I purposely avoided blogging about Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea and the Central Asia Institute debacle. I did so because issues with my eyes largely kept me away from my computer last week. More importantly, I did so because as an academic (and not an aid worker), I am considerably less qualified to discuss Greg Mortenson than my fellow development bloggers whose boots are on the ground.
A good example of a blogger whose boots are on the ground is J., who blogs anonymously over at Tales from the Hood. I particularly enjoyed his or her cynical take on Tea-gate titled “No Sh!t,” in which he or she addresses how little this adds to our understanding of development practice:
“Thanks to all those awesomely intuitive peeps in the mass media, what, exactly, are we learning from all of this? Well…
It turns out that doing long-term programming, and doing it properly is hard. It takes commitment. It costs a lot of money. Who would have thought? No Sh!t.
Going someplace where there are a lot of brown people and having an epiphany about how simple the needs of the poor are is easy. Doing something about it takes a lot of knowledge and skill and experience. No Sh!t.
… And even with a lot of knowledge, skill and experience, there are no guarantees of success. Sometimes programs fail. Even ones that are well-planned, resourced and executed. Sometimes they fizzle or deliver marginal results. No Sh!t.
Greg Mortenson is a big, lumbering, completely disorganized (according to a ‘friend’) oaf who thought this was all nice and easy, but who – as it turns out – was just plain wrong. No Sh!t.
A famous journalist who thought he understood aid better than he does (I know, almost never happens, right?), whose own career has been made by inaccurately portraying the issues (‘it’s simple, really’) in the name of ‘raising awareness’, and who got all misty over Three Cups of Tea… is now heartbroken and covering his own ass. No Sh!t.“
(Update: Tom Murphy over at A View from the Cave informs me that J. is male. Duly noted.)
Tales from the Hood and “Tea”-gate (Updated)
I purposely avoided blogging about Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea and the Central Asia Institute debacle. I did so because issues with my eyes largely kept me away from my computer last week. More importantly, I did so because as an academic (and not an aid worker), I am considerably less qualified to discuss Greg Mortenson than my fellow development bloggers whose boots are on the ground.
A good example of a blogger whose boots are on the ground is J., who blogs anonymously over at Tales from the Hood. I particularly enjoyed his
or hercynical take on Tea-gate titled “No Sh!t,” in which heor sheaddresses how little this adds to our understanding of development practice:“Thanks to all those awesomely intuitive peeps in the mass media, what, exactly, are we learning from all of this? Well…
It turns out that doing long-term programming, and doing it properly is hard. It takes commitment. It costs a lot of money. Who would have thought? No Sh!t.
Going someplace where there are a lot of brown people and having an epiphany about how simple the needs of the poor are is easy. Doing something about it takes a lot of knowledge and skill and experience. No Sh!t.
… And even with a lot of knowledge, skill and experience, there are no guarantees of success. Sometimes programs fail. Even ones that are well-planned, resourced and executed. Sometimes they fizzle or deliver marginal results. No Sh!t.
Greg Mortenson is a big, lumbering, completely disorganized (according to a ‘friend’) oaf who thought this was all nice and easy, but who – as it turns out – was just plain wrong. No Sh!t.
A famous journalist who thought he understood aid better than he does (I know, almost never happens, right?), whose own career has been made by inaccurately portraying the issues (‘it’s simple, really’) in the name of ‘raising awareness’, and who got all misty over Three Cups of Tea… is now heartbroken and covering his own ass. No Sh!t.“
(Update: Tom Murphy over at A View from the Cave informs me that J. is male. Duly noted.)
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Published in Commentary and Development