to see whole

There exists the argument that some returned volunteers have gained insight into the damage they have done to others - and thus become more mature people... The damage which volunteers do willy-nilly is too high a price for the belated insight that they shouldn't have been volunteers in the first place (from To Hell with Good Intentions, 1968).

i've been struggling with these words for a few days now... what they mean. how to understand them. the implications. for me and for others. for this kind of work (international development). for the ethic they could inspire. for a deeper understanding of our roles. and for a greater awareness of – for lack of a better word – the system(s) we're all a part of. actually, there is a better word... wholeness.

i had 3-4 conversations with good friends about illich and his ideas this weekend. they helped me realize that it's not about just stopping... ending international development. as if that were possible. indeed, many people are benefiting and i don't have the right (or the power, really... i'm not sure anyone does. even illich must have understood that) to just stop it.

it's not about that. it's about change. no matter how slow or gradual... and it does change. it is changing. international development, that is. not just what work is being done but also how it's being done. "it's a matter," as one of my friends put it, "of unlearning paternalism in exchange for partnership."

it's also about intention... the theory of change i believe in is that change comes from within. this is hard for me to describe or fully articulate, but people only have the power to change themselves... and that can be quite powerful. but it can also be tenuous... the control we have, even over ourselves. which is why i'm so interested in presence.

presence, as i understand it, is less about having control over the situations we find – or, if you like, put ourselves – in... and more about how we deal with them. this takes awareness. a greater awareness than i had while i was in cameroon. and often a greater awareness than i have in my day-to-day, even today. even at the 'simple' frustrations in life, whether it's waiting for a bush-taxi or a metrobus.

this lack of awareness had me looking (and i'm still looking... b/c it's hard to unlearn these things) for specific answers to the situation i was in. a young american overseas trying to help. there was more than that, to be sure... i was also trying to learn. understand. respect. adapt. did i do damage? i'm sure i did. less than others? perhaps.

but it isn't just about me or any other volunteer or kind of volunteer (muslim, multicultural, bicultural...). it's also about the change occurring in the people, and the countries, we were working with. change that we didn't have very much, if anything, to do with.

and there's more... a change in the institutions doing development. brought on, in part, b/c of their understanding of past and present failures, and the need to change. there are many voices speaking up right now about peace corps needing to change [see the Fall 2008 'Worldview'; PDF, esp. pages 20-21]... to pick only one institution in the behemoth that is international development. a very small player, at that.

so the bigger picture emerging is a set of factors changing... coming together to change. one of my friends asked me to stop trying to isolate any one of those factors in the hope of finding change in it alone... she asked me to think more whole. it's about the change in everything coming together.

which brings me back to illich... there's certainly something to his "to hell with good intentions" argument. there's a lot to it! "scathingly accurate," as another friend pointed out... and compelling. and yet there's more. i.e. there's a bigger picture that illich's argument is only one part of. what is it? i haven't figured it all out.

i've gotten glimpses of it... and the experiences i've had and the people of wisdom around me are helping me see more. this blog is helping me see more. that is, in part, why i'm doing this... to see more. to see whole, insha'Allah.

don't come to help

If you have any sense of responsibility at all, stay with your riots here at home. Work for the coming elections: You will know what you are doing, why you are doing it, and how to communicate with those to whom you speak. And you will know when you fail. If you insist on working with the poor, if this is your vocation, then at least work among the poor who can tell you to go to hell. It is incredibly unfair for you to impose yourselves on a village where you are so linguistically deaf and dumb that you don't even understand what you are doing, or what people think of you. And it is profoundly damaging to yourselves when you define something that you want to do as "good," a "sacrifice" and "help."

I am here to suggest that you voluntarily renounce exercising the power which being an American gives you. I am here to entreat you to freely, consciously and humbly give up the legal right you have to impose your benevolence on Mexico. I am here to challenge you to recognize your inability, your powerlessness and your incapacity to do the "good" which you intended to do.

I am here to entreat you to use your money, your status and your education to travel in Latin America. Come to look, come to climb our mountains, to enjoy our flowers. Come to study. But do not come to help.

Ivan Illich, from To Hell with Good Intentions. 1968.

an impact?

i'm not sure where to start with the previous post... to make an impact. how do i reflect on my thinking then, through how i think presently? ellen was right about indoctrination [see the 3rd comment]. i feel like it's been a steady process of unlearning a lot of what i've learned growing up. not just in school, though that's probably where it started. but also through work and in life.

there are at least 3 issues that come up for me as i reread what i wrote more than 6 years ago in that post:

1. most importantly, what does making an impact mean?
2. what do i mean when i write about a place called "Africa?" what "Africa?"
3. how do i begin to address the last line in the previous post, for myself... where am i needed most?

while all 3 of these issues are certainly worth deconstructing, i'll only be focusing on the first one. for now.

so what does that mean? "to make an impact or a difference in a small village." i suppose i was referring to (international) sustainable development. peace corps training was my first introduction to that concept, explicitly. i'm sure many a peace corps volunteer has struggled with the idea. we often talked about it... were we making a difference? what would make us more effective? how could we have more of an impact?

and how is that measured, exactly? in the number of people reached? students taught? farmers trained? or community development projects executed? for other agents of international development, perhaps it's more easily quantifiable or more tangible... like miles of road built or rural infrastructure constructed. tons of food produced or local income generated. to say nothing of attempts at quantifying "quality of life."

i can't help but notice how all these are external measurements... how about the difference or the impact made within? on ourselves... as humans. reciprocally. reflexively. b/w people. not just "development agent" and "beneficiary." how do we begin to measure the depth of human exchange or relationship?

and what if that exchange, by definition, is not reciprocal? what if the relationship, no matter how "human," is not at all of mutual benefit? the thoughts of ivan illich come to mind [thanks to ellen for sharing in an early comment]... and what he describes as a likely "new awareness" for "North American do-gooders":

...the awareness that even North Americans can receive the gift of hospitality without the slightest ability to pay for it; the awareness that for some gifts one cannot even say 'thank you' (from To Hell with Good Intentions, 1968).

i'm not sure what to say, really... there's more from illich. much more. and i'll let him speak for himself in the next post. yet i can't help but wonder (without going too much into it here) about the 3rd question i raised above, "where am i needed most?" and is it simply a question of where?... or what? and how?