Haiti: An Ethnographic Study of the Effects of International Aid on Haitian Life

Haiti has seen an increasing number of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and intergovernmental organisations (IGOs) providing structural and emergency aid in times of con ict and natural disasters (Laillet, 2020). This was intensi ed in 2010 when Haiti regained international attention from a ravaging earthquake that shook its core. This ethnographic study analyses the effects of NGOs and IGOs a decade after this natural disaster. We attempt to venture beyond the statistical evidence grounding most analyses provided by NGOs and IGOs to reveal perspectives from individual Haitians who have been impacted by the policies and decisions of these organisations. In doing so, we examine the local standard of living, the infrastructure and the social dynamics through four in-person interviews conducted in their respective geographic locations. These interviews set a basis for a discussion and examination of organisations’ allocation, dependency on the organisation and the sustainability of an action once an organisation has decreased its input. The voices of local Haitians reveal that the profound yet subtle impacts under-represented in narratives are crucial to understanding the day-to-day challenges faced despite foreign aid. We conclude that Haitians face a stasis of social mobility, despite the copious work done by aid organisations that is often inconsistent and misaligned with the needs of Haitians.


Introduction
In times of crisis, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and intergovernmental organisations (IGOs) are a critical foundation for relief efforts. For Haiti -a Caribbean country with an intricate past -NGOs and IGOs have played a key role in the nation's recent history. Before the 2010 earthquake, the UN conservatively estimated that there were already up to 10,000 NGOs established in the country (Edmonds, 2013: 2), earning the country the moniker the 'Republic of NGOs' (Farmer, 2011: 4). Since then, the number of organisations has surged -particularly following the 2010 earthquake, which killed an estimated 220,000 people and displaced another 1.5 million (UN Peacekeeping, 2018). Although considered 'the worst national disaster in the history of the Western hemisphere' (Birrell, 2012), this event gave Haiti the rare opportunity to rebuild and transform itself. The impressive international response to the earthquake saw over $2 billion donated to charities and another $6 billion pledged by governments and institutions (Birrell, 2012). However, despite the expectations from international bodies and Haitians alike that organisations would provide relief and stability for Haiti, the presence of NGOs and IGOs has instead aggravated violence, sexual assault and wealth disparity within the nation (Beeton, 2012). Following the earthquake, 'the dysfunctional system of humanitarian aid … good intentions aside, has become another obstacle to Haiti's recovery and sovereignty' (Farmer, 2011: 4).
Haiti remains in stasis, seemingly unable to escape from the rubble it found itself in a decade ago. This incongruity between expectation and reality of foreign intervention highlights the severe effects that organisations have had on Haitian life.

Historical context
Throughout the late twentieth century, when Haiti's leadership changed frequentlyin part by the hand of US interventions -political and social life was left unstable and vulnerable. Consequently, Haitian agricultural industries -the cornerstone of the Haitian economy -were unsupported by the government and became especially vulnerable to foreign actors. When the incumbent president-deemed-dictator Jean Claude 'Baby Doc' Duvalier was exiled and replaced by General Henri Namphy's military rule, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) pressured Namphy to cut rice tariffs that protected the local agricultural industry. The competition between foreign imports with heavy subsidies and local produce hindered local farmers, resulting in a signi cant diminishment of the agricultural workforce as they moved to cities in search of income (Kushner, 2012).
This large in ux of a formally rural population, coupled with unemployment and Haiti's political instability, led to the coup d'état of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004.
However, given the copious resources in Haiti owned by the American government and nationals, instability in Haiti was unacceptable for US interests. This instigated the intervention of the UN Peacekeeping Force in Haiti, (MINUSTAH) under the premise of maintaining peace and security, which was later dissolved and replaced with the United Nations Mission for Justice Support in Haiti (MINUJUSTH) in 2018 (United Nations Security Council, 2018). Before Haiti had a chance to salvage its economy and restructure its leadership, the 2010 7.0 magnitude earthquake devastated the country.
Instability within the Haitian government, coupled with a lack of agricultural produce, rendered the nation unsustainable on its own and perpetuated recurring international intervention (Panchang, 2016).

Rationale for foreign intervention
Although the Haitian government is arguably more stable and structured now compared to 2004, internal corruption remains (Moreno et al., 2012). Haiti additionally continues to be confronted by challenges, including over-population in the capital, Port-au-Prince, and violence incited by urban poverty and high unemployment (Congressional Research Service 2020; Justesen and Verner 2007;Marcelin, 2015). Although foreign governments are often a prominent source of funding for aid organisations, many nd developing governments such as Haiti's to be frequently corrupt. As such, the funds pledged to aid the people rarely end up in the hands of those who need it; instead, they were never delivered, mismanaged by foreign organisations or used by government of cials for extravagant lifestyles disproportionate to the commonwealth (Moreno et al., 2012). With the redirection of funding towards aid organisations, there lacks a united coordination to direct funding and aid towards priority areas requested by local need (Laillet, 2020).
Following the earthquake, large foreign aid organisations provided immediate relief to locals in the form of emergency aid such as food, water and shelter. For the purposes of this paper, the term 'foreign aid' is used to describe the large international humanitarian relief organisations focused on aid in post-disaster (environmental, human, political and other) contexts. Although some of the stated challenges exist in local, grass-roots, bottom-up and structural development organisations and projects, the discussion of these is beyond the scope of this study, given their key features and methods that differentiate them from large international relief NGOs and IGOs. While emergency aid is crucial to survival in times of humanitarian crisis, they are often unsustainable, and their persistence beyond times of crisis creates dependency (Beeton, 2012;Birrell, 2012). The transition from urgent emergency aid to longer-term development, however, has not been clear in Haiti, with many foreign aid organisations persisting beyond the immediate crisis and attempting to take on the role of development organisations and government bodies. This ineffective planning and impractical execution results in minimal development, while also creating new threats to the Haitian people (The Lancet, 2016). Consequently, not only are many foreign aid organisations funded to continue unsustainable aid but also projects that are sustainable fall short of their expectations due to poor planning and management, and a top-down approach that does not recognise and address the needs of the supposed bene ciaries. This revelation within academic communities has led to scholarly research focused on the intent and effects of aid organisations in Haiti.

Intent and effects of aid
Scholars, including Beeton and Panchang, are sceptical of the intent of aid organisations in the country. Haiti has become extremely dependent on international organisations -most notably peacekeeping groups, organisations distributing food and water, and public health groups -as they provide services that its own government cannot (Pilinger et al., 2016). When these organisations depart, they leave behind gaps of basic needs that the government is unequipped to ll. This large dependency on organisations thus creates an unequal power dynamic between the government and aid organisations, allowing the latter to have seemingly free rein in Haiti and ostensibly having the power to execute its own agenda on a foreign state. It is commonly known within local development circles that the large majority of international organisations operating in Haiti are not registered locally, which further limits oversight and cooperation between the government and aid organisations. Beeton (2012) even claims that organisations such as the UN are there for their own gain, pro ting off Haiti's misfortune. Despite MINUSTAH's large budget of $1 billion per year (United Nations Security Council, 2017), most of its resources are spent maintaining its peacekeeping force. Further, money devoted to aid organisations is often not reinvested into the Haitian economy to create jobs and infrastructure.
Instead, resources like MINUSTAH's are often spent hiring foreign staff and importing vehicles to Haiti and projects requiring construction are led by foreign companies with minimum wage jobs given to local Haitians (Panchang, 2016). These socio-economic hierarchies reveal why Haiti is so pro table for aid organisations, as they attempt to bolster their own country's economies (Beeton, 2012).

Limitations of current research
While there are numerous NGOs and IGOs operating in Haiti, research thus far has primarily centred around the ineffective structures and effects of the UN's intervention through observational and statistical analyses (Beeton, 2012;James, 2010;Panchang, 2016;The Lancet, 2006;The Lancet, 2016).
Accurate evidence of the inef cacy of international organisations has been dif cult to attain as language barriers, power dynamics and scholar bias hinder data collection.

Methodology
Data was collected through semi-structured interviews and observational research.
This study was conducted as an ethnography, given the pressing need to add local experiences to the larger discussion of the ef cacy of international aid and to supplement the current statistical data that makes up the majority of current evaluations of Haitian aid. By centring Haitian voices, this study aims to highlight the effects of foreign aid on Haitian life.
Through the contacts and network of a local organisation, Haiti: Hands On, we travelled to different disadvantaged communities in Port-au-Prince and two rural villages, Terre Froide and Jean Jean ( Figure 1). We interviewed community representatives of their own communities and used convenience sampling through contacts in the Haiti: Hands On network. The former is near Fonds-Verrettes and the latter near Léogâne, both of which are located in the south-east and south-west of Port-au-Prince, respectively. In Terre Froide, we interviewed a family and observed them in their daily lives as well as visited two schools and one clinic in surrounding communities. Although participant observation was conducted in Jean Jean, an unexpected community accident prevented us from being able to complete our planned interviews. Our observations and interviews in urban settings centred around the greater Port-au-Prince area, including wealthy areas such as Pétion-Ville and less developed areas such as Canapé Vert and Croix-des-Bouquets. In all, we interviewed a housekeeper in Pétion-Ville, two members of the Terre Froide community and a Haitian NGO worker in Canapé Vert, all ranging in age and gender. All four interviews were conducted in Creole with the presence of a translator and notes transcribed by summary. Our observations included those from different areas and informal conversations exchanged between Haitians, NGO workers and foreign travellers. This study is inkeeping with the American Anthropological Association code of ethics and approved by Haiti: Hands On. Verbal, informed consent for interviews was obtained in Creole.
The interviewees' names were deidenti ed for con dentiality purposes.

Impacts of aid organisations on Haitian Life
Who gets what?
In times of natural disasters and con ict-related emergencies, communities without Despite Hurricane Matthew's ravaging impact on communities such as Jérémie in the south of Haiti, Chedeline does not recall any international aid being offered to her parents' community. She recounted that, after the hurricane, roads connecting to the south of Haiti became inaccessible and hazardous. As a result, aid organisations instead focused on the more easily accessible communities, despite being less impacted. However, since it was paramount for Chedeline to provide safe shelter for her parents regardless of whether aid to Jérémie was available, she not only had to purchase materials to rebuild their house, but also pay for transportation to move materials from the capital to their community. This situation indicates a discrepancy of aid distribution based on geographic accessibility, regardless of the level of impact.
There are communities in Haiti that have been aided by NGOs in times of humanitarian crisis. In Terre Froide, a rural community in the east, we interviewed Emmanuel, a farmer who has lived in the community since 1984. He recounted the times his community was af icted by natural disasters. In times of drought, like the spell from 2011 to 2015, an NGO came to their aid and occasionally -yet inconsistently -provided water for their crops and animals. Even though Terre Froide did receive aid, its erratic delivery did not provide the community with the resources to recover fully.
The issues presented by Chedeline and Emmanuel highlight the lack of consistent aid outside the capital, where many aid organisations have been concentrated since 2010 (Beeton, 2012). The vast presence of aid and funding within Haiti should suggest that aid should arrive in places of need at a duly time, thus highlighting problems lying not in resources or funding, but in the delivery of aid. However, many NGOs and IGOs present in Haiti are developmental and have limited capacity for providing emergency aid to communities in times of crisis. That being said, the uncertain presence of such aid in communities beyond the capital remains concerning for emergency or developmental aid.
Food, shelter and water are basic necessities. In Chedeline's case, the dangerous roads, which were damaged by the hurricane, did not impede her from nding a way to provide these necessities for her parents. The irony is that the work promised by aid organisations -the entire reason they are in Haiti in the rst place -often falls in the hands of already vulnerable family members who are placed in even more precarious situations by virtue of helping. This highlights the false promises made to Haitians by these organisations by their very presence in the country. As many such crises result in the loss of life, or leave even those with comparative means, like Chedeline, unable to support their families, the reliance on immediate or extended family thus becomes impossible.
This failure by organisations to provide aid to Jérémie, despite their signi cant funding, underlines The Lancet Global Health's criticism (2016) on the ineffectiveness of aid organisations in providing Haitians with adequate and timely support during humanitarian crises. However, this disparity of aid not only suggests that NGOs decide aid based on a community's accessibility, but also implies that the intent of certain aid organisations may be to provide aid that is most economical and ef cient for the organisation. This further corroborates Beeton's suggestion that these international organisations are using funds to further their own organisational and national economies (Beeton, 2012), and they are sustaining their presence by selectively choosing economical and accessible communities to show donors that they are, in fact, doing meaningful work in Haiti.

Transience of aid
Although aid organisations have been present in Terre Froide, Emmanuel noted that most would be inconsistent and would never stay for long periods of time for continued support of the issues they faced. While aid organisations have supplied water for farmers like Emmanuel in times of drought, it takes upwards of a decade for these rivers to return to their original ability to provide water to entire communities.
However, as soon as rainfall restarted in 2015, the organisations previously providing support with water access discontinued their aid. As a result, Emmanuel's family now has to travel about 1 hour by foot in order to nd suf cient water for their crops.
Kervens, another member of the Terre Froide community, echoes this sentiment by describing the times in which the NGOs working in neighbouring regions would spontaneously appear and disappear over the span of two to three years. A health clinic 30 minutes away from Terre Froide that was once opened by the UN, and provided healthcare for the surrounding communities, was operational for three years until it closed. We got in touch with the mayor there and travelled to the closed health clinic to nd the building still operational, but no longer run by the UN. Instead, a small NGO uses this clinic as a malnutrition centre to distribute dietary supplements for malnourished children. The mayor explained that the clinic -originally staffed by doctors and nurses who provided care to the area -closed due to a re-prioritisation of funding. Now, people have to travel an hour by car to get health care, something that is not accessible for most families in Terre Froide. These trends that depict the scarcity and inconsistencies of international aid are discussed in the research of Beeton (2012) show that it is not only the ineffective bureaucracy but also the focus on providing statistical representation that reduces and categorises aid's impact on Haitians. This results in false hope, complacency and dependency that ultimately harms Haitians in their ability to escape the daily challenges that persist beyond the initial impact of the crisis. Little has been done regarding improving the quality of aid by large foreign organisations, some of which are implicated through the interactions with interviewees.

Dependency
The dependency on foreign organisations for basic necessities -such as Doctors Without Borders and Partners in Health for free emergency healthcare -explains why the government has so little control over aid organisation work within Haiti.
Organisations consequently are able to perpetuate systems of high-quantity, lowquality projects to Haitians. Like the government's dependency on aid organisations to provide basic services, communities have often developed a similar dependency.
Furthermore, the act of foreign intervention often shapes a Haitian image of foreigners, namely of the French, Americans and Canadians, as one rooted in aid.
Coupled with the sole appearance of foreigners in the context of providing aid to the community, Haitians in rural communities often associate foreigners with help and thus expect it from those that interact with them. The negative experiences with aid described throughout this piece, coupled with the country's historical legacy of foreign colonisation, exploitation and violence by France, the United States and Western bodies such as the IMF have commonly, and understandably, resulted in a deeply rooted distrust towards foreigners and their intentions.
The manipulation of research through falsi ed accounts of Haitians who were sexually assaulted, as proposed by James's research, helps clarify the effects of continual interaction with foreigners under the context of aid and disproportionate power dynamics that result in misreporting of narratives (James, 2010). The Haitians interviewed for this study were aware of the actions needed to gain sympathy and support from foreigners. When projects fail and aid workers leave, it not only leaves behind empty buildings, disappointment and broken promises, but also perpetuates a distrust between communities and foreigners. This repetitious cycle of aid groups providing ineffective aid thus drives Haitians to make the most out of the duration of the project. While some Haitians are able to bene t in doing so, they are still unable to escape from the grasp of poor aid.

Sustainable aid through education
Given these pitfalls of international aid, certain local grass-roots projects like Robenson's and smaller bottom-up foreign organisations, have effectively addressed community needs through a community-based, bottom-up approach that centres the voices of those most affected by systemic issues. However, Robenson recounted that it is hard to nd both people willing to work for small NGOs and donors willing to fund small projects without the same recognition as large foreign organisations.
The consistent failure of large international NGOs in Haiti over the course of a decade may explain why Chedeline, Emmanuel and Kervens -living in both urban and rural communities -state that they perceive little to nothing having changed within Haiti since the in ux of aid organisations after the earthquake. Instead, they have emphasised trying to only rely on themselves and their own communities since aid is often transient and ineffective when most needed. This realisation has instigated a call for change in status quo, with education as a possible vehicle.

Why education?
All interviewees expressed that education is key to improving their own lives and Haiti's social discourse. Emmanuel, who works as a farmer and seamster, repeatedly emphasised that he does not want his children to follow in his footsteps. As a rural farmer, he is not only dependent on the climate of Haiti to nourish his crops but also on an economy that has consistently disadvantaged him. Emmanuel hopes his children will be able to escape this system that continues to deprive him by becoming doctors and teachers. He insinuated that he wants stability for his children, as well as safety from their being marginalised, and that their education could achieve that.
When asked what it meant to be Haitian, his immediate response was the importance of education and perseverance. Since education is not free in Haiti, families have to pay exorbitant prices in order to educate all of their children (Beeton, 2012). In fact, the World Bank estimates that 80 per cent of schools in Haiti are privately owned or run by churches or NGOs (The World Bank, 2017). In Emmanuel's case, he has to pay for seven children to attend school. He hopes to send at least one of his children to university.
Chedeline's experiences have also taught her the importance of education. Growing up in Jérémie, she found that women did not have much choice other than to work in the elds and have a family. Instead, she aspired to be her own boss and create her own company. When she moved to Port-au-Prince in search of opportunities, however, she found that her primary education from Jérémie made it hard for her to nd jobs and opportunities that supported her aspirations. As a result, she went to culinary school and became a private chef and housekeeper for a wealthy Haitian-American family in Pétion-Ville. In retrospect, Chedeline wishes her parents understood the importance of breaking from this expected norm through education. People seemed to be discontented by the constant challenges they face in rural areas and, in response, seek means of escaping existing conditions through pathways of education and migration to a major city.
However, Kervens, a college student from Terre Froide studying political science and education in the capital observes large differences in the values held between urban and rural areas. Living in Port-au-Prince, he sees that his peers had a wide variety of dreams and aspirations, whereas in Terre Froide, dreams are more gender-speci c: boys aspire to be drivers (stemming from a desired social mobility beyond less glori ed agricultural work) while girls follow a de ned path of having a family.
When people in both rural and urban communities face adversity, they have looked towards means of sustainability to support their aspirations, particularly in independently shaping their own future rather than relying on outsiders. It has become a consensus that education can provide not only a better standard of living and opportunities but also a more self-reliant future for Haitians as a collective.
However, while people in both urban and rural communities have agreed on the importance of education, its effects vary between communities. We hypothesise that Robenson attributes this phenomenon to the idea of self-interest as a protective mechanism, still existing after a major disaster in Haiti. In Robenson's view, this re ex to care solely for individual shapes a social phenomenon manifested in competition and distrust, even after a disaster has passed. These sentiments, although compounded by natural disasters and recent crises, have historical roots in communal distrust during colonisation and dictatorship. Robenson supposes Haitians have adopted a headstrong, distrustful mentality to protect themselves from further exploitation. While this mentality is understandable and useful in times of extenuating circumstances, it prevents negotiation and understanding between groups. It also accentuates the underlying circumstantial rifts that continually in uence meaningful partnerships between Haitians and aid organisations.
In the end, when asked what it meant to be Haitian, most interviewees responded with some paradoxical combination of resilience, perseverance, individuality and community.

Limitations
Although this ethnography provides insights of the effects into foreign aid on Haitian life, its interview sample size remains limited. Interview participants were additionally recruited through Haiti Hands On's network in their partner communities. Due to these factors, observations made in both rural and urban communities may thus be unrepresentative of the status quo. Observations made during participant observation in these communities in Haiti may also be biased, given the research team being foreigners, despite speaking uent Creole. We have attempted to account for these potential limitations by recruiting interviewees in communities that have a longstanding and trusting relationship with Haiti Hands On as it allowed for a more candid dialogue about foreign intervention with the interviewers, despite their own positionality. That being said, the circulation of narratives involving suffering beyond fellow Haitians can cause areas of bias and misrepresentation beyond groups represented by our interviewees.

Conclusion
While this ethnography has corroborated the predominant research on the inef ciencies of international organisations in Haiti, little to no scholarly work had been done to seek out the voices of Haitians a decade after Haiti's devastating earthquake of 2010. This ethnography highlights the voices underpinning the deep-seated desires of Haitians to be independent of foreign aid and the strong resilience of Haitians for family and community.
Haiti has a rich history that portrays strength in the face of all kinds of adversity, although this narrative is often excluded from mainstream accounts of the country.
Instead, Haiti is portrayed as a country rampant with people unable to help themselves. This has shaped a donor culture that further perpetuates a super cial interpretation of impact within aid organisations. In turn, this image has trickled down to affect the Haitians that aid organisations are serving, resulting in an inef cient use of aid, preservation of exploitative power dynamics and change in attitude towards foreigners. This reality further perpetuates a continued in ux of aid that has been present in Haiti for over a decade. Particularly given the growing global instability a decade after the 2010 earthquake, there is an increased need for effective development. By redirecting aid efforts and placing Haitian voices at the centre of their approach, Haiti may nally independently and sustainably tackle its challenges in the next decade.