Laura Augustin’s ‘Sex at the Margins’ (2007), and Jerker Edstrom’s 2010 article ‘Time to Call the Bluff’ highlight similar barriers to effective development programs.
Augustin challenges imperialism in international aid, particularly concerning prostitution. Her work discusses Western aid workers’ desire to impose their own morals and control those that they help, for example, determining what aid is received (Augustin, 2007). Edstrom notes similar issues within HIV/AIDS interventions: Westerners giving aid suited to their own culturally-specific morality, hindering its effectiveness (2010). Edstrom believes that focussing on Africans as pitiful and vulnerable ‘noble savages’ to be saved, results in Western development workers overlooking …show more content…
This construal ignores the reality of sexual relations, inhibiting the effectiveness of interventions; e.g. some women find prostitution a reasonable source of income (Edstrom, 2010). For example, Western aid focusses on preventing entry or encouraging exit from prostitution. Despite pleas from Sex Workers Rights movements, no development programs aim to increase protections for sex-workers, such as condom use. Instead, based on Western gender binaries, programs continue to address inappropriate areas of sexual relations, denying the possibility that women might wish to continue in the industry (Edstrom, 2010). This reflects Augustin’s (2010) observations: Western aid workers define the development ‘problem’ (e.g. Migration or HIV/AIDS) and what aid is given, in a way that suits Western moral …show more content…
For example, Augustin (2010) emphasises that health professionals should ask themselves why they are helping these people – i.e., is it from a sense of superiority to help the needy ‘save themselves from themselves’, or a desire to hear their concerns and implement the desired changes? It is a necessity that aid workers ask themselves this before they can possibly collaborate effectively with the community, with collaboration being an essential step in creating effective interventions that the target audience will respond to. An individual volunteering from a sense of moral superiority is highly unlikely to consult the community, likely believing that the Western method of assistance is the only method possible.
Correcting the desire to ‘help’ civilise the ‘savages’ – due to western superiority – would allow aid workers and health professionals to acknowledge the reality of the ‘problem’ they mean to alleviate. This includes the times when reality requires that workers challenge unequal structures (such as gender binaries) in their own society, as well as the nation receiving aid. This will allow professionals to accurately address risk behaviours, e.g., anal sex in HIV/AIDS, as a human problem, not a ‘gay’ problem, under the misguidance that women don’t participate in this activity (Edstrom,
Augustin challenges imperialism in international aid, particularly concerning prostitution. Her work discusses Western aid workers’ desire to impose their own morals and control those that they help, for example, determining what aid is received (Augustin, 2007). Edstrom notes similar issues within HIV/AIDS interventions: Westerners giving aid suited to their own culturally-specific morality, hindering its effectiveness (2010). Edstrom believes that focussing on Africans as pitiful and vulnerable ‘noble savages’ to be saved, results in Western development workers overlooking …show more content…
This construal ignores the reality of sexual relations, inhibiting the effectiveness of interventions; e.g. some women find prostitution a reasonable source of income (Edstrom, 2010). For example, Western aid focusses on preventing entry or encouraging exit from prostitution. Despite pleas from Sex Workers Rights movements, no development programs aim to increase protections for sex-workers, such as condom use. Instead, based on Western gender binaries, programs continue to address inappropriate areas of sexual relations, denying the possibility that women might wish to continue in the industry (Edstrom, 2010). This reflects Augustin’s (2010) observations: Western aid workers define the development ‘problem’ (e.g. Migration or HIV/AIDS) and what aid is given, in a way that suits Western moral …show more content…
For example, Augustin (2010) emphasises that health professionals should ask themselves why they are helping these people – i.e., is it from a sense of superiority to help the needy ‘save themselves from themselves’, or a desire to hear their concerns and implement the desired changes? It is a necessity that aid workers ask themselves this before they can possibly collaborate effectively with the community, with collaboration being an essential step in creating effective interventions that the target audience will respond to. An individual volunteering from a sense of moral superiority is highly unlikely to consult the community, likely believing that the Western method of assistance is the only method possible.
Correcting the desire to ‘help’ civilise the ‘savages’ – due to western superiority – would allow aid workers and health professionals to acknowledge the reality of the ‘problem’ they mean to alleviate. This includes the times when reality requires that workers challenge unequal structures (such as gender binaries) in their own society, as well as the nation receiving aid. This will allow professionals to accurately address risk behaviours, e.g., anal sex in HIV/AIDS, as a human problem, not a ‘gay’ problem, under the misguidance that women don’t participate in this activity (Edstrom,