Charles London

Recent Activity

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  Charles commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  Humanitarian Advertising vs. Disaster Porn: How Far Is Too Far?

  brutal, indeed.

  
  

  Powerful and troubling. Africa becomes a shack to send money because we hear a child we can't see screaming? I am upset on many levels, and reaching for my wallet.

  
  

  Interesting also that Africa is never mentioned.

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  Charles commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  Predictions of Three Coming Humanitarian Crises

  i tried to link to him, but, as you see, i had some technical problems. Here he is at the TED conference predicting that Iran won't get the bomb. http://www.ted.com/talks/bruce_bueno_de_mesquita_predicts_iran_s_future.html

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  Charles commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  Predictions of Three Coming Humanitarian Crises

  Interesting to see the role Climate Change plays in all of these crises. Food insecurity and Drought are Thing One and Thing Two in this region, jumping out of their box and trashing the house.

  
  

  As for preseason predictions, perhaps the humanitarian community should hire Bruce Bueno de Mesquita.

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  Charles commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  Predictions of Three Coming Humanitarian Crises

  Interesting to see the role Climate Change plays in all of these crises. Food insecurity and drought are Bruce Bueno de Mesquita.

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  I Will Not Criticize Nicholas Kristof

  Check out the link in my first comment to the Marketing Report. It basically says that pictures of children's facing showing emotion are more successful in fundraising drives. And providing emergency aid costs money...so it raises that spectre of exploitation...are we exploiting a child by using his suffering to raise money? If so, is it a necessary evil?

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  I Will Not Criticize Nicholas Kristof

  I hear you, and I have actually always been inclined to like Kristof, since he was writing about Congo and about Sudan long before anyone else in MSM was paying attention. BUT, in the column referenced above, he makes criticisms that are needlessly insulting to aid workers, without offering anything new. As for hope-Botswana, Ghana, pieces of of Uganda, over half of the Congo-all areas that are working on peace, reconciliation and economic growth. And there are a lot of articles out there about that. The coverage of Obama's Ghana speech highlights some if this stuff, you google it.

  
  

  And your idea about focusing on future potential is great, though it doesn't seem to be what Kristoff is suggesting in his column. I guess my objection here is that I don't know what he is suggesting, other than that "do gooders" aren't all that good at doing what they do.

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  I Will Not Criticize Nicholas Kristof

   Ok, while some of his points are valid (people are more inclined to give to a specific person they can see; collective guilt does erode a sense of personal responsibility), the column itself is drivel hiding behind quotes from Peter Singer. The interesting points are Singer's, who has made them quite well in his book, in his 2006 NYTimes Magazine Essay (What Should a Billionaire Give) and his 1971 paper,"Famine, Affluence, and Morality." I'm just not sure why Kristoff wrote this column other than to hurl tired insults at aid workers for not being good at marketing and because he's contracted to write columns.

  
  

  To some of his specific points: Yes, emphasizing successes is great--people and organizations already do that.

  
  

  "Do-gooders also have a penchant for exaggeration, so that the public often has more trust in the effectiveness of toothpaste than of humanitarian aid." I don't know where he's getting this from. Is there a poll out there comparing Oxfam and the IRC to Crest and Colgate? Exaggeration? Aid workers raise desperate funds to avert a crisis they see coming. If that crisis doesn't occur, that's a success. It's not crying wolf if it's your cries that keep that wolf away. Whether or not aid actually prevents these disasters is another debate, but not the one he seems to be having. He just wants to spit in the eye of the humanitarian community, and not, it seems, in an original way. There are plenty of Is Aid Effective columns and blogs out there. Why not add to that arugment if you want to stir the pot? I just don't get what point he's making of any substance. Humanitarian Aid needs better marketing? Thanks for the insight.

  
  

  "Do-gooders" the world over never would have come up with that on their own. I gotta go call all my do-gooder friends on my (red)phone now. Maybe they'll put down that issue of the Journal of Marketing research that describes effective charity fundraising stragies (http://www.marketingpower.com/ResourceLibrary/Documents/JMRForthcoming/Face_of_Need.pdf), ditch that star-studded fund-raising poker tournament for Darfur http://www.anteupforafrica.org/ and read Nick's column so they can learn about marketing! There's so much he has to teach!

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Wednesday Award for the Worst Place in the World

  I feel like Dadaab was having these problems when I was in the region in 2003. In Kakuma, everyone spoke with horror about Dadaab.

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  What Right Do We Have to Advocate on Darfur - Part 2

  Well said, Paul.

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  Charles commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  What Right Do We Have to Advocate on Darfur - Part 1

  Perhaps an essential phase in developing advocacy and intervention plans in any community is to first understand the norms of that community (I assume this usually does not happen, for example, who knows how thick a stick it is acceptible to beat your wife with in Dinka culture? answer:no thicker than  man's thumb.), and then developing policy from there.
  We can oppose the abuse of women and girls, or pre-pubescent marriage, or anything else we believe is 'bad' as long as we acknowledge that we are not basing this on some universal idea, but on our conception of the good. Then it falls to us to make the case that not marrying a 12 year old to a 72 year old is no good, or that beating anyone with any size stick isn't good either, but it is far more respectful than arguing that a culture is flying in the face of universal values and they just don't know it. We have to acknowledge in human rights discourse that we are not defining universal rights, but prescribing rights we intend to pursue with the various forms of power at our disposal. We have basic beliefs in the dignity of the individual, and we are going to try to spread them. Others have other beliefs. We must listen and learn about these beliefs, accomodate when we can. But we won't always be able to. And this is where power, dangerously, comes in. I like your recommendation for CAUTION. In the end, caution is the only foolproof policy.