The Problem with International Aid to the Third World

    My problem with international aid to the Third World, which is also discussed in Killing with Kindness by Mark Schuller, is two-fold. First, there exists the question, "Why do certain countries need aid?" This seemingly simple question may be answered with equally simplistic answers. Haiti needs aid because the country just experienced an earthquake, because the government is corrupt. Middle Eastern women need help because the women are oppressed. Indian women need aid because the women are raped. But doesn't the United States experience natural disasters, and don't we usually aid ourselves, domestically? Foreign countries do not come from the outside in to aide us, consequently controlling us. Also, many would argue that the US government is corrupt? Who will aid the people of this "democracy"? Are there no women and other people in the United States who are oppressed? Are there no women in the United States who are raped? So, the simple question of "Why do certain countries  need aid?" becomes complex when we examine what make a certain country certain in its status as Third World, developing, or insufficient to help itself and make its own decisions.
    Another issue with international aid is the reality of lived experience. We often hear, or read, or even draft, the mission of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and nonprofit organizations, the US equivalent to NGOs. In the nobility of their mission statements, we marginalize the reality of lived experience. How could the people of Haiti experience such detriment even after so many noble organizations travel there for the express purpose of aiding them? The hegemonic assumption is that if marginalized people cannot manage to be aided, unaidable perhaps, there must be an intrinsic, essentialist quality to them that even aid from noble, read superior, individuals, systems and countries cannot break through. The erasure of lived experience of Haitian people receiving aid reminds me of the erasure and marginalization of Hurricane Katrina victims. If the reality of their suffering, even post aid or because of supposed aid, comes to light, victim-blaming ensues. Individualization of suffering, seen as rare cases or just the way certain people are, exists as an effective tool to null and void out the reality of system of oppression -- imperialism, neoliberalism, colonialism, globalization.
     An expression states, "Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime." But where is the expression that leads us to question why we would need to teach a man to fish, that questions who is in a position to teach, and how teaching and giving can lead to control? All this reminds me that lived experience is essential to theory, also supported by Danticat's Brother, I'm Dying memoir. We all know the purpose of political asylum as granted to foreigners. What we don't know is the reality of asking for that aid in certain bodies, from certain countries. Lived experience is the only way to understand the reality of effects of systems of oppression -- racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, heterosexism, ableism. Our paradigms are one thing, and they vary from person to person; our experiences are another, and they also vary.