Beyond Good Intentions
A Journey into the Realities of International Aid
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
Young and idealistic, Tori Hogan travels to Kenya as an intern for Save the Children, intent upon doing her part to improve the lives of refugees. But the cynicism of a young African boy changes Tori’s life and sets her on a course to reconsider everything she thought she knew about helping those in need.
Years later, Tori returns to Africa and embarks on a journey through Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda, searching for the truth about what does and does not work in international aid. While there are glimmers of hope along the way, she discovers an aid industry mired in waste, ineffective solutions imposed by well-intentioned outsiders, and humanitarian efforts that do more harm than good.
Beyond Good Intentions is both a moving story of one woman’s personal journey and an urgent call to arms to change the way we offer aid overseas. Tori’s candid reflections on international aid shine a light on our ability to improve the lives of others, often in ways we would never expect.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This latest incarnation of Hogan's Beyond Good Intentions project, which investigates systemic problems in international aid, takes the form of a travel memoir tracing her search for a young Somali refugee whose honest words about the failure of humanitarian groups eight years earlier had sparked her interest in aid reform. Although depressingly little else has changed at the muddy U.N.-run camp she revisits, Hogan doesn't find the boy she's looking for, but she continues on through Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda, visiting hospitals, orphanages, agricultural education projects, and textile factories. Hogan, who has spent most of her career analyzing problems in the aid system, believes that it might be more inspiring to find solutions. In some of the places she visits, the results are disappointing: aid recipients are denied dignity; handouts eat away at their self-sufficiency; jobs are funneled to expatriates instead of locals; resources are wasted. However, Hogan manages to uncover a few projects that have taken root in local communities, such as a booming microfinance center in Uganda launched by just a few locals trained as "change agents." Though Hogan's insights into the dark side of international aid are eye-opening for those unfamiliar with this world, the book suffers from a fixation on her tumultuous romance with a Dutch traveler named Mark, its simple prose waxing unsophisticated as Hogan moons over how "cute" her "soul mate" is.
