The Top 100 NGOs 2013. - Akshaya Patra

a woman walks By a
Fire in The ruBBle-
FilleD sTreeTs oF
PorT-au-Prince
© un PhoTo/logan aBassi
FeaTure FeaTure
The gloBal Journal + January & FeBruary 2013
a man seTs uP a
TemPorary shelTer in
The imPoverisheD ciTé
soleil seTTlemenT
© un PhoTo/logan aBassi
On 12 January 2010, the deadliest earthquake in the history of the Western Hemisphere
struck Haiti. In a country already struggling with huge developmental challenges, the
disaster killed more than 300,000 people and left over one million homeless. Yet, despite
an unprecedented outpouring of global generosity, the relief – and later reconstruction –
effort has floundered. In this ‘Republic of NGO’s, good intentions have often gone wrong,
and those driven by a humanitarian impulse have inadvertently contributed to
an international response that will be remembered most for promises unfulfilled.
Long before January 2010, when
the sky above Port-au-Prince
swarmed with foreign aircraft and
aid caravans proliferated in the rubble
dust, Haiti had been known for one
of the world’s thickest concentrations
of aid groups. The country’s everworsening
poverty and proximity to the
United States (US) and Europe’s island
holdings, combined with an absence of
major conflict, had for decades made it
a place where aid workers felt needed
and free to work. A persistent lack of
local governance meanwhile meant that
managers could experiment as they
pleased. Many of the most successful
projects, by their own criteria, had long
since become essential providers of
public services, further supplanting and
weakening the state.
This weakening of sovereignty was
a bitter pill for the second-oldest
independent republic in the Western
Hemisphere. Snide references to the
Caribbean nation being governed as
a de facto ‘Republic of NGOs’ date
back to at least the 1990s. Moreover,
experienced aid workers themselves
knew that the cycle of dependency and
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despondency undermined their own
goals. A persistent lack of coordination
among NGOs ranging from offices
of the world’s pre-eminent international
actors to one-man shows seemingly
improvised on the spot made an
effective aid regime impossible.
When in mid-2009, less than a
year before the earthquake, former
US President Bill Clinton was
appointed the United Nations (UN)
Special Envoy for Haiti, one of his
primary missions was to improve
NGO coordination, eliminate
redundancies, and see to it that