid and emergency assistance did little to overcome the asset depletion of households. Similarly it would permit a reduced dependence upon emergency humanitarian aid for those made vulnerable by their poverty (Devereux et al., 2006). Ethiopia’s PSNP functions as a Public Works and Direct Support scheme, tying cash or food to beneficiaries’ supply of labour in labour-intensive infrastructural community projects to increase household purchasing power (Holmes and Jones, 2010). For poor households unable to contribute their labour, their choice in unconditional food or cash forms their direct support (Gilligan et al., 2008).

Women’s occupation in agriculture and food security as well as their low representation in paid labour and gender-wage disparities have been incorporated within the PSNP such that one third of women are required to engage in paid labour opportunities (Holmes and Jones, 2010). This is with the intention of enhancing women’s autonomy, linked to the generalisation that access to an income equates to notions of empowerment (IADB, 2003 in Bradshaw, 2008a). An explicit feature of programme design has been to account for women’s household and child obligations through the provision of crèche services and flexible working hours to overcome their time poverty (Holmes and Jones, 2010). The PSNP is a significant advance on earlier CCTs in its recognition of the barriers to women’s empowerment. However whilst gender sensitivity has been a pervasive feature of the PSNP, there has been inconsistency in the prioritising of these services on the ground (Holmes and Jones, 2010). Furthermore the lack of attention to the role of intra-household gender relations in resource allocation questions the extent to which improving women’s welfare has been addressed.

Three quarters of the programmes 8 million beneficiaries received cash or food aid in exchange for their labour, with one quarter unconditionally (Devereux, 2006). Yet even where female labour was exchanged, stipends were directly distributed to the heads of household regardless of gender differences (Holmes and Jones, 2010). This infers programme practitioners have viewed households as a single unit and as a result overlooked the reality in Ethiopia that men and women make use of assets and resources differently. The fact that the unitary approach to intra-household resource allocation adopted here was challenged for its failure to account for gender asymmetries is evidence of an inconsistent approach to advancing women’s welfare within the PSNP. The provision of cash in this instance has served to strengthen the position of males over women in male-headed households. Women have faced uneven access to finances whilst their opportunity for enhanced voice was limited to a 30 per cent provision in the decision-making of community assets, giving credence to the view that the benefits to women as cash or food beneficiaries is confounded by unequal gender relations as well as social norms. The finding that male unemployment increased household tensions in Lesotho can be applied to Ethiopia. Though women and men entered into employment the fact that women did not necessarily receive the cash income suggests this could fuel tensions where men do not allocate resources in the same way as women. These findings suggest cash can increase gender conflicts where women are not beneficiaries, supporting the role of food aid in reducing conflict over scarce resources.

The limited literature on household preferences for food, cash or food and cash has emphasised the difficulty in knowing in what context providing one or the other is better suited (Kebede, 2006). Fifty-four per cent of households participating in the PSNP reported a preference for food only, compared to 36% for half cash half food, and 9% favouring cash only. However Devereux et al., assert this preference may have stemmed from the fact this is what they had already been provided and thus had nothing to compare it to (2006). The difficulty of implementing a control group within such programmes would explain the limited literature on the gendered allocation of resources within households. Of significance was the preference amongst wealthier households for cash, whilst poorer households favoured food and cash. This would imply that the need for food and cash has strong links to the livelihood strategies adopted by poor and wealthier households, as well as potential inclusion errors. Nonetheless, the majority of food receiving households reported consuming all of the food at home, whilst only 7% sold a proportion of it. From this it can be inferred that food aid is less likely to create household tensions as it meets immediate needs, however the fact that food only recipients were more likely to sell than those receiving both food and cash transfers may suggest otherwise. Where limited by a lack of research, it is difficult to say with certainty the reasons for some household’s sale of food aid, and in particular on what cash was spent. The fact that men and women utilise cash and value assets in distinct ways is fundamental for a better understanding of the value of food and cash transfers.

Households that expressed a preference for cash recorded their greatest spending on staple foods, groceries, clothes, health and education. Here it can be argued families’ lack of investment in education results from their level of poverty rather than the World Bank’s idea of misguided beliefs. Households in receipt of food transfers enjoyed greater income growth than those given cash, whilst transfers of cash plus food were found to offer self-reported food security, income increases as well as the ability to purchase and keep livestock (Sabates-Wheeler, 2009). This lends the support to the value of food aid when supplemented with cash as a means for achieving long-term development. This evidence also shows the value given to food aid providing greater validity for the provision of cash and food to poor families. Where Devereux et al.’s study is limited by a lack of disaggregation of resources by gender; this may be due to the non-differentiation between genders in resource transfers. In spite of this, some gender analysis can be applied to the response of participants who expressed a preference for food, cash or both (See Appendix 1). Women reported fears that cash would be spent irresponsibly thus preferred food transfers only, whilst concerns over high food prices, difficulty getting to market, and the fear that cash aid artificially augmented food prices were similarly reported by food receiving households. A limitation of food aid expressed by those favouring cash was that food aid had to be collected and brought home, suggesting a male tendency to sell food along the way or that poor households lacked sufficient labour. Cash and food together on the other hand met the food and non-food needs of households, allowed for greater food security when food prices were high whilst cash was more useful after harvests and reduced the need to sell food for cash (Devereux et al., 2006). It is clear food aid supplements livelihood strategies whilst cash permits a more effective route to sustaining livelihoods and investing in health and education through increasing purchasing power. Support for cash as a complement to food aid is justified where cash transfers are increased in line with food prices and delivery of food aid is more efficient. Of course the institutional capacity of countries is an important factor in addressing these issues.

Support for sensitivity to intra-household relations and cultural norms in the design of social protection programmes are warranted where polygamy is a norm. Where first wives were recognised as main beneficiaries in the transfer of resources, this was at the expense of second wives regardless of their participation in public works or the depth of their needs (Holmes and Jones, 2010). In terms of overall empowerment, Holmes and Jones argue that the PSNP had positive impacts on women at the individual level in terms of the enhanced opportunities for their participation in economic activities, increased knowledge, skills and self-esteem as well as contributing to male attitudinal changes (2010: 20). Forty per cent of women entered into paid labour works with both sexes having wage equality. Women reported the benefits of such employment as a greater alternative to the domestic and abusive work they often engaged in. However societal attitudes had not changed towards women workers such that male labour was more valued and given greater incentive to work (Holmes and Jones, 2010). It can be argued that women’s participation at this level has not contributed to enhancing their voice, agency or power. Similarly where women reported increased confidence and self-esteem as a result of their paid labour opportunities, this did not alter their gendered roles and responsibilities within the household. This evidence further suggests that where programme officers are not informed of the benefits of enhancing women’s empowerment, there is little hope for advancing women’s welfare. In effect no aspect of the productive safety net programme was effective in making women agents of development. The fact that these programmes seek to promote long term benefits once the programme ends is indication of a need to better assess the gendered allocation of resources within households. Women reported increased feelings of worth and gained more respect as a result of their participation in public works, whilst some noticed men shared the burden of women’s duties. However of the 8 million programme beneficiaries, these changes were witnessed amongst a minority of households. Rather than becoming the agents of change made synonymous by development agencies since the UN ‘Decade’, the advancement of women in development has been hindered by a failure to challenge social stereotypes and men’s attitudes.

Food And Cash Transfer (FACT), Malawi

The implementation of Malawi’s food and cash transfer (FACT) scheme in 2005-06 formed part of an international response to its food crisis. With CARE International, the unique design of FACT represented a humanitarian relief intervention where the provision of cash plus food offered “all the benefits of both while avoiding the limitations of each,” (Devereux et al., 2006a: vii). The innovative programme was designed to meet 50% of rural household’s food needs through a 25% food aid provision of maize, beans and oil, with 25% through a cash amount equivalent to the cost of buying that food (Ibid.). The decision was made to provide both cash and food aid in case of potential market failure to ensure nutritional requirements were met and that food reached those less able to obtain it such as female-headed households and the elderly.

The necessity of providing cash followed previous assumptions that contend it is more empowering for women; it is cost-effective and has positive impacts on local markets. Families reported the benefits of food and cash transfers in ensuring food security and to their children’s education (Devereux et al., 2006a). Under FACT men and women generally behaved in similar ways to households in Lesotho; women were more likely to share food transfers, whilst men were more inclined to lend cash to other men. Where both were received, few reported domestic violence though this is not to say it did not occur (Devereux et al., 2006a). Though women’s gendered roles have traditionally remained in the production and preparation of food, FACT had little effect on changing men’s attitudes towards shared responsibilities within the household. Even where cash and food transfers were given to the women, in many male-headed households they willingly gave the cash to their husbands (Devereux et al., 2006a). It can be argued that where the gender division of labour reinforces women’s household domain and the stereotypical male breadwinner, women have little self-esteem to assert control over cash transfers thus surrendering it to their husbands.

It is important to note that assumptions that men use money selfishly cannot be generalised to all males. In polygamous households cash was spent on their second wife and family, which couldn’t be defined as misuse. As Devereux et al., argue such situations require cultural sensitivity and attention to the complex meaning of ‘household’ (2006a). Nonetheless it was apparent that men asserted full decision making power where they were given the cash by their wives, but in 60% of cases families reported mutual discussion of how best to spend the cash. However the fact that it is difficult to ascertain the level of women’s participation within this process, for example whether they were able to assert a voice or they passively agreed does little to suggest cash transfers offer greater female empowerment when gendered power relations prevail. There is strong support for the gendered targeting of resources based on FACT and Ethiopia’s PSNP particularly in the benefits to children, however greater analysis is required to avoid encouraging a trade-off between women and children. As found in Ethiopia, the value of cash to households was significantly reduced where it was provided to men. So whilst the provision of cash to women has the potential to enhance their power and status, it cannot be asserted that this will challenge gendered power asymmetries.

Based on the studies of Ethiopia and Malawi food aid is less likely to reinforce unequal gender relations as it is entirely consumed, however in terms of empowering women it has only reinforced a traditional division of labour. Food and cash together contribute to alleviating the burdens placed solely on women with the potential for shared decision-making within the household. However where there is a concern over men’s behaviour, it is necessary to incorporate men into social protection programmes to permit a greater level of intra-household cooperation. That employment can be more empowering for women has potential for women in Ethiopia were women receive the cash, and men earn their own income. Devereux et al. suggest achieving female empowerment within cash and food transfers requires direct attention to addressing gender issues, enhancing the knowledge of community actors to support women and promote gender sensitisation training in the wider community (2006a).

Red de Protección Social (RPS), Nicaragua

Nicaragua became one of the first classified low-income countries in Latin America to implement a social protection strategy in 2000 as part of its Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) (Regalia and Castro, 2007; Bradshaw and Viqez, 2008). Implemented across two phases, Red de Protección Social was designed to alleviate short-term poverty within rural Madriz and Matagalpa whilst tackling long-term poverty through human capital formation (Maluccio and Flores, 2004). The success of RPS, determined through its objectives for achieving food security, health and nutrition as well as education dissolved concerns over the applicability of such programmes from middle to low-income countries. As the second poorest country in Latin America, RPS was designed according to Nicaragua’s own poverty and policy context and thus differed from Mexico’s Oportunidades in its economic growth focus, particularly where gender parity in education was not promoted through greater cash incentives to girls (Bradshaw, 2008a; Molyneux, 2006). Instead the Pay For Performance Model (P4P) incorporated private providers, as well as a supply side logistic that incentivised both cash beneficiaries and private services in exchange for performance conditions (Bradshaw and Viqeuz, 2008). This has been an innovation in addressing where the supply and quality of services fail to meet the growing demand for education and health services, but also suggests the promotion of GDP growth through the private sector that will trickle down to the poor.

Targeting conditional cash transfers to one member of a household inevitably risks increasing tensions between generations, gender relations, and relatives (Adato and Roopnaraine, 2004:68). In Nicaragua, the limited analysis of gender relations within the household has meant affirmative conclusions are difficult. Nonetheless, in some cases there were increases in intra-household gender tensions where men perceived women’s new income as cash beneficiaries as replacement for them (Bradshaw, 2008). Forty-three per cent of women beneficiaries reported their husbands withholding earnings for their own use, amounting to as much as 50% of their income in some cases (Ibid.). Moreover, Bradshaw found there was a greater tendency amongst women who earned their own income through paid labour to report their husbands (2008). Whilst this suggests these women may have greater levels of confidence, this can be the cause of increased conflict between men and women, particularly where women depend on their partner’s income.

In Bradshaw’s analysis of poverty in Nicaragua, women reported the causes of intra-familial violence as alcohol, economic problems and the behaviour of men and women within households (2002: 17). Whilst this was not confined to the regions in which RPS has been enacted, it can be inferred that men’s socially constructed behaviour has the potential to negatively impact household welfare whilst the scarcity of resources can create conflicts. The extent to which cash transfers increase tensions over how to spend resources is less documented but no less important. Targeting cash to women has raised women’s social standing at a community and household level, whilst their opportunity for enhanced knowledge and participation has altered intra-household gender relations (Adato and Roopnaraine, 2004). It is interesting that in Adato and Roopnaraine’s analysis of RPS impacts, men vehemently supported the targeting of cash directly to women in that men saw food production as the woman’s domain (2004). Men similarly asserted that male tendencies were for the anti-social expenditure of cash, thus warranting the need to provide cash to women (Ibid.). However men also stated that where food was not a priority then cash should be provided to men (Bradshaw, 2002). This reinforces the social construction of gender that has dictated men and women’s roles. This also suggests if food aid was being provided, men may demand to be cash recipients as this denotes their roles. A majority of respondents reported that cash eased conflicts in relieving the stress of limited resources, which purports to the valuable role of cash transfers supported by such occurences in both Ethiopia and Malawi. In some cases there were reports of men demanding cash from women (Adato and Roopnaraine, 2004). The fact that this has not been well documented is not to suggest domestic violence or gendered conflicts do not occur due to resource transfers, but points to the sensitivity of such an issue and the repercussions for women and children. The fact that other reports claimed money was rarely spent on vegetables (Quisumbing and Maluccio, 2000) suggests the important role of food transfers in such programmes, but also the variation in household priorities relative to how cash is allocated. This is not to advocate conditionality but to recognise that households cope with poverty in varying ways.

3.2 Integrationist or Agenda-Setting? Mainstreaming Gender at the Policy and Programme Level

A gendered analysis of Nicaragua’s PRSP finds support for the contention that international development policy has followed what Jahan (1995) defines as an integrationist approach to mainstreaming gender. Understood as the means by which women have been identified as participants and beneficiaries in development, without the explicit goal of redressing the structures that perpetuate their subordination, the objectives of the PRSP have not paralleled a confident shift towards GAD discourse. The UN Economic and Social Council definition of gender mainstreaming defined making gender issues a feature of the ‘design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development’ programmes (1997 cited in Porter and Sweetman, 2005: 2). However the PRSP has pushed for labour intensive economic growth as a solution to reducing poverty with little reference to gender goals (Bradshaw, 2008a). This lends support to Elson’s (2004) argument that GAD policies have not re-shaped development agendas. The promotion of labour-intensive growth instead resembles WID arguments for women’s entry into the productive sphere. Poverty alleviation is addressed from a ‘perspective of greater generation of wealth’ through GDP growth and employment (IMF, 2006:19) yet the RPS is not designed as a conditional work programme. Though this could be the result of low investment in infrastructure and limited job creation.

Early literature on the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS) process of Nicaragua discussed the integration of civil society to contribute to its design and monitoring (Dijkstra, 2011). With this the participation of women’s organisations would permit greater attention to attaining gender justice within developing economies (Ibid.). Gideon argued poverty reduction strategies needed to ‘promote women’s voice to influence development agenda’s, maintain a level of cooperation between women’s movements and policymakers, ensure transparency and accountability and make explicit the goal of gender justice’ (2006 cited in Dijkstra, 2011: 297), however whilst in theory there has been an opportunity for women’s voice and transparency this has not translated into practice (2011: 297). This supports the notion that poverty has not been viewed in the context of gender roles and relations, supporting the view that human capital and poverty reduction do not go hand in hand.

A significant trend within the PRSP is the discussion of making women beneficiaries in health and education, but this is not synonymous with action on the ground level (Dijkstra, 2011: 293). RPS has promoted two of four pillars of the IMF’s ‘strengthened’ PRSP; the investment in human capital, and social protection for the most vulnerable (IMF, 2006). Under this women have been portrayed as a vulnerable group in need of social welfare alongside that of children and the elderly. This is supported where Dijkstra asserts women have not been identified as ‘economic agents’ at any point within the paper (2011: 293). Whilst the targeting of cash to women within RPS is not confirmation of a gender approach, it purports to failure to embed gender justice within the PRS process. The idea that women have been made decision makers merely by fitting them into CCT programmes is corroborated by the application of Molyneux and Thomson’s 2011 framework to RPS. The criteria laid out by the authors purports to an allocation of resources that directly seeks to strengthen women’s capabilities, the goal of social and economic empowerment, family-friendly policies, shared responsibility amongst men and increasing women’s voice in regards to programme design, implementation and evaluation (2011). The targeting of cash to rural women in RPS has had the effect of increasing the obligations of women with a lack of attention to their existing responsibilities. Meeting the conditions for cash transfers, their attendance in community meetings and talks on how to become better mothers has had the impact of augmenting their time poverty and lowering their self-esteem as mothers (Bradshaw and Viquez, 2008). Cash allows women to meet the additional needs of their family with the benefit of meeting children’s in education, however this has been to reinforce women as what Bradshaw describes as “objects of reproduction” (2008:199). Interestingly, women beneficiaries reported significant improvements in household gender relations as a result of cash transfers, whereby the paucity of resources was a cause of conflict (Adato and Roopnaraine, 2004). This further reinforces the value of resource transfers in meeting the survival needs of poor households, rather than just their socially constructed needs.

Gender equity and female empowerment has been asserted as an indirect effect of making women cash beneficiaries as opposed to an overarching goal of CCTs. This would imply gender was not excluded in the design of RPS. However the fact that the RPS has recognised men’s stereotyped behaviours in terms of wasteful spending (Bradshaw, 2008a), their failure to address it implies an integrationist approach to gender in policy and RPS. As in Malawi and Ethiopia, male attitudes remain a significant barrier to the empowering potential of cash and food transfers. Whilst it is of credit to Ethiopia’s PSNP in recognising the need for crèche facilities the failure to implement these is further symbolic of an integrationist approach in international policy, but even less so where women in Ethiopia have not been made beneficiaries of cash transfers. The fact that RPS does not seek to encourage gender parity in education implies there is little recognition of how gender shapes poverty. Though Bradshaw and Viquez suggest this may be because primary school attendance is not unequally gendered (2008: 833). RPS identifies women according to the social construction of women’s needs in other words dictating what is best for them. The corollary of which has been to reinforce their status as “passive recipients of welfare” (Razavi and Miller, 1995: 4). This supports Goetze’s argument that WID discourse did not promote women’s strategic gender interests such as challenging social stereotypes, but what development required from women. This would support the argument that international policy has not changed with the shift from WID to GAD discourse.

In assessing whether women have the ability to be empowered based on Kabeer’s distinction between power, empowerment and disempowerment, is supported by women’s subordination under gender divisions of labour and social stereotypes. RPS has identified women solely as cash beneficiaries and not with the intention to challenge the gendered asymmetries of power that perpetuate other forms of disadvantage. The demand for public accountability and quantitative measures of progress within today’s aid industry could explain the focus on education and health targets as a definition of programme success. However this would only reinforce the need to address gender inequality from the top down. The need for effective monitoring and further research into gendered power imbalances and women’s social relations is pivotal to addressing gender equity and enhancing women’s status through CCTs. Women represent tools of development under RPS, which gives credence to the argument that policy practitioners have failed to move from an integrationist to an agenda-setting approach in mainstreaming gender. The autonomy exuded to women as cash beneficiaries has been further questioned with conditionality. If women fail to meet the conditions for which they qualify, they risk their entitlement for that period with consequences for the ability of households to meet their immediate needs. As this research has found, this augments gendered conflicts suggesting the greater importance of resource transfers than conditionality in poverty reduction, if not the “morally atrocious” nature of conditionality (Freeland, 2007).

Chapter Four

4.1 Conclusion

This research has discussed and analysed Nicaragua and Ethiopia’s social protection programmes as well as the humanitarian relief intervention that was Malawi’s Food and Cash Transfer. In seeking to assess whether food and cash transfers can better mediate the unequal gender relations and power-asymmetries within poor households, it finds cross-country comparative support for the hypothesis that food and cash transfers together have a greater capacity to reduce household gender tensions. Food and Cash together can mediate gender tensions where intra-household conflicts stem from a scarcity of resources. The case studies used show the value of resource based transfers in promoting food security in both a development and humanitarian context, as well as the ability for households to meet important non-food needs, provided women remain resource beneficiaries. The fact that men and women use resources differently is a significant finding and thus highlights the importance of a contextual understanding to gendered roles and relations at both the community and household level. The significance of this is to appreciate how resource transfers and their allocation can strengthen the position of men over women when women are not beneficiaries. As both the literature and case studies show, where men and women do not have access to their own income, this can be a cause of heightened disagreements. Similarly male disempowerment can also increase tensions in providing cash to women. This identifies the need to readdress men’s exclusion from social protection programmes to promote gender equity and mutual decision-making, otherwise food and cash aid may reinforce traditional divisions of labour where social stereotypes are not challenged.

Critically the provision of cash and food-based resources to women within CCT programmes has done little to increase women’s agency, choice and power in a context of gendered power asymmetries. Whilst women reported enhanced status and self-esteem in Nicaragua, this has been within a context of their own gendered roles. The explicit promotion of investing in the health and education of poor children has been at a corollary to the welfare of women and the recognition that poverty is shaped by gender roles and relations. The extent to which women’s reinforced division of labour and time poverty stems from a failure to address gender equity and female empowerment at a broader level is to challenge the rising profile of women under the UN since the mid-Seventies. Addressing gender justice within development programmes on the ground level has been contingent on the prioritisation of gender equity and female empowerment at the policy level. The impact of this on poverty reduction schemes at a time when the effectiveness of development aid is under intense scrutiny has severe implications for developing economies and the poor reliant on assistance. This research highlights the importance of making gender equality and female empowerment an explicit goal of social protection schemes in order to promote long-term, sustainable poverty reduction.

At a broader level, social protection programmes have displaced the role of the state in the public provision of goods solely onto women in leading to what Chant has identified as the ‘feminisation of responsibility and obligation’ (2006 cited in Bradshaw, 2008a). The long-term consequences of the inattention to gender justice at both levels to paraphrase Jahan will only serve to make women’s progress in development more elusive (1995) and perpetuate existing gender inequalities in the future.

Cash or Food Aid? Assessing the role of resource-based transfers in achieving female empowerment and gender equity in social protection programmes (162)

The Learn Africa Project: Public Health, Applied Learning and Research Internship

HiiDunia — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 17:22:53 +0000

Report Author: Trevor Mattos

In October of 2010, Gordon College student Miranda MacKinnon and I began planning to do a small-scale development project in Togo, West Africa. We sought to connect Gordon College students with a non-profit organization called Clinics of Hope. Since 2004, Clinics of Hope (COH) has established and sustained several medical clinics in Togo. Local clinic staff provides essential medical services to remote communities, who would otherwise not have sufficient access to healthcare. Our vision was The Learn Africa Project, to prevent disease and promote education within a community where COH was working. We planned to supplement the COH model with support for disease prevention and education, and provide an opportunity to get students creatively involved with COH’s work on the ground, in Africa. We hoped to live within a Togolese community, in reciprocity with the people. The project aimed to facilitate discourse about development in West Africa by sharing life and work in community.

We chose a village called Ganavé in southeast Togo, where a COH clinic had been established the same year. The community was in dire need of a primary school, and healthcare initiatives to address intestinal parasites in school-age children. We planned to do three things in Ganavé:

1. Partner with community leaders to construct a three-classroom primary school.

2. Treat all school-age children with Albendazole for intestinal parasites, and effectively prevent infections from reaching the threshold of disease.

3. Concurrently conduct a village-wide research survey on health and education in Ganavé.

Meeting the educational needs of children in the least developed parts of the world is vital to breaking the cycle of poverty (Garcia, p.52). However, infrastructure remains a major barrier to achieving basic education in poor parts of the world. In a 2005 study, UNESCO confirmed “adequate infrastructure” is a major challenge to primary education in Kenya (Omwami & Keller, 2010). As nations in sub-Saharan Africa attempt to universalize primary education, existing pressures on infrastructure and human resources are exacerbated, and quality education is compromised (Omwami & Keller, 2010). “To expand enrollment without investing in infrastructure only causes the quality of education to decline” (Omwami & Keller, 2010). And to begin with, “The quality of the primary school facilities…their durability and functionality, is often abysmal” (Theunynck, p.2). Lacking infrastructure is discouraging children from finishing primary school and teachers from coming to teach (Theunynck, p.2). Therefore, one critical way to promote education is to partner in developing sound educational infrastructure.

This is what we did in Ganavé, where the situation was no different. Before leaving for Africa, we raised $6,000 to contribute to building Ganavé a three-classroom primary school. We worked closely with the village community to manage and participate in the school construction process. It was extremely difficult, frustrating, and challenging. As it stands now, the Ganavé School is without a roof. We are currently seeking funding to complete this project. Through the process we learned hard lessons about development, dependency, conflict, and resources in poor communities.

A related public health issue in West Africa, that affects education, is parasitic infection caused by soil-transmitted helminths (STH). There are 400 million school-age children infected by STH, which often leads to anaemia, attention deficits, learning disabilities, school absenteeism and dropout (WHO, 2006). Failure to treat children, who are more susceptible to STH infection (Kirwan et al., 2009), seriously inhibits childhood development (WHO, 2006).

A 2003 study in Cameroon proved that not only are children targets of STH infections, but that STH infections usually compound in children, involving more than one species, thereby increasing morbidity. High prevalence and abundance of parasitic infections raises serious concerns about morbidity in school-age children (Tchenté et al., 2003). As a result of intense STH infections in the Cameroonian community of Loum, “school children in Loum are subject to significant nutrition, education, developmental and productivity constraints” (Tchente´ et al., 2003).

But despite the harsh realities of STH, effective anthelmintic treatments, recommended by The World Health Organization, are available. “Regular treatment with…anthelmintic drugs in school-age children reduces and maintains the worm burden below the threshold associated with disease” (Bethony et al., 2006). More precisely, treatments with Albendazole successfully reduce prevalence and intensity of STH infection in children (Kirwan et al., 2009). And anthelminitic drugs (like Albendazole) can be used not only in cases of diagnostically confirmed STH infection, but also in large-scale treatment of endemic communities – significantly reducing child morbidity in these areas (Bethony et al., 2006). In 2001, “the World Health Assembly passed a resolution urging member states to control the morbidity of STH infections through large-scale use of anthelmintic drugs for school-age children in less developed countries” (Kirwan et al., 2009). The benefits of deworming children include improved iron stores, growth and strength, cognitive performance, and school attendance (Bethony et al., 2006). Moreover, children show signs of improved nutritional status and higher motor and language milestones in early childhood development (Bethony et al., 2006). In Ganavé, we distributed Albendazole to all school-age children (2-18 years) during our public health research survey. It is our hope that this initiative will improve childhood development, keep children healthier, and improve school attendance and student performance. In order to maintain child health and development, COH staff will need to continue distributing Albendazole to all school-age children at regular intervals throughout the year. We soon hope to officially establish this program along with others based on our research in Ganavé.

Prior to traveling to Togo we drafted a research proposal, informed consent document, and preliminary survey. After some revision, The Gordon College Institutional Review Board approved our research proposal, allowing us to conduct a survey in Togo. For our survey, we worked alongside 2 translators, Delali Degbeh and Sunday Olaniyan. We spent many days moving from home to home in Ganavé, and a number of neighboring villages. The experience was deeply educational, something I will never forget. Not only did we collect valuable information that could help COH be more effective in Ganavé (and distribute medicine to keep children healthier), we also greeted each family in the community, we learned their names and faces, and we heard many stories about life in West Africa.

The purpose of the research was to ask people in Ganavé how they understood their health and education needs. We planned to evaluate the relationship between the two, submit our analyses to Clinics of Hope, and help design programs that more effectively address the needs particular to Ganavé. We realized that not every village is the same, and we know very little about the day-to-day lives and decisions that Togolese people have to make. Our 2-month experience in Ganavé helped increase our understanding, as did our research.

A cursory analysis of our data would reveal that rates of malaria and malnutrition are high, in addition to the rate of soil-transmitted helminth infections. Also, social issues that have a bearing on economic (and physical) wellbeing include: polygamy and broken family structures. The role of women in the community, and related investment (or lack there of) in women’s health and education, is very low. Women’s disempowerment, we believe, plays a large role in the underdevelopment of these Togolese communities.

Our experience has taught us that prevention is the central tenant of public health. Programs must be effective and sustainable, and they must seek to eradicate the root causes of disease, not only their symptoms. Also, we must not overlook the relationship between social factors and physical health, as many social structures regulate access to healthcare and social services. More generally, we learned that with community development/health programs like this, you must be able to think on your feet, reassess, readjust, and learn from experience. Compared to the relative success we achieved with our STH treatment program, and our efforts to construct a primary school, our most valued achievement was real cross-cultural interaction and conversation. We made deep friendships and learned through the narrated experiences of our West African family. I remain humbled and grateful to our co-workers in Togo, for they have taught us much.

Links & Resources:

The Learn Africa Project – A collaborative Global Health and Development project carried out between Gordon College, Massachusetts and Clinics of Hope.

Clinics of Hope – Homepage of NPO ‘Clinics of Hope’

Works Cited:

Bethony, Jeffrey, Simon Brooker, Marco Albonico, Stefan M Geiger, Alex Loukas, David Diemert and Peter J Hotez. 2006. Soil-transmitted helminth infections: ascariasis, trichuriasis, and hookworm. The Lancet, 367: 1521-32.

Garcia, Marito, Alan Pence, and Judith L. Evans. 2008. Africa’s Future, Africa’s Challenge: Early Childhood Care and Development in sub-Saharan Africa. The World Bank: Washington, DC. 525 pp.

Kirwan, Patrick, Samuel O Asaolu, Síle F Molloy, Titilayo C Abiona, Andrew L Jackson, and Celia V Holland. 2009. Patterns of soil-transmitted helminth infection and impact of four-monthly albendazole treatments in preschool children from semi-urban communities in Nigeria: a double-blind placebo-controlled randomized trial. BioMed Central, Infectious Diseases, 9:20.

Omwami, Edith Mukudi, and Edmond J. Keller. 2010. Public Funding and Budgetary Challenges to Providing Universal Access to Primary Education in sub-Saharan Africa. International Review of Education, 56:5-31.

Tchuente´, L.-A. Tchuem, J.M. Behnke, F.S. Gilbert, V.R. Southgate, and J. Vercruysse. 2003. Polyparasitism with Schistosoma haematobium and soil-transmitted helminth infections among school children in Loum, Cameroon. Tropical Medicine and International Health, 8:11, 975-986.

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How can NGOs practice ‘doing good’ and minimise ‘doing harm’? What are the dilemmas and challenges present?

HiiDunia — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 20:07:14 +0000

This version of the paper includes Boxed text sections (shown in italics). Please refer to the PDF Download for the full Paper including Bibliography and all citations.

How can NGOs practice ‘doing good’ and minimise ‘doing harm’? What are the dilemmas and challenges present? (228)

Author: Carly Garonne

Introduction

Promoting human rights, driving the cause against climate change, and at the forefront of disaster relief; non-government organisations (NGOs) have an essential role in addressing the issues of global poverty and injustice. Despite good intentions, harmful conduct can arise at any time without an NGO even being aware. This occurs in many ways, such as by breaking the local economy, providing service delivery that harms health and well-being of the local people and by reinforcing conflict. This essay will contribute to the growing body of research on ‘doing good’ and minimising ‘doing harm’ by arguing that harm can be reduced by deeply understanding the context of each programme, taking a rights-based approach and conducting participatory work. Additionally, one of the most important means, albeit controversial, is to record failure. History will only be repeated if it is not documented. Based on the complexities of this debate, this essay will specifically concentrate on the role of international NGOs (INGOs) in order to channel the research. The content is structured into three parts beginning with an overview of INGOs in a modern context to show that growing pressure is being placed on NGOs to increase effectiveness and be accountable for their actions. The dilemmas facing INGOs will be analysed in part two, through the provision of numerous examples and case studies to highlight existing challenges. To finish, general principles that all INGOs can adopt to increase effectiveness will be presented. A conversation has started on acknowledging NGO failure, only if we continue this discussion can harm be reduced.

Part 1: A Background on NGOs

NGOs in Modern Society

Throughout the world, the nation-state has decreased in its ability to meet the basic needs of citizens and an increasing reliance on the world markets has only led to increased inequalities (Tesoriero 2010: 2). Although these mechanisms are not going anywhere fast, uncertainty in their performance has led citizens to look for other means to ‘fill the gap’ that have been left by the state and the market (Salamon and Anheier 1996: xi). This has predominantly been in the form of NGOs. NGOs are defined as organisations that are institutionally separate from the government, despite potentially receiving support and are ‘non profit’ distributing, meaning they can make profit but it cannot be distributed (Smillie 1995). A dramatic amelioration of NGOs in the past two decades has been observed (Pinkney 2009: 30), with the number of INGOs rising simultaneously.

It is important to recognise that NGOs, as part of the space between state and the market, are integrated within civil society. Tesoriero (2010: 16) describes civil society as the formal or semi-formal structures established voluntarily rather than through a government programme or a directive, comprised of NGOs, service clubs and other institutions that mould a functioning society. The term ‘civil society’ has been rejected throughout the developing world as a northern model being ‘too simplistic’ and ‘irrelevant to societies in the south’ (Clayton 1996: 254). As this essay is focussed on analysing NGOs on an international scale, the term NGO or more specifically, INGO, will remain.

An increase in NGOs has meant enhanced competition for limited donor funding. A form of managerialism has arisen for NGOs, demanding focus on outputs, strategy, competition and entrepreneurship and has characterised them by submissions, service agreements, contracts and tenders (Kenny 2011: 162). With this, pressure has increased to raise the standards of NGOs monitoring and evaluation procedures (Pollard and Court 2008: 146). Increasing accountability has to be constituted towards donors and the public, which means that NGOs should be made more aware of possible harm caused by their actions. Competition for financial resources in the sector, has had a devastating impact on NGOs, in that it has resulted in a ‘worst practice’ – secrecy (Admittingfailure 2011), which will be discussed in depth in part three. Amongst the competition for donor support, NGOs are being rewarded for their successes and therefore forced to lie about their failures.

INGO Motivations

Many types of INGOs exist, each with their own motivation and theory. INGOs are defined as any NGO that is working in a country other than its own (Smith, Stebbins, Dover 2006 : 110). Within this, some authors differentiate between NGOs from the developed world, known as ‘Northern NGOs’ and local NGOs in the developing world as either ‘Southern NGOs’, ‘National NGOs or ‘Indigenous NGOs’. Furthermore, differences exist between the different motivations and theories behind INGOs work. David Korten (1990) explains how each NGO implicitly operates on ‘different assumptions regarding the nature of the development problem’. Korten (1990: 114) outlines four different ‘generations’ that define the theory of a particular NGO. This ranges from ‘relief and welfare’ that focuses on direct delivery to meet immediate needs, to ‘small scale, self reliant local development’ – commonly understood as community development initiatives, ‘sustainable systems development’ that seeks changes in specific policies and institutions, and finally ‘the fourth generation’ that associate with the power of people’s movements in driving social change (Korten 1990: 115 -123). The examples and case studies provided in this essay range across the various generations of which the reader should consider. INGOs should have a clearly defined motivation behind their work as this will affect the reasons for their intervention and the methods they exert. This essay contends that a deeper understanding of the complexities associated with development and a greater concentration on long-term sustainability will lead to increased INGO effectiveness.

Part 2: Dilemmas and Challenges

More harm than good

Insufficient pre-departure research proceeded by minimal follow-through, presents space for INGO intervention to go horribly wrong. The list of such harm is endless, and the negative affects of some work possibly remain unknown. Implicit messages made through advocacy and the significant impacts of aid dependency have not been raised in this essay due to word constraints, however must be acknowledged as causing significant issues for the sector. This section will therefore solely focus on what the author believes are the major mistakes of INGO work. Before continuing, it must be acknowledged that despite many failures occurring, most INGOs succeed in providing immediate assistance (Riddel 2007: However current available statistics struggle to measure long-term affects and do not account for a consistent deficiency in reporting failure (which will be discussed in depth in part three). Moreover, poverty and injustice continue on a phenomenal scale around the world; immediate relief does little to challenge its root-causes. Regardless, within all INGO initiatives, whether it focusses on education, health, or human rights, from relief to advocacy – with all success comes an amount of failure.

The Act of Giving

Food, medical equipment, blankets, school books, toys and more; INGOs continue to import millions of resources into developing countries without assessing the local context. In the name of ‘helping’, non-financial resources manufactured kilometres away are brought in to poorer countries, whereas resources are often available locally. Often ‘in kind’ donations take up valuable space in cargo shipments, waste INGOs time sorting through the myriad of items, and may be unusable or potentially dangerous (Gray 2010). Box 1 highlights some of the dilemmas facing the provision of material items. The key issues raised here are the harm caused to local businesses with the flood of foreign items and that products are often unsustainable in the long-term. Resources may furthermore damage health and well-being. For example, the introduction of water points in many locations, such as Ghana and Tanzania, without technical training of locals has led to stagnant water found around the area, and in at least one case led to a breeding ground for mosquitoes (Adunga 2001: 25). Although these examples are filled with good intentions, the affects on the local community have proven much more harm than good.

Box 1 : Mosquito Nets in Africa

Dambiso Moyo (2009) in her controversial book Dead Aid, highly critical of aid to Africa, provides an example to show how aid can break the local economy. Through explaining a hypothetical scenario she describes a reality that occurs across many INGOs in Africa. Moyo describes a mosquito net maker who manufactures around 500 nets a week; employing ten people who each must support more than fifteen relatives. Despite their strenuous efforts, they struggle to beat the malaria-carrying mosquito. An INGO steps in with 100,000 mosquito nets to ‘help’ the affected region. However, the market is now flooded with foreign nets and the local net maker is out of business. Their 150 dependants can no longer be supported. Additionally, in a maximum of five years, the majority of the imported nets will be torn and damaged, no longer effective in preventing malaria.

Food aid is another potentially detrimental act of providing assistance. A large amount of food aid sourced through INGOs is produced far away, taking lengthy trips to arrive at its destination, as well as going through many bureaucratic channels (Timmer 2005: 1). Box 2 details the detrimental affects that this can have. Similar to the case study in Box 1, the local economy may be harmed in the process and time lost through getting the food to its destination. Timmer (2005:1) adds that the introduction of foreign food aid, although needed at the point of appeal, may be followed by a new local harvest. If a new harvest is to follow after foreign food aid has flooded the markets, local prices may collapse, harming the local rural economy (Timmer 2005: 1). INGOs must deeply consider the affects they will have on the local people and their economies. Accessing supplies from the nearest area, whether its local, regional or in a neighbouring country, will usually be the fastest and cheapest strategy (Timmer 2005: 2).

Box 2: Food Aid to Ethiopia

In 2009, the Ethiopian Government appealed to USAID for emergency assistance in an on coming famine (USAID 2009). USAID responded with 65,410 metric tons of cereals, pulses, vegetable oil and blended food to the World Food Programme (WFP) managed by Catholic Relief Services, CARE, Save the Children US and UK, World Vision and more (USAID 2009). Owen Barder (2009), Senior Fellow and Director for Europe at the Center for Global Development (CGD) with extensive experience in Ethiopia, explains how this aid proceeds to occur. The food is bought from American farmers and shipped by road to Djibouti where it is then brought by road to the needed location in Ethiopia. Transport costs add up to $568 metric tonne (approx. AU$588)whereas local prices of wheat at the time were $489 metric tonne (approx. AU$506). Furthermore, the time taken to get the resources there, amounts to the nearly a week that local, regional or national farmers could feed the population. This food that is available locally would increase the incomes of Ethiopian farmers or alternatively those in neighbouring African countries. These local farmers livelihoods and well-being are being undermined by imported foreign food aid. (Barder 2009).

The Effects of Microfinance

Microfinance initiatives (MFIs) can play a significant role in providing people with an opportunity to escape poverty. Extensive amounts of aid money has been donated to INGOs to provide small loans to millions of people around the developing world (Riddell 2007: 274). The idea of micro-credit schemes arose from the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh who have provided credit to over five million people since the end of 2005, with 95% women, in schemes characterised by low interest payments and very high rates of repayment (Riddell 2007:274). Overwhelmingly high success rates have occurred since the MFIs were first created (Riddel 2007: 275). However, 2009-10 saw a turning point for microfinance, with numerous negative affects arising (Rozas 2011 :7). It has been made evident that often the poor are using the money only for immediate needs (Snodgrass and Sebsted cited in Riddel 2007: 275). This use as a ‘stop-gap measure’ to buy essential goods only descends them into further indebtedness (The Reality of Aid 2008). Furthermore, considering the current global economic system, the success of self-employed businesses on the market is disproportionately low compared to big businesses and transnational corporations operating in developing countries (Singh 2008:50).

When the downfall of MFIs first struck in 2009, no best practices or case studies were available to provide guidance for MFI crises (Rozas 2011 :7). Through this, arose the publication Weathering the Storm: Hazards, Beacons and Life Rafts (Rozas: 2011), which provides MFIs with many case studies of what can go wrong and ways to overcome challenges. This publication is invaluable for MFIs to ensure best practice and not to repeat mistakes of the past.

Arguably, a more beneficial response can be provided through unconditional cash transfers. Cash transfers give people choices on where their money goes and available evidence shows that they are being used widely from meeting health and education costs, purchasing food and clothing, and even to investing in small business (IDS 2006: 1) Givedirectly.com (2011), is a prime example. Through a cash donation to their website, GiveDirectly.com locates poor households in Kenya and the money is transferred electronically to the recipients SIM card where cash is retrieved at participating banks (GiveDirectly 2011). Other than given the choice on how they spend their money, it also empowers them to meet their most immediate needs and to invest in effective opportunities (GiveDirectly 2011). This differs from microfinancing as there are no restrictions on how the money should be spent and no need for repayment (IDS 2006:1). Cash transfers are still in their infancy, however signs of successful application are something for INGOs to consider.

However, neither cash payments nor MFIs are quintessential elements for development. Both strategies must be combined with other anti-poverty programmes, such as health-care and education training to raise the living standards of the poor (Singh 2008: 46). Singh (2008: 47) asks ‘what can women do with credit if they do not have child care, education, training and health services?’. The success of both programmes depends on wider changes in the development agenda, including changes in structures and institutions (The Reality of Aid 2008: 18). INGO professionals should inherently be ‘trying to work themselves out of a job’, therefore integrated sustainable solutions within all initiatives is essential.

Creating a ‘Brain Drain’

INGOs presence in a developing country may weaken well-established local NGOs and remove able workers from more effective local positions. From a southern NGO perspective, INGOs enter a communities where local NGOs were already present and compete unfairly with the local organisations while undermining the independent sector (Menocal and Rogerson, cited in Barber and Bowie 2008:748). INGOs often offer higher international wages, removing a competent workforce lured away from essential local employment. Often local employees recruited into working for the INGO are the most educated and could have taken up employment in government positions or worked successfully in the private sector (Barber and Bowie 2008: 749). This manipulates the private sector and the civil service declines. An example of this is provided from Malawi, where the AIDS epidemic was severe and an INGO lured a local worker from their position in the state health sector with an income increase of three times what they were previously earning (Barber and Bowie 2008: 753). Barber and Bowie (2008:749) argue that a ‘downward spiral’ is perpetuated due to the more able citizens joining international employers and the less able remain, as corruption increases, confidence in the government declines further and young people are less inclined to join government employment.

INGOs have comfortably defined themselves as distinctly separate from the state and the government, which has created the western notion of ‘civil society’ (Clayton 1996: 254). Barber and Bowie (2008:748-9) argue that INGOs should not take the same approach in in developing countries. To fight corruption and establish ‘good governance’, INGOs should be working with state officials to form collaboration with the voluntary sector rather than seeking their own agendas (Barber and Bowie 2008: 749). Recruiting local people for their own benefit is part of this parcel, especially when they may pay international payment standards.

Reinforcing Conflict

International assistance in conflict situations, while sometimes reducing tensions and strengthening the means towards peaceful resolutions, INGOs can also reinforce or prolong conflict. Often INGO programmes are designed to only target specific sections of societies, which may cause for social discontent. Earle and Simonelli (2000: 119) explain how in Rio Chayote, the refugee population that had tirelessly fled there were being helped by an INGO, yet were seen as having acquired ‘special benefits’ by the local population. Power struggles had not been taken into account as the INGO had not researched the full political situation (Earle and Simonelli 2000: 122). Box 3 examines another scenario that shows how structural differences can be reinforced. INGOs must form deep understandings of the social, cultural, economic, ecological and political context (Earle and Simonelli 2000: 122).

Box 3: Misled Efforts to Regain Peace

A dialogue process was organised by an INGO working in a conflict area. Minority and majority representatives were present and the INGO played a neutral role in the diplomatic proceedings. However, due to differing levels of education and work experience, the dialogue ended with the minority group feeling overwhelmed and cornered by the more powerful majority. The agency did not have the power to stop the domination of one side of the discussion from humiliating their counterparts. The asymmetries of power were reinforced and the minority group were further disadvantaged. (Anderson and Olson 2003: 12).

Implicit Ethical Messages

INGOs may force implicit ethical messages onto the local population through their actions and attitudes. INGOs from the developed world enter developing countries as leaders for the local community. Yet their conduct and attitudes may rub off negatively on the local community. For example, an INGO may use armed guards to protect their resources from theft or to protect their staff from harm. An implicit ethical message is broadcast that arms are legitimate and that weapons are necessary for security and safety (CDA 2004: 10). Moreover, when INGO staff appear nervous and worried for their own safety around others, this projects the message that it is normal to approach others with suspicion and belligerence (CDA 2004: 10). Gender roles may also be reinforced through INGO staff taking on more family-based roles and other staff’s inabilities to let go of their own gender conceptions (Bebbington, Hickey and Mitlan 2008: 29). These harmful processes are not as easy to observe and much more difficult to report, while the INGO will often be ignorant of such harmful ways. However, these processes can be the most harmful as they can change the habits of society, which can be passed down generations. An engrained consciousness of their actions will deter this and training INGO staff in ethics would be ideal.

Part 3: Optimising ‘doing good’

Preventing Harm

Part two explored the types of harm that can be done, while providing tools to prevent these specific processes from occurring. Discussion will now turn to the underlying principles that INGOs can adopt to minimise harmful actions. Firstly, the critical need for INGOs to fully understand the context they are entering will be analysed followed by the need to take a rights-based approach. The most fundamental means to avoid harm, however, is to document it. These following principles can be applied by any type of NGO, no matter their motivation or understanding on the nature of development.

Understanding the Context

Successful INGO work initiatives result from understanding the context and assistance program in depth before programme mobilisation. Earle and Simonelli (2000: 122) state that ‘one must know the [target] community in all its facets’ by researching and fully understanding its history, culture, social divides, culture alongside the current economic and political systems. They state further that without knowing the context to such an extent is a ‘widely irresponsible social experiment’ (Earle and Simonelli 2000: 122). INGO assistance programmes must be ‘unpacked’ in order to fully understand the impact that their actions may pose onto the local communities (CDA 2004: 6). Based on the findings from part 2, Box 4 highlights some key questions that INGOs should be asking before mobilising in a foreign country. These questions should also be continually monitored and reassessed throughout the life of the project or programme (CDA 2004: 5).

Box 4: Questions INGOs should be posing.

• What resources will be brought into the country? Are these available locally? What impact will our resources have? What mechanisms can we put in place to ensure their long-term sustainability?
• Are there other local NGOs in the area? In what ways can we collaborate to effectively work together?
• Are we inadvertently undermining or weakening local structures?
• Have we considered power relations between conflicting groups? Will our work reinforce any ongoing conflict?
• What impact will we have through our implicit ethical messages? Are we reinforcing any gender roles?

Rights-Based Approach and Participatory Approaches

The most renowned and most-adopted principles to afford INGO effectiveness are from The Sphere Project, which was established in 1997 with proceeding editions (The Sphere Project 2011: 5). Although the handbook focusses on disaster relief, two main approaches are offered that every INGO can learn from. The handbook recommends a humanitarian approach routed in a rights-based approach and participatory methodology (The Sphere Project 2011: 6). The handbook stresses the importance of including not only local people but also local and national authorities in all stages of intervention (The Sphere Project 2011: 6).

Active participation of the local community is crucial to best meet the needs of the local people (The Sphere Project 2011: 23) It is argued that the more professional INGOs have become, the less inclined they are to consult with the local people, believing that ‘they know best’ (Whiting 2011). If change is to be sustainable it must be location specific, designed based on the knowledge of that particular context and must be owned by the people, based on their experience and understandings (Wallace 2001: 33). Involving the local population in the whole process of the INGO programme will enhance its sustainability, as the local people can take ownership and ensure greater probability for success (Fowler 2000: 21). This will no doubt also be enhanced with cooperation of local NGOs.

Document Failures

An INGO harms a local community in Indonesia. It is not made public as it may upset the donor. A few years later the same mistake takes shape in Botswana. A few months after that it is repeated again in Thailand, then Peru, then East Timor….Unless we document our failures, they are only bound to be repeated. (Admittingfailure 2011).

The INGO sector is built on a system designed to reward success and completely evade failure. Donors need to see that NGO programmes are making progress and meeting objectives in order to provide funding (Fowler 2000: 115). INGOs are then forced to distort their successes, otherwise they risk losing funding and nothing will be achieved. This occurs over and over again. This system is unsustainable. Earle and Simonelli (2000: 123) state that ‘failure documentation is a liability for many organisations, whereas illusions of success sell’. A dramatic overhaul of the INGO to donor relationship needs to change to allow for recognition of mistakes. Only once we admit our mistakes can change to our processes be recognised. Through recognition, necessary steps can be taken to rectify a problem and other INGOs will not repeat the mistake. Admitting and publicising failure will contribute to a body of knowledge addressing why errors should not be repeated and this, perhaps, is INGOs ‘saving grace’ (Earle and Simonelli 2000: 123).

Monitoring and evaluation systems characteristically are designed to address shortfalls in NGO work; these need to be revived to form sites of honesty and integrity. Perhaps donors should not be turning the blind eye, by recognising that every project coming through may not be that well-performing. The risks associated with admitting mistakes to donors should be eliminated. Charles Kenny (2011(b)) suggests that what might work was if donors could allow, or even better encourage, early exits from bad projects, where the project managers were able to use the continued funding for something better in a similar sector. Further research into this option as well as means to turn the system around is crucial.

Additionally, a platform is needed for INGOs to share their experiences together to form a knowledge base. A new website, Admittingfailure.com, is trying to achieve just that. Released in January 2011, this site allows all types of NGOs and people working in development to share their stories of projects or programmes that have gone wrong (Admittingfailure 2011). The site is designed to correct the error of ignoring failures and aims to:

“create a best practice of openness, transparency and honesty. We’re all in this together. We’re on the same side in the fight against poverty, inequality and unnecessary suffering in too many forms. Let’s admit our failures to find greater successes”

As it is the websites is in its early stages, its success is hard to tell. It is hoped, however, that many NGOs and people working in the field will acknowledge its benefits and become more involved – as such an initiative could be the benchmark of change to come.

Conclusion

Although INGOs have a significant role in fighting poverty and injustices throughout the world, this essay has highlighted some of the issues that can arise. Non-financial foreign resources may disrupt the local economy, microfinance initiatives may indebt the poor further and INGOs may reinforce conflict through their actions. Furthermore, it has been made evident that INGOs may cause a ‘brain drain’ by removing workers from the government or the private sector for their own benefits. The challenges faced by INGOs in asserting implicit ethical messages is an issue that often goes unnoticed, of which INGO staff need to be continually aware of in order to reduce devastating long-term affects. Despite good intentions, much harm can be done without conscious recognition of the potential for devastation. INGOs must take greater initiative in researching the context of their work, consider a rights-based approach and involve the local people to the greatest extent to ensure local ownership. However, admitting mistakes is the most important way to ensure more good is done than harm. If space is not created for INGOs to share their lessons learned, harm will only be repeated.

How can NGOs practice ‘doing good’ and minimise ‘doing harm’? What are the dilemmas and challenges present? (228)

Globalization, Regulation and Geography: The Development of the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands Offshore Financial Centres

HiiDunia — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 19:57:49 +0000

This version of the paper includes the Abstract, Preface and First Chapter (without Tables). Please refer to the PDF Download for the full Paper including Tables, Appendix, Bibliography and all citations.

Globalization, Regulation and Geography: The Development of the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands Offshore Financial Centres (108)

Author: Alan Hudson

Abstract

This dissertation explores the development of the Bahamas and Cayman offshore financial centres (OFCs) as places in the regulatory landscape of international finance. It aims to move towards an understanding of processes of financial globalization.

Chapter one asks: what explains the emergence of these new places – offshore financial centres – on the map of international political economy?, and introduces the Bahamas and Cayman. Chapter two critically reviews the literature around the themes of globalization, regulation and geography, arguing that conceptualizations of global financial integration as “the end of geography” (O’Brien, 1992), neglect the role of states in processes of globalization and take too narrow a view of geography, a view which falls into the “territorial trap” (Agnew, 1994). Chapter three is a “methodology” chapter.

Chapter four begins to explore the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs, describing the regulatory construction of place. A series of questions are addressed: why construct a place for offshore finance; who constructs a place for offshore finance?; how is a place constructed for offshore finance; and, what are the local impacts of constructing a place for offshore finance? Chapter five expands the focus to consider how the relationship between the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs has affected their development. Chapter six expands the focus again, looking at the relationship of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs with the USA and at their place within the regulatory framework for international banking provided by the Basle Committee.

Chapter seven brings together some of the insights gleaned from earlier chapters and seeks to put the “regulatory landscape” metaphor to work, moving towards an explanation for the development of OFCs and processes of financial globalization. It is argued that the development of stateless monies produced an economic space of flows, increasingly divorced from the political space of states and the productive economy. The OFCs, through the practice of unbundling sovereignty, articulate the economic and political spaces of capitalism.

Preface

Whilst in New York City, meeting bankers to talk about international finance and the development of offshore financial centres as part of my fieldwork I took the opportunity of visiting the Guggenheim Museum. The Guggenheim Museum is laid out as a wide spiral ramp with exhibits in alcoves just off the ramp. I strolled up the ramp enjoying the exhibits, a bit confused at times – unsure as to whether an object was an exhibit or simply a chair or a thermometer – but finding much to interest me. Once I reached the top of the ramp I began to wonder whether it would have made any difference if I had started at the top of the ramp; perhaps it would have been an easier, less confusing, more interesting and informative route? Pondering this, at the very top of the ramp, I came across a sign advising visitors that we should begin our tour of the museum by taking a lift to the top of the ramp and then gently stroll down and around the museum’s spiral.

At times during my research this event has popped up in my mind; the process of doing a Ph.D. is interesting but can be confusing and only really begins to make sense once you get to the end. And then you may feel that you ought to have started at the top of the ramp rather than the bottom. But, there is no lift to the top of a Ph.D. However, my research has taken me on a tour of some interesting exhibits and in this dissertation I’ll offer you my preferred route around some of them.

Chapter 1

THE PLACE OF OFFSHORE FINANCIAL CENTRES IN PROCESSES OF FINANCIAL GLOBALIZATION

“if we are to look for anything truly distinctive (as opposed to ‘capitalism as usual’) in the present situation, then it is upon the financial aspects of capitalist organization and on the role of credit that we should concentrate our gaze” (Harvey, 1989, p.196).

1.1. NEW PLACES ON THE MAP: OFFSHORE FINANCIAL CENTRES AND FINANCIAL GLOBALIZATION

Over the last thirty years one of the more interesting developments in the geography of the international political economy has been the appearance of “new places” on the map.1 These places are offshore financial centres (OFCs); places which host banking, insurance, and other financial activities, away from the onshore regulatory authorities. Such centres include the Bahamas and Cayman in the Caribbean, Gibraltar and Jersey in Western Europe, Bahrain in the Middle East, Singapore and Hong Kong in East Asia, and Vanuatu in the South Pacific (see Figure 1.1). The appearance of these new places on the map of international finance poses interesting questions: why did they develop as OFCs?; what role do they play?; are the various OFCs part of a general process of financial globalization or is the development of each centre explicable only in its own terms?; how does the development of OFCs relate to the wider international political economy? Curiosity about the development of OFCs leads to efforts to find an explanation for their development; how are we to explain or interpret the development of OFCs?

A useful starting point in developing an explanation of new phenomena is to consider what other processes were going on at the same time: what might have caused the development of OFCs? Given that OFCs are involved in finance, developments in the financial and monetary spheres seem a good place to start. The development of OFCs has largely taken place since the late 1960s, a period which has seen the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system and a re-shaping of the landscape of international finance.

The Bretton Woods system, with the dollar at its centre, was based upon the hegemony of the US economy, and the US promise to exchange dollars for gold at a fixed rate of $35 per ounce (Strange, 1986; Helleiner, 1994; Corbridge, 1994). This hierarchical monetary framework provided stability for the post-war reconstruction of Europe and Japan, the internationalization of production and the growth of world trade, but the dynamics of economic development in turn undermined the rigid monetary framework. The fluidity of capitalism undermined the fixity of the states-based monetary system (Harvey, 1989; Leyshon, 1992).

There were several factors leading to the collapse of the Bretton Woods system. The value of the dollar was guaranteed by the US Government and its promise to redeem dollars for gold; this guarantee was based upon the hegemony of the US economy and the ability of the US Government to exchange dollars for gold; the Bretton Woods system was predicated on the link between a strong US territorial economy and the US dollar. This link was stretched and broken by processes of globalization. As international trade grew, as US multinationals expanded their dollar-denominated operations overseas, as dollars were increasingly held overseas and traded in Eurodollar markets, as dollars were printed to finance the Vietnam war, the credibility of the US promise to redeem dollars for gold – the basis of the Bretton Woods system – was brought into question.

It was in this context that Nixon acted in August 1971 to break the link between the dollar and gold. This move signalled the beginning of the end of the Bretton Woods system and a shift to a new monetary system where the value of the dollar was neither formally guaranteed by the US Government, nor backed by gold. The monetary system based on relationships between territorial states had been shattered by the extension of economic activity beyond states’ borders. Monetary relations were flexible and privatized; but, what was the dollar worth? The space of economic activity increasingly transcended the territorial spaces of political authority; there was no guarantor of the currency in a globalizing economic space.

Might the collapse of the Bretton Woods system and the development of offshore financial centres be somehow related? Might both developments be part of a wider dynamic and explicable within a common theoretical framework? Might the development of OFCs be connected with processes of financial globalization, the collapse of Bretton Woods, and the mismatch between economic and political spaces? It is these questions, among others, which I address in this dissertation.

This dissertation is an effort to explain the development of OFCs and to see how their development fits in with wider processes of financial globalization. How, then, are we to explain the processes of financial globalization? For some commentators the development of global financial markets is due to technological developments and the power of market forces. In this interpretation financial activity increasingly transcends political boundaries leading ultimately to the “end of geography”, a scenario in which location and regulation no longer matter, or matter less (O’Brien, 1992). For Harvey and other commentators financial globalization is part of the dynamics of capitalism; the latest effort by capitalism to avoid its contradictions through the creation of credit and expansion into new spaces (Harvey, 1982). Although on the surface these interpretations are similar – they both point to the changing geographies of the international political economy – they are different in important ways. For O’Brien geography – as spatial difference – comes to an end as space is homogenized and equilibrium is reached. For Harvey financial globalization (re)produces uneven development; new geographies – spatial differences and spatialities of power and social relations – are produced to avoid the fixity of existing geographies. The question is, then: “how are geographies implicated in processes of financial globalization?” Is geography annihilated, or are geographies both destroyed and created in an ongoing process of uneven development?

I could select a theoretical framework now and then fit my analysis of the development of OFCs into that framework. However, that would be to prejudge matters; how would I choose the theoretical framework? Rather, I intend to gradually develop an explanation through my exploration of the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs, and return to more abstract theoretical concerns in conclusion. As Harvey has argued “at some point or other tangible connections must be made between the weft of theory and the woof of historical geography” (Harvey, 1982, p.451). Geographies may or may not be important in processes of financial globalization; whether they are, and if so how, is an empirical question. For, as Swyngedouw has suggested: “the difference that place makes lies exactly in the fact that different places are different … But the nature of these differences can in essence only be detailed empirically. Nothing a priori can be said about the difference(s) embodied in and constructed through space” (Swyngedouw, 1991, p.158).

The development of OFCs provides a window through which to consider processes of financial globalization. Dealing in intangible, mobile and freely-convertible assets, OFCs provide a particularly interesting window to look through. The development of OFCs is a hard case through which certain processes of financial globalization, and the importance, or not, of geographies should become clear. In my dissertation I look at and through the development of two particular OFCs, the Bahamas and Cayman, seeking to analyze how and why these places are different, and what difference this makes to the workings of the international political economy.

1.2. THE BAHAMAS AND THE CAYMAN ISLANDS

The Commonwealth of The Bahamas is an archipelago of over 700 islands in the Caribbean basin, of which 29 are inhabited, encompassing a total land area of 9000 square km.3 The island-chain stretches for 1300 km. from 80 km. east of Florida to 80 km. north of Haiti on a north-west to south-east axis. Nassau is the capital city, communications hub, business centre, and main population centre of The Bahamas. Nassau is on the small island of New Providence which is home to approximately 172,000 people from a total population of 255,000 (Bahamas Government, 1994; see Figure 1.2).

The Bahamas were “discovered” by Columbus in 1492, with San Salvador probably being Columbus’ first landfall in the West Indies. Spanish settlers took indigenous Lucayans to work on plantations elsewhere but it was not until the mid-seventeenth century that the first permanent settlers arrived, from Bermuda in search of salt, and from Britain setting up plantations on Eleuthera and New Providence. The Bahamas were made a British Protectorate in 1718 and a representative House of Assembly was established in 1729. The eighteenth century saw the importation of African slaves to work the plantations, a key phase in the development of Bahamian society.

The plantation economy did not take root in the Bahamas and since the nineteenth century the economic fortunes of the Bahamas have been closely tied to events in the nearby USA. The Bahamas prospered from blockade running during the American Civil War and from smuggling during the prohibition years of the 1920s before developing its natural resources as a major tourist centre for wealthy Americans. In 1908 the Royal Bank of Canada established the first foreign bank conducting public business.

This was followed in 1936 by the first trust company, the Canadian-owned Bahamas General Trust Company, and in 1942 by the first private bank. This haphazard development of financial facilities was consolidated from the late 1960s as the Bahamas Government adopted an offshore financial development strategy. The Bahamas gained Independence from Britain in 1973.

The Cayman Islands are a group of three islands in the Caribbean Sea, 180 miles north-west of Jamaica and 750 km. south of Miami.4 The two smaller islands, Little Cayman and Cayman Brac, are sparsely populated: Grand Cayman is the main population centre, focus of tourism, financial activity and employment. Grand Cayman is 35 km. long and 12 km. wide at its widest point. The population of the Cayman Islands in 1991 was 27000 (Cayman Islands Government), having risen from 18000 in 1980, with all but 1500 living on Grand Cayman (see Figure 1.2).

The Cayman Islands were first mapped by Columbus in 1503 and named “Las Tortugas” because of the large numbers of turtles in their vicinity. Sir Francis Drake was the first Englishman to visit Cayman in 1586. The Treaty of Madrid in 1670 shared out the Caribbean possessions of Spain and England with the result that England gained The Cayman Islands; they have remained a British colony ever since. The Cayman Islands, unsuitable for agriculture because of the infertile soils, were unoccupied for many years except for deserters, debtors, buccaneers, and some settlers from Jamaica. The inhabitants of Cayman survived by making rope, catching turtles and working as merchant seamen until local elites began to pursue a development strategy based firstly on tourism, and secondly on finance. Fundamental to this strategy was the opening of Owen Roberts International Airport in 1952 and the increasing availability of electrical power. Barclays opened the first bank in Cayman in 1953, beginning the island’s development as an OFC.

By 1991 the Bahamas hosted $287 billion of offshore financial activity and almost 400, banks whilst Cayman played host to 544 banks and $442 billion of offshore banking activity (Bank for International Settlements, 1993). The volume of offshore banking activity hosted by the two centres had risen since 1974 from $23 billion and $3 billion for the two centres had risen since 1974 from $23 billion and $3 billion for the Bahamas and Cayman respectively (see Figure 1.3). My task in this dissertation is to explain how such apparently marginal places have developed as important OFCs, and as important places in the landscape of international finance.

1.3. A MAP OF THE DISSERTATION

A study of the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs could have been many things. Before explaining what my dissertation is, it is worthwhile mentioning what it is not. In particular, it is not three things
Firstly, it is not a guide for financiers and potential investors looking for a way to use the uneven geographies of regulation and taxation to increase their profits and to hide their money. Such guides are readily available elsewhere (Spitz, 1994; CCH International, 1992). Secondly, it is not a traditional “development” dissertation. My aim in this dissertation is not primarily to document and analyze the impact of offshore financial development on the peoples of the Bahamas and Cayman (see Hampton, 1994). Thirdly, my dissertation is not a traditional “economic geography” dissertation. My aim is not simply to map the changing distributions of banks, clients and monies in the OFCs. Such a dissertation would have been made near-impossible by the confidentiality upon which the centres’ success as places for offshore finance is built.

More positively, my dissertation is an effort to understand both the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs and their position in processes of financial globalization. Rather than providing a simple mapping or description of the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs my aim is to understand their development, to contribute to an explanation of the map of international finance. With my focus on a specific case in its wider context, and my effort to write a theoretically-informed and theoretically-informing dissertation, my study may be seen as a “new regional geography” (see section 3.2). With my attention to the social relations, practices and processes of offshore finance it may also be seen as a “new economic geography” (see section 3.2.2). In essence, my dissertation is an effort to write a geopolitical-economy of offshore financial development which avoids the territorial trap of mainstream international relations theory by historicizing geography and looking in detail at the place of OFCs in processes of financial globalization (Agnew, 1994; see also section 2.4.4).

In chapter 2 I provide a review of the existing literatures around the themes of globalization, regulation and geography, using these literatures to prepare the ground for my thesis. Through this review I consider the meaning of “globalization”, look at financial globalization as a hard case, assess some treatments of money and finance in social science, and offer a brief history of financial globalization. I then address the question of whether financial globalization has led to the “end of geography” and the demise of states as important regulatory authorities in the international political economy. I argue that states retain an important role in processes of financial globalization, and further suggest that there is more to geography than states as fixed territorial containers. In concluding chapter 2 I argue that in order to understand the processes of financial globalization, and the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs, a geopolitical-economy which considers the sites, practices and processes of regulation is needed.

Chapter 3 is a “methodology” chapter in which I explain how I have conducted my geopolitical-economy. I argue that it is important to reveal the ways in which research is produced in order to facilitate its evaluation, and suggest that if we are to understand the processes of financial globalization and offshore financial development we need to adopt a “new regional geography” approach. To understand geographies of flows we require flexible research strategies. I begin with a discussion of the emergence of a new regional geography, before considering the impact of the reflexive turn on economic geography, and the role of case studies in a new regional geography. I then describe the processes of my research, my research strategies, and the ways in which I collected and analyzed data.

In chapter 4 I begin to write a geopolitical-economy of the development of the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs, focusing initially on the regulatory construction of the Bahamas and Cayman as places for offshore finance, and working with ethnographic data collected during fieldwork. I begin with a brief discussion of the apparent placelessness of offshore finance, before addressing a series of questions about the regulatory construction of place: why construct a place for offshore finance?; who constructs a place for offshore finance?; how is a place constructed for offshore finance; and what is the local impact of constructing a place for offshore finance? I argue that the Bahamas and Cayman are constructed as places for offshore financial activity through regulation, sets of social practices. I conclude with the suggestion that the regulatory construction of any one place cannot be understood in isolation from other places, a point I take up in chapter 5.

In chapter 5 I consider the relationship between the Bahamas and Cayman as places in competition to host offshore financial activity in the Caribbean. My purpose is to consider how their relationship affects the construction of the Bahamas and Cayman as places for offshore finance. I begin by discussing the competitive environment in which the two centres are positioned, before considering their competitive strategies. I address the question of whether they are locked into a cycle of competitive deregulation, and look in detail at the Bahamas’ move to Independence in 1973 and the opportunity that this offered Cayman. I then consider the ways in which the Bahamas and Cayman increasingly compete through representing themselves as stable and reputable places for offshore finance, and address the impact that multinational banks have on the centres’ competitive strategies.5 That is, does the presence of multinational banks with a presence in both centres introduce a further element of complexity? I conclude with the suggestion that the development of the Bahamas and Cayman as places for offshore finance, and their relationship, cannot be understood without looking at the wider context for their development, a point I take up in chapter 6.

In chapter 6 I expand my focus to consider the wider regulatory landscape in which the Bahamas and Cayman are placed, particularly the relationships of the OFCs with the USA, and their position within the regulatory framework for international banking provided by the Basle Committee on banking regulations and supervisory practices (Basle Committee). I examine the relationship of the “onshore” with the “offshore”, through an historical analysis. I begin by considering the initial development of the Bahamas and Cayman as, in part, a result of onshore regulatory practices and then consider the efforts of US regulatory authorities to regain control over dollar-denominated banking and to extend their control over the offshore centres, beyond US territorial space. In particular, I look at the development of International Banking Facilities (IBFs), the Castle Bank and Bank of Nova Scotia cases, and the development of Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties (MLATs). Finally I examine the reconstruction of the Bahamas and Cayman as places for offshore finance, and the impact of the Basle Committee’s regulatory framework on their development.

In chapter 7 I bring together some of the insights gleaned from my analysis of the development of the Bahamas and Cayman and put the “regulatory landscape” metaphor, a metaphor developed throughout the dissertation, to work. My aim is to move beyond a redescription of processes of financial globalization and offshore financial development, towards an explanation. I consider a Marxian account of financial globalization (Harvey, 1982), and argue that explaining the development of OFCs in these terms – suggesting that OFCs are “on the margins and at the centre of global capitalism’s displacement of crisis” (Roberts, 1994, p.111) – might be coherent and convincing, but, I argue, it fails to specify the ways in which the development of OFCs is related to processes of financial globalization. After a brief detour to the middle ages to pick up some conceptual tools I offer a fuller explanation of the development of OFCs and their place in processes of financial globalization. I argue that the development of stateless monies and Euromarkets reconfigured power/space, producing an economic space of flows, increasingly divorced from the political space of states and the productive economy. I argue that OFCs, which were developed through the actions of offshore elites and onshore financiers, articulate the economic and political spaces of capitalism, providing a link between the economic space of flows and the political space of states and the territorial productive economy. In this way OFCs partially resolve the paradox of absolute globalization. The OFCs articulate the spaces of capitalism through the practice of “unbundling sovereignty”, the separation of sovereignty into sovereignty over physical space and sovereignty over access to the space of flows. It is through the practice of unbundling sovereignty that the Bahamas and Cayman OFCs are central to processes of financial globalization. Geographies are regulated and regulatory.

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