Archive for the ‘NGOs’ Category
After war, who’s not a ‘vulnerable population’?
I’m up to my ears in UN project reports about peacebuilding activities in various countries, and I continue to see language like this, a recommendation about what a small business should do were it to receive UN financial support: “Give more jobs to vulnerable persons affected by the conflict (ex-combatants, women, youth, disabled, …)” Ex-combatants. [...]
Boozing it up in the ‘third world’?: The mix tape
Update, after I got out from under my rock In one of the very active comments sections on the blogs that have taken this up, someone accused Nick Kristof of living under a rock. Accused is a strong word. ‘Asked if he did’ is better. I have been the cyber equivalent of living under a [...]
Creepiest Google searcher ever, and a confidentiality conundrum
Like a lot of bloggers, weird Google search terms will send people my way. I used the word “thighs” in a blog headline once, and now every week I get a few people who I’m pretty sure are just looking for porn. Awesome. But here’s a Google search term that’s also a reminder of how [...]
Does charity work like carbon offsets?
First, let me just say that it sounds like carbon offsets are a guilt salve more than anything else. If you saw the piece in Harper’s Magazine, it’s hard to be optimistic that offsetting carbon does much more than make lay people feel guilty and make smart people scheme about how to create another derivatives [...]
"I swear, that is SO legal," or, why the man in charge of fixing Liberia's justice sector "owns" all the laws
A piece of investigative reporting that took Glenna Gordon and I the better part of our month together in Monrovia, and lots of her time before that, is finally in the world. The story is about Philip Banks, by my impression a genial and very smart man, who claims to own the copyright to Liberia’s [...]
One year of corruption in Africa = 704 million years of HIV treatment
At least according to the calculations of the Namibian* activists who made this video, the first in a series called “Lords of Bling.” Take a look if you want to know how many courses of TB or HIV treatment you could get for the money Uganda’s President Museveni pours into his private jet, Swaziland’s King [...]
I am a freelance journalist and multimedia producer who covers human rights, Africa and foreign affairs. [