Experience or Expertise?

When it comes to international aid, who knows best?

When providing international aid, is it better to have years of experience in the field, or local expertise? Are there pros and cons to favoring one or the other? Most would agree that a mix of the two is needed to implement a successful project, and it is often very apparent when the two are not held in the same regard. When this happens, who gets to decide if the project has failed? Two projects, both focused on gender-based violence, provide contrast to show the wrong way to combine tried and true practices with local customs, and how to do it right.

On International Women’s Day in 2015, Wajir Town, Kenya started a gender violence hotline to simplify the process of reporting instances of gender-based violence and expedite the investigation and prosecution of crimes such as rape and sexual harassment. No one entity claimed ownership of the hotline, although support was provided by NGOs like Mercy Corps and International Rescue Committee with funding provided by the U.K.’s Department for International Development.

Three years after it was launched an investigation led by Devex found that the hotline was often out of order, sometimes for months at a time, and even when it was fully operational those trained on manning the hotline were not sending their reports to the police. Per Devex’s report, multiple police officers said they were unware of the hotline, a sentiment echoed by residents of Wajir Town, despite it being advertised on billboards and local radio stations. A lack of funding was commonly mentioned to explain the hotline’s failure, especially when it came to advertising. Ownership of the hotline was given to the local government after the first year, at which point support from the previously mentioned NGOs ended.

What is most notable in the Devex piece is the brief discussion of a local practice called the Maslah system, wherein community elders meet to discuss disputes brought before them and determine the punishment should the individual be found guilty. The author noted that opinions on the Maslah system were mixed with some community members supporting the system while many NGOs and government agencies were against it. Some saw the hotline as a potential improvement to the Maslah system as it created formal police reports, although as Devex details, lack of awareness of the hotline was prevalent.

Additionally, it was noted that violence against women was often unreported to the police because it was addressed using the Maslah system. In 2017 Mercy Corps claimed that the number of convicted rape cases rose from zero in 2014 to 31 in 2017 and attributed this increase to the hotline, although Rashid Ishmael, a paralegal for Wajir law courts, said these numbers are likely due to increased efforts to contact victims of gender-based violence and educate them on their rights.

Nearly 6,000 miles away on the other side of the continent another gender-based project, this time focusing on providing basic education and resources to women and girls in Senegal, provides a contrasting example of the ways in which an NGO can successfully incorporate a community’s customs in their work to create a stronger project. Tostan’s education program, which uses traditional methods of learning to discuss important topics, concludes with a review module at which time the participants visit other Tostan communities and perform the theater pieces they developed.

After the first cohort of 35 women completed the human rights education model in Tostan’s Community Empowerment Program, the women decided to abandon female genital cutting (FGC) as their final project. At this point they began a series of visits to surrounding villages to perform theater pieces that showcased their knowledge of the dangers of FGC and the benefits of proper hygiene and health practices. Because of this work, by one educator’s count of the 347 villages he visited, 341 agreed to give up FGC.

Although these two projects had a different focus it is clear to see which one was more successful in accomplishing their goal. The differences between the projects are vast and revolve around the ways in which the leading organization engaged with the community and incorporated their practices and customs into the work. In Kenya, the hotline was meant to replace the Maslah system although no attempts were made to marry the two resources and allow for punishments to be decided by the system while also creating formal police reports. Additionally, promotion of the hotline was not successfully reaching those most vulnerable to experiencing gender-based violence. Despite this, three years after the hotline was launched it was declared a success.

In contrast, Tostan use of community theater as a means of information sharing gave the villages that had not yet abandoned FGC an entry point into the discussion as they were also able to give and receive information in a manner that was familiar to them. This method not only gave students ownership of the program, but it also led to a successful education program wherein thousands of communities have agreed to end a harmful, yet at one point, prevalent, practice.

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(HKS) Garcia-Rios, P., & Fung, A. (2015, October 15). Female Genital Cutting: Confronting the Power of Tradition in Senegal. Retrieved May 12, 2021, from https://case.hks.harvard.edu/female-genital-cutting-confronting-the-power-of-tradition-in-senegal/

Langat, A. (2019, February 14). No answer: Kenya’s gender-based violence hotline fails to connect. Retrieved May 12, 2021, from https://www.devex.com/news/no-answer-kenya-s-gender-based-violence-hotline-fails-to-connect-93822

Tostan. (n.d.). Promoting Health and Positive Practices. Retrieved May 12, 2021, from https://www.tostan.org/areas-of-impact/health/