September 06, 2018

Charity and aid work need to be reexamined

editor:	Shira Jeczmien

As the United Nations (UN) celebrates International Day of Charity on September 5, it seems appropriate to examine what this day should mean to us, in 2018, and in the coming years. In the 2030 global Agenda on Sustainable Development, laid out by the UN in 2015, there is a conscious and focused recognition that the eradication of poverty in all of its forms is perhaps the single biggest global challenge facing all member states around the world. As part of the 2030 agenda, 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were set forth, and as outlined by the UN, “They have the potential to transform our lives and our planet by providing the framework needed for philanthropic institutions to enable all people to contribute to the betterment of our world.”

While charity is vastly different to international aid work, I believe that they both share a common ground, which is the allocation of resources to those in need and the agenda to compensate externally instead of developing tools, jobs and access to resources internally.

It is impossible to talk about international aid without mentioning the Contonou agreement, which is the base of the so-called development aid á la Europe. Signed in Contonou on June 23, 2000, it is the most comprehensive document to date that sets forth a 20-year aid plan between Europe and 79 countries from Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP). It could be said that the EU-ACP Cotonou Agreement played a large part in how the West understands its development, trade and economic cooperation towards those countries – and not necessarily for the best. Just this week, German Chancellor Merkel and Gerd Müller, Federal Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development, have been criticised for travelling to Senegal, Ghana and Nigeria with a suitcase that “contains numerous gifts supposed to promote German investment. A second piece of luggage contains measures to combat the causes of migration.” Yet none seem to have considered the needs of the countries, as Robert Kappel writes in the International International Politics and Society journal.

This week saw a large number of African leaders travel to China, while in tandem a wave of European leaders has travelled to African nations. They all came, Macron, Merkel and May, with the promise of helping. But these offerings are set out to serve none other than Europe and largely focused on how to protect the union from migration from Africa. 

Currently, Europe has not expressed a coherent plan on how to deal with the fastest-growing continent, especially in view of the fact that Eurocentric, neo-colonialist instruments such as the Contonou agreement have failed and are not an attractive alternative for African countries. Meanwhile, African economies such as Ghana, Nigeria or Tanzania are posing ‘politely’ but determinedly, while becoming increasingly self-confidently in opposing the ‘helpers from Europe’. As spoken by Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo during a press conference with the visiting French President Emmanuel Macron in December 2017, “We have to get away from this mindset of dependency. This mindset about ‘what can France do for us?’”.

Maybe Europe needs a few lessons in what aid and charity means? Certainly a rethink. Therefore, an International Day of Charity offers a good opportunity to consider where charity starts and how economic partnerships could come to place instead.

Photo: Craig Owen / Oxfam