The personal and the professional: Aid workers' relationships and values in the development process

Third World Quarterly

Volumn 33, Issue 8, 2012, Pages 1387-1404

  Fechter, Anne Meike ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ALTRUISM; HUMANITARIAN AID;

EID: 84865048307     PISSN: 01436597     EISSN: 13602241     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2012.698104     Document Type: Article

References (84)

1. R Chambers, 'Responsible well-being-a personal agenda for development', World Development, 25(11), 1997, p 1749.
2. Ibid, p 1747.
3. C Blackmore, Responsible Wellbeing and its Implications for Development Policy, University of Bath, Working Paper Series WeD 09/48, 2009, p 13.
4. E Mawdsley, G Porter & J Townsend, 'Trust, accountability and face-to-face interaction in North-South NGO relations', Development in Practice, 15(1), 2005, p 77.
5. N Long, Development Sociology: Actor Perspectives, London: Routledge, 2001.
6. Long, 'An actororiented approach to development intervention', in DA Cruz, Rural Life Improvement in Asia, Report of an APO seminar on 'Rural Life Improvement for Community Development', 2003, pp 47-61.
7. Blackmore, Responsible Wellbeing and its Implications for Development Policy, p 14.
8. R Chambers, 'Participatory rural appraisal (PRA): Analysis of experience,' World Development 22(9), 1994, pp 1253-1268.
9. Chambers, Responsible well-being - a personal agenda for development.
10. Cf P Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, New York: Seabury Press, 1970.
11. 'Responsible well-being', p 1749.
12. Chambers, 'Participatory rural appraisal', p 3.
13. D Gasper and AL St. Clair, 'The field of development ethics: an introduction', in D Gasper and AL St. Clair (eds) Development Ethics, Farnham: Ashgate, 2010. p19.
14. AK Giri & PQ van Ufford, 'Reconstituting development as a shared responsibility', in PQ van Ufford & AK Giri (eds), A Moral Critique of Development, London: Routledge, 2003, p 255.
15. M Foucault, 'An Aesthetics of Existence' in L Kritzman (ed) Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings, 1977-1984, London: Routledge, 1988.
16. Giri and van Ufford, 'Reconstituting development as a shared responsibility', p 254.
17. however, immersion programmes, as described by R Irvine, R Chambers & R Eyben, Learning from Poor People's Lives: Immersions, 2004, at http://www.exposure-dialog.de/english/.
18. Long, 'An actor-oriented approach to development intervention', p 48.
19. Chambers, 'Responsible well-being', p 1749.
20. Chambers, Participatory rural appraisal', pp 3-4.
21. T Vaux, The Selfish Altruist: Relief Work in Famine and War, London: Earthscan, 2001, p 7.
22. Ibid, p 180.
23. For existing examples, see JGilbert, 'Self-knowledge is the prerequisite of humanity: personal development and self-awareness for aid workers', Development in Practice, 15(1), 2005, pp 64-69.
24. C Min-Harris, Staff Care and Humanitarian Aid Organizations: A Moral Obligation, Issue-Specific Briefing Paper, Humanitarian Assistance in Complex Emergencies, University of Denver, 2011.
25. P Curling & KB Simmons, 'Stress and staff support strategies for international aid work', Interventions, 8(2), 2010, pp 93-105.
26. D Mosse, 'Introduction: the anthropology of expertise and professionals in international development', in Mosse (ed), Adventures in Aidland: The Anthropology of Professionals in International Development, Oxford: Berghahn, 2011, p 22.
27. Ibid, p 17.
28. Ibid, p 12.
29. RL Stirrat, 'Mercenaries, Missionaries and Misfits: Representations of Development Personnel', Critique of Anthropology 28(4), 2008, pp 406-425.
30. D Lewis, 'Tidy concepts, messy lives: defining tensions in the domestic and overseas careers of UK non-governmental professionals', in Mosse, Adventures in Aidland.
31. Relationships for Aid, London: Earthscan, 2006, pp 45-46.
32. R Allahyari, Visions of Charity: Volunteer Workers and Moral Community, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2000
33. M Baillie Smith & N Laurie, 'International volunteering and development: global citizenship and neoliberal professionalisation today', Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 36(4), 2011, pp 545-559, among others.
34. P Redfield, 'Doctors, Borders, and Life in Crisis', Cultural Anthropology 20(3), 2005, pp 328-361.
35. A Amin, 'Extraordinarily ordinary: working in the social economy', Social Enterprise Journal, 5(1) 2009, pp 30-49.
36. N Gunetilleke, N De Silva & G Lokuge, 'Development professionals: reconciling personal values with professional values', IDS Bulletin (Special Issue, Time to Reimagine Development?), 42(5), 2001, pp 45-51.
37. M Arvidson, 'Contradictions and confusions in development work: exploring the realities of Bangladeshi NGOs', Journal of South Asian Development, 3(1), 2008, pp 109-134.
38. Mosse, Introduction: The Anthropology of Expertise and Professionals in International Development, p 21.
39. For further examples of professionals expressing these doubts see Kanbur, 2010, and Fechter (this issue).
40. Allahyari, Visions of Charity, p 4.
41. Chambers, 'Responsible well-being', p 1749.
42. T Morris, The Despairing Developer: Diary of an Aid Worker in the Middle East, London: IB Tauris, 1991.
43. T Vaux, The Selfish Altruist; P Griffiths, The Economist's Tale: A Consultant Encounters Hunger and the World Bank, London: Zed Books, 2003.
44. A Thomson, K Cain & H Postlewait, Emergency Sex and other Desperate Measures: True Stories from a War Zone, London: Ebury Press, 2006.
45. On the concept of the development blockbuster, see D Lewis, 'The gift of experience? Expert memoir narratives, knowledge and development', unpublished seminar paper, University of Sussex, February 2011.
46. G Bolton, Aid and Other Dirty Business: How Good Intentions Have Failed the World's Poor, London: Ebury Press, 2008.
47. WEasterly, WhiteMan's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done so Much Ill and So Little Good, London: Penguin, 2006.
48. D Moyo, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is Another Way For Africa, London: Allen Lane, 2009.
49. J Sachs, The End of Poverty: How We Can Make It Happen In Our Lifetime, London: Penguin: 2005.
50. http://aidworkers.net/?q1/4blogs.
51. http://stuffexpataidworkerslike.com/; and http://shotgunshackblog.com/.
52. Accessed at http://stuffexpataidworkerslike.com/#149 High School Reunions, 7 May 2012.
53. Duncan Green, Oxfam UK, 'From poverty to power blog', at http://www.oxfamblogs.org/fp2p/.
54. http://thesenewboots.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/day-326-questions-no-answers.html.
55. 'Copenhagen4Belgrade4Copenhagen4Kampala4Dares Salaam4Copenhagen', at http://pernille.typepad.com/louderthanswahili/blogpost.
56. R Eyben, 'Making relationships matter for aid bureaucracies' in Eyben, Relationships for Aid. On the issue of relationships,
57. I McWha & M MacLachlan, 'Measuring relationships between workers in poverty-focused organisations', Journal of Managerial Psychology, 26(6), pp 485-499.
58. S Lister, Power in Partnership? An Analysis of an NGO's Relationships with its Partners, CVO International Working Paper 5, London: CVO, London School of Economics, 1999, abstract.
59. Ibid, p 15.
60. Eyben, 'Fellow travellers in development', this issue.
61. Eyben, Relationships for Aid, pp 44-45.
62. Mawdsley et al, 'Trust, accountability and face-to-face interaction in North-South NGO relations', pp 77-82.
63. Ibid, pp 78-79.
64. M Girgis, 'The capacity-building paradox: using friendship to build capacity in the South', Development in Practice, 17(3), 2007.
65. Ibid, p 357.
66. Q-methodology is a social science research method which was developed by the psychologist William Stephenson, and is used to explore people's viewpoints and subjectivities.
67. S Brown, 'A primer on Q methodology', Operant Subjectivity, 16(3-4), 1993, pp 91-138.
68. U Kothari, 'History, time and temporality in development discourse', inMWoolcock (ed), History and Development, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2010.
69. D Lewis, 'Using life histories in social policy research: the case of third sector/public sector boundary crossing', Journal of Social Policy, 37(4), 2008, pp 559-578.
70. Lewis, 'Crossing the boundaries between "third sector" and state: life-work histories from the Philippines, Bangladesh and the UK', Third World Quarterly, 29(1), 2008, pp 125-141.
71. U Kothari, 'From colonialism to development: oral histories, life geographies and travelling cultures', Antipode, 37(3), 2005, pp 49-60.
72. The term 'aidnography' is shorthand for the 'ethnography of aid'. J Gould, 'Introducing aidnography', in J Gould & HS Marcussen (eds), Ethnographies of Aid-Exploring Development Ttexts and Encounters, Roskilde: Department of International Development Studies, 2004.
73. Mosse, 'Introduction', p 20.
74. A Cornwall, S Jolly & S Correa, Development with a Body: Sexuality, Human Rights and Development, London: Zed, 2008.
75. LA Charlés, Intimate Colonialism, Walnut Creek, CA: LeftCoast Press, 2007.
76. For an extreme example, see the alleged trading of sex for food among UN peacekeepers, at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/01/wikileaks-un-peacekeepers_n_944917.html.
77. H Hacker, 'White man's bedtime stories: zur Ö konomie von Geschlecht und Whiteness in Texten der Development-Kontaktliteratur', Ö sterreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 31(4), pp 45-65.
78. Chambers, 'Participatory rural appraisal', p 3.
79. CDB Burt & SC Carr, 'Organizational psychology and poverty reduction: the multi-dimensionality of the aid worker experience', Journal of Managerial Psychology, 26(6), 2011, pp 444-452.
80. Mosse, 'Introduction', p 16.
81. For example, CB Eriksson, HV Kemp, R Gorsuch, S Hoke & DW Foy, 'Trauma exposure and PTSD symptoms in international relief and development personnel', Journal of Traumatic Stress, 14(1), 2001, pp 205-212.
82. 'What is wellbeing?', People in Aid Newsletter, at www.peopleinaid.org/pool/files/newsletter/2007-janen.pdf.pdf.
83. Vaux, The Selfish Altruist, pp 7-8.
84. Chambers, 'Responsible well-being', p 1749.