“Most of the institutions that come in to offer help after disaster don't have the resources to provide concrete help. . . . Donor communities invest billions funding peace talks and disarmament. Then they stop. The most important part of postwar help is missing: providing basic social services to people. Not having those resources might have been a reason men went to war in the first place; they crossed a border and joined an armed group because they didn't have jobs. In Liberia right now, there are hundreds of thousands of unemployed young people, and they're ready-made mercenaries for wars in West Africa. You'd think the international community would be sensible enough to know they should work to change this. But they aren't.” CulturePeaceInternational RelationsDisplacementSocial ServicesPostwarInternational AidResource AllocationRelief Work Book:Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War Source: Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War
“to be a good advisor, you have to set aside your own personal opinions and feelings in a kind of detachment or camouflage – since self-interest is incompatible with objectivity – and avoid the limelight. Maintained over years, this steady, watchful, guarded attitude had become a way of life for me – one in which I constantly looked out for pitfalls, anticipated threats coming over the horizon, and readied myself to move and adapt at a moment’s notice and melt from the picture. Was it possible that that I had blended too much into the background of my own life… blurring my own identity” International DevelopmentOverseasAdvisorAid WorkRelief Work Book:Raising Hare: A Memoir Source: Raising Hare: A Memoir