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Aid or exploitation?: Food-for-work, cash-for-work, and the production of “beneficiary-workers” in Ethiopia and Haiti

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  • Carruth, Lauren
  • Freeman, Scott

Abstract

The distinct subject positions of “beneficiaries” and “aid workers” pervade global aid vernacular, the grey development literature, and the field of development studies, but this binary obscures additional and vital forms of labor within the global aid industry. This analysis is based on the juxtaposition, comparison, and historical contextualization of two case studies drawing on two independent ethnographic research projects in the Somali Region of Ethiopia and southwestern Haiti. We find that although not designated either “employees” or “aid workers,” many beneficiaries are required to work to qualify for assistance: for example, food-for-work programs in Ethiopia and cash-for-work programs in Haiti both require beneficiaries to perform difficult manual labor with aid agencies to qualify for disbursements of food or cash. Accordingly, participants in these programs figure themselves workers and not the passive recipients of charity, and in both places, we find that participants critique the inadequacy of the wages for their work. Beneficiaries who work for aid are therefore what we call “beneficiary-workers:” they work within the aid industry, but are neither officially employed nor adequately compensated for their labor. Further, these beneficiary-workers are alienated both from the benefits of their labor and the means of designing or leading the aid programs on which they depend. Aid that requires beneficiary-workers’ labor is therefore not fundamentally designed to alleviate poverty or spur economic development; it is instead designed to discipline the poor and to valorize and justify the aid organizations that delimit their labor. By revealing the effects of food-for-work and cash-for-work project in these two places, and by highlighting the critiques of work-for-aid projects leveled by participants themselves, this analysis questions the ethics and appropriateness of food-for-work and cash-for-work projects.

Suggested Citation

  • Carruth, Lauren & Freeman, Scott, 2021. "Aid or exploitation?: Food-for-work, cash-for-work, and the production of “beneficiary-workers” in Ethiopia and Haiti," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:140:y:2021:i:c:s0305750x20304101
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105283
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Little, Peter D., 2008. "Food Aid Dependency in Northeastern Ethiopia: Myth or Reality?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(5), pages 860-874, May.
    2. Freeman, Scott & Schuller, Mark, 2020. "Aid projects: The effects of commodification and exchange," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    3. Krause, Monika, 2014. "The Good Project," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226131221, August.
    4. Christopher Clapham, 2018. "The Ethiopian developmental state," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(6), pages 1151-1165, June.
    5. Bethelhem Debela & Gerald Shively & Stein Holden, 2015. "Does Ethiopia’s Productive Safety Net Program improve child nutrition?," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 7(6), pages 1273-1289, December.
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