Somali Aide - Beyond Paralysis

The dire situation in Somali is confounded by groups within that country who are blocking the entry of aide; while "donor fatigue," "will full neglect," "lack luster effort," (Amy Goodman on "Democracy Now") and the confusion of where your donation might go if you sent it paralyse the potential donors. What to do? The UN has described the situation as the most dire drought/famine for many years in Africa (60) and issued a "famine alert" for 11 million people. Meanwhile the press, radio and TV media are muddled by the impasses.

Paralysis is so common today, as to make personal action practically impossible it seems. There is no doubt that we need changing strategies to make aide function better, to replace charity with systems which actually repair the damage suffered by the people to be aided. Huge order, and one taken on by the landmark book by Rebecca Solnit, "A Paradise Built in Hell; The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster," Penguin Books, c2009. She describes how communities as wide ranging as San Francisco (1906), Halifax (1917), Mexico City (1985), New York City (2001), and New Orleans (2005), and some of the changes brought about in response to them give us hope and models for the future.

I'm going to look up the Red Cross and Care on Google, see if they have any suggestions about what is next for Somali. Meanwhile let's all look in the directions suggested by Sonit's book and see how things might be different in all of this. As of 7/27 it looks like a way has been found to bring in aide successfully, the UN announced the arrival of planes with aide today.