Haiti is the most destitute country in Latin America. Two-thirds of the population survive on less than a dollar a day and half its children are malnourished. Unemployment is rife and national production is meager. The hillsides are heavily deforested, and farmland is depleted of nutrients.
Haiti has received billions of dollars in aid over the years, yet the situation has only deteriorated. This leads many foreign aid workers and diplomats to characterize Haiti as a failed state, a country where endemic corruption and political violence render positive change impossible. But the reality is that many of the root causes of Haiti’s problems lie outside the country, in governments and aid organizations that impose their own unsustainable and unworkable agendas on the poor. While many non-profit organizations (NGOs) and foreign governments have noble intentions, they have failed to bring about lasting change in Haiti. Often, their donations do not help the poor but instead make them dependent and passive.
It is time to recognize that nations cannot be built by foreign powers and democracies cannot be installed from afar. It is time to recognize that channeling money through wealthy NGOs and aid organizations run by elites with little or no contact with the poor leads nowhere. It is time to recognize that feeding a starving child without awakening his or her consciousness, just as giving a man a fish instead of teaching him to fish, will not end the cycle of poverty and violence.
It is time for a new way of doing things. The solution for Haiti must come from within Haiti – not from the government, not from the elites, not from the aid workers, but from the poor masses who make up 90 percent of the population. The cycle of poverty ends when the poor stand up, join together and begin struggling for change.
This does not mean that foreign individuals, organizations and governments are helpless to turn things around in Haiti. On the contrary, they have a crucial role to play. The situation in the country is so desperate and resources so scarce, that the Haitian poor cannot simply pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Haiti needs outside help, but that help must allow for poor communities to organize, take the lead, set their own agenda and define their own priorities.
