Comments on: 2011: Youth, not Religion / Spontaneity, not Aid

By: Benoit Challand

Benoit Challand — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 17:28:43 +0000

As the two useful comments touch on similar questions, here is a joint reply. To Jessica, first the conclusion that I reach on how “professional activism is lost when it comes to spontaneity”, stems from sheer empirical observations, i.e. I could not see a significant impact of professionalized organization on these initial demonstrations in the whole region. Nor can I see in the last two or three weeks new types of claims made by such professional organizations in Algeria or in the Palestinian territories (the two scenes we seem to be familiar with). In other words, aid given by donors (large ones in particular) has not (in your words) “permitted people to grow, reflect, or critique certain grievances”. Laypeople have done so, but without any external intervention (and large bombing campaigns won’t probably help it either).
Granted, professionalized organizations and spontaneous demonstrations are different things and I don’t exclude that on some very specific points (advice on constitutional reforms, watchdog role of human rights associations, capacity building for trade unions, etc), the professional institutions can make a positive and significant contribution to the ongoing revolts. Donors can and should make a difference by insisting on a true dialogue with local partners who should have a say in the ways in which the aided program is tailored, organized and evaluated. But the point is that reporting mechanisms, budget requirements, or the donor’s priorities (all legitimate questions) should not pre-empt and destroy the capacity for local actors to choose their priorities and modalities of interventions in an autonomous manner.
So how can aid earmarked for “civil society” practically preserve spontaneity? Maybe by having international donors with a real anchorage on the ground, sensing what the communities can already offer (rather than starting from scratch and creating new potentially artificial institutions), offering more smaller grants and favoring a greater sense of rotation amongst the beneficiaries (rather than keeping funding the same happy few).

By: Jess Northey

Jess Northey — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 18:38:44 +0000

Benoit, your work remains an inspiration to me.. I really like your last two posts. I do however disagree on a couple of points. Firstly, that professional activism is lost when it comes to spontaneity of demonstrations. Why? Is this not two different things?
There is organized and programmed development work, which may be instigated at local, intermediary, government or donor level. Then there is a very different form of political action which is demonstration. I do not see how being involved in the former (donor funded NG0s for example) in an organized, professional structure (if it is a serious and committed organization) would diminish the potential for the latter? Or have I misunderstood? Indeed, the former (if donors manage it well) may permit people to grow, reflect, critique certain particular grievances, or sectors which they join together to work on. This may enable to them to participate in demonstrations with a more informed and publically debated opinion.
That you want to gain donor money, you have to speak the language? There are of course standard grant documents to gain funds in any system, in any country. Otherwise, it would be handing out money haphazardly with no control. This would most probably lead to some sort of nepotistic buying off of organizations. If it is seen as ‘buzzwords’ and jargon – that implies, to me, that the donor organization financing has failed. It has failed to understand, communicate with, capacitate and support its target group.
That there be some sort of formatting and processes to go through, in order to ensure the transparency of financial management, is not inherently a bad thing. If organizations are asked to supply minutes of a general assembly, statutes stating their goals, a budget with what they would seek to spend the money on (with unit prices, and estimates for the needs of project) then this – in the logic of things – is not to create bureaucracy, but to prevent corruption, improve accountability, help train for better financial management and for charities to be able to successfully manage small development actions and frame their eventual lobbying activities.
In the case I am looking at in Algeria, NGOs which have received external donor support from the EU and Algerian government did not become ‘businesses’. Nor do they support external priorities nor the state’s agenda. What they do is contribute to development at the regional level, they protect the local heritage (as interpreted by the individual association, not the state or donor), they work for a better dialogue between the state and society on questions of public health, vulnerable populations amongst many other honorable objectives. They are also forum in which people dialogue, discuss politics, and criticize and propose. The members may participate in public demonstrations or they may not.
I agree with you that western interference, critiques, and poor donor policies are negative for the region and democracy in general. The underlying hypocrisy in our policies, in that we support stability, not democracy undermines the objectives of civil society support programmes. But this does not always mean they fail. Nor does it mean that civil society organizations are corrupted or rendered artifical by working with foreign donors.
Does it kill spontaneity? Who knows, but all the regimes are going to have change in light of the current revolutions, and as you suggest this change should also be seen in western ones..

By: elena bottici

elena bottici — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 12:49:49 +0000

Dear Benoite,

I totally share your view. i live in London, in an area vastly populate by people of Islamic and Arabic connection, here people have mixed feeling. The desire of starting a new more democratic, Middle East and North Africa, with or without the aid of Western military action, and the feeling that a wester military action may be motivated by the exploitation of the countries oil reserves.

However you underlined how important it is that to let the spontaneity of this revolution grow without the aid of the western society, but there is growing concern that without such aid the revolution would be crashed by their government , just like what we’re seeing in Libya .

So how can we support the revolution, knowing that without the aid of the western world they will be overpowered by those governments that are using such military force?

How do you see a practical solution?

Elena Bottici