Aidnography

We as academics and bloggers often criticise small projects, organisations or individual initiatives. But one of the unique strategic skills that only people in large aid organisation seem to posses is thinking in big numbers: The EU wants to spend 239 million Euros (about US$ 312 million) on 10,000 humanitarian volunteers that will be sent to the field from 2014 to 2020 'to volunteer worldwide in humanitarian operations'. Why? Because the project is 'meeting the need for humanitarian volunteers' as the promotional video explains. Finally, all these desperate claims of local communities affected by humanitarian catastrophes to please, please send European volunteers will find an open ear; also, after long and successful lobbying work, 10,000 young Europeans, many potentially affected by under- or unemployment in their home countries will be able to work for little money volunteer (I could not find details about how much they get paid) alongside proper EU experts that

Hello all, A nice selection of good reads found its way on this week's list: We start with three contributions on capitalism and development: The pitfalls of the 'Green Economy', privatising entire cities in Honduras & outsourcing jobs to Kenya; but the second part features more uplifting, even entertaining material before the third parts wraps up with some interesting career-related resources. Also, do check out the 'Academia' section on classroom disruptions and the GUARDIAN's development studies reading list! Enjoy! Development The Dark Side of the “Green Economy” One concern is that this new green economy is a form of “disaster capitalism”—a global effort to put the “services” of nature into the same hands that caused the global financial meltdown. And that seems like a very, very bad idea. Increasingly, the evidence on the ground bears this out. The reforestation plan in Mozambique has peasant farmers planting industrial monocultures of African palm

Hello all, In addition to two new blog posts quite a few interesting stories ended up on my link list this week. From great collections of resources for studying/reading development to immersions, everyday lives of aidworkers, networked organisations and some other links that made me wonder in the end whether I am/we are a bit self-absorbed sometimes in development land ;)! Anyway... Enjoy, share and be happy! New on aidnography Reflections on #virtualapsa & using HangOut for academic events Last week, a core group of participants of the original APSA panel 40-3 'Issues of and responses to Internet governance' decided to take advantage of modern technology and try out a virtual panel via Google Hangouts. (...) I just want to take the opportunity and share a few technological, practical and academic reflections on the event. The role of graduate studies in the 'flawed development system'- a reply to Karen Attiah As development students submit their theses and finish

As development students submit their theses and finish their programs, Karen Attiah’s post ‘ Who Gets to Criticize the International Aid System? Not Grad Students, Apparently ’ is an interesting reminder about some of the core challenges that many new graduates are likely to face in the coming months. There has already been a debate on Karen’s initial post on AidSource last year, but I want to take the opportunity to share some thoughts on what Karen describes as her ‘original intent’ of her post: The original intent of my first post was, “What role does academia and our pre-profressional schools play in this flawed system that we have?” (...) I would love to hear from “J” and those inside and outside of AidSource on how our schools are doing, preparing people for the world of international development, and how graduate programs could better prepare students for that life, or even further yet, how academia can improve the international development system as a whole. I want to a

Last week, a core group of participants of the original APSA panel 40-3 'Issues of and responses to Internet governance' decided to take advantage of modern technology and try out a virtual panel via Google Hangouts . We also broadcasted and recorded the HangOut on YouTube : Also, make sure to check out Luke Perez' blog for more presentations from #virtualapsa ! I just want to take the opportunity and share a few technological, practical and academic reflections on the event. First, I am definitely not suggesting that virtual meetings are a panacea or ‘the future’ for academic conferences, but getting 6 people from 3 countries, 2 continents and 4 different States in the US online at the same time was pretty amazing. Second, for core academic exchanges, i.e. presenting research, talking to colleagues about that research and getting feedback on your research virtual meetings like HangOuts are a great start and definitely worth considering if you are planning a smaller

Hello all, As some of the more political science-minded among you have probably noticed, this week's annual meeting of the American Political Science Association (APSA) got cancelled . I wasn't planning to attend in the first place (The Monkey Cage had an interesting discussion about the whole cancel-not cancel/ attend-not attend scenario), but I took the opportunity and suggested a virtual panel via a Google HangOut and it looks like this will be happening tomorrow, Friday 31 August from 12 noon to 1p.m. EST (drop me a line if you are interested to join but I will also tweet details). The original panel 'Issues of and Responses to Internet Governance' will likely be reduced to two nonetheless interesting presentations: JP Singh (Georgetown University) will present 'Representing Power: Participation and Deliberation in ICT4D Projects and Internet Governance' and Daniel Esser (American University) will present a paper he and I co-wrote together: 'Do Socia

Hello all, This week's links feature three highlights: First, do watch Daniela Papi's TED-talk on voluntourism and service learning! Second, have a look at Jennifer Lentfer's interview questions for aid organisations (and why they are great but may not lead to employment...) and third, have another look at this week's education debate on the paradoxes of studying, teaching and working inside and outside academia with a PhD. And if you happen to have a book recommendation on 'development' books that would be great, too! Enjoy! New on aidnography More development (fiction) tales After my review of Disastrous Passion I received a few messages regarding recommendations of books that portray development in a similar way-fictionalised, but not 'invented' stories. I didn't want to think too long and 7 books came to my mind that are in some ways similar to Disastrous Passion even if they are not 'development fiction' in the narrow sense. Some