NGO's - (Tunnel) Visionaries

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Brooklyn, New York, United States of America (Free-Press-Release.com) January 3, 2012 -- Nowadays, NGO’s are facing harsher criticism than ever before, but unfortunately criticism alone is not enough. Whether you are looking at the sheer lack of transparency when it comes to their sources of funding, whom they hold their allegiance to, how they go about their research or the almost zero accountability in transitional civil society it seems that by in large NGO’s and the power that comes with them goes almost completely unchecked.

As we are beginning to discover, these things are only the tip of the iceberg. Ever since their existence NGO’s have somehow managed to impose their “own” ideas of what they feel is right and just while often ignoring the “big picture”. Of course, I am not speaking about every NGO out there and certainly there are some very noble organizations carrying out equally noble acts, but by their very definition NGO’s are more often than not dictated by some narrow objective that is undoubtedly tied to the interests of those who are footing the bill.

Moreover, their tunnel vision approach is often misaligned with the bigger picture and by choosing to focus solely on issues that they may deem important and ignoring the broader spectrum of social, political and economic contexts they often end up doing more harm than good. In essence, NGO’s are only seeing the trees and not the whole forest, which is crucial in the development and long-term success of any region.

An example given by Rana-Lehr Lehnardt in her paper published for the Cornell Law Library is that of NGO’s buying slaves their freedom. Of course this looks very nice on paper and surely an easy sell for donor funding, but what it fails to recognize is how buying a slave’s freedom from the one participating in this practice only encourages the continuation or even increases the market for slaves. Instead of finding ways to perhaps punish or alienate those buying the slaves in the first place they ended up actually increasing the demand. More slaves = more $$$. Not a bad plan if you happen to be a slave broker.

According to a UN press release some NGO’s even went as far as academic dishonesty in NGO position and background papers ignoring the greater good and instead pushing their own agenda and self-promotion. This in itself is a major problem. For one, it is unethical, but more concerning is the risk it involves. For example, if one does not take the necessary time to carry out the proper due diligence it is pretty easy to take a side early on based on the perceived preliminary findings only to find out too late you have been supporting the wrong team, thus only prolonging the conflict and suffering.

So what is the solution? Unfortunately this question is a lot easier asked than answered, but to start with, NGO’s must have clear directives that are fully transparent, as well as total transparency when it comes to who is financing their operations. They must be held 100% accountable to their donors, but more importantly to their constituents who are the very people they claim to be representing.

In itself, this would seem like a pretty basic, logical mandate, but given that currently there is no organization in existence with any real power to enforce this it appears as though NGO’s will continue to go about pushing their own ideas and progressing their own agendas, at least for the time being.

That being said, people seem to be catching on and with that are starting to ask questions. Questions that NGO’s either cannot or do not wish to answer. One can only hope with the mounting pressure that they will eventually be held to the same amount of transparency and accountability of which they impose on others.

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