Defining Community Development as Task and Process
Community development is defined as a process where people come together to take actions so that solutions are generated for common problems. Community development comprises both, task and process. The task is the social change so that equality, justice and human rights can be achieved (Green & Haines, 2015). The process is the application of the principles of participation, empowerment and collective decision making in a structured and co-ordinated way. The purpose of the development of the community is to give justice, equality and respect to all the people, irrespective race, caste, creed, gender and so on. It involves the change in the relationship between the ordinary people and the people beholding power. The basis of community development thus is the social, political, racial and gender equality, mutual respect and justice (Phillips & Stein, 2011). Thus, if the above are met a community develops and becomes prosperous. International aid project helps in the program of community development. International aid is any form of needed assistance like money, goods and services given by the government of one country to another or by multilateral institutions such as the World Bank and IMF to help different countries. International aid project is official development assistance that promotes public welfare and reduction of poverty (Hermano et al., 2013).
The United State Agency for International Development (USAID) is an aid project, founded by John F. Kennedy on 3rd November 1961, headquartered at Washington D.C., United States. Its motto is “From the American people”. USAID guides international development and humanitarian efforts so that it can reduce poverty, save lives, strengthen democratic governance also help people to progress and be successful. It allows people from any corner of the world to overcome their problems and be prosperous (Faust, Grävingholt & Ziaja, 2013). The international aid project helps in the development of an individual, which result in the development of the community as a whole — the aid project assists in the success and prosperity of a community.
The government of a country does not always meet the mentioned principles of community development; it requires help from the other programs in the form of monetary funds or good and service assistance. International aid projects like the USAID can provide this. It helps individuals, families, communities and countries by giving monetary funds, goods or any other kind of services that it requires so that they can develop and be prosperous. They help people worldwide irrespective of gender, colour, race, ethnic background and so on. They provide aid to the developing and the underdeveloped countries so that they can thrive and be prosperous (Mkandawire, Kayembe & Katombosola, 2019). They offer monetary grants to those countries, which are affected by any epidemic disease, natural disaster and even terrorism. They provide education to decrease the rate of illiteracy. USAID helps in the development of an individual and thus the development of the community as a whole.
Role of International Aid Project in Community Development
There are different types of discrimination among people all over the world. The political inequality is a form of power inequality; it is the difference in the influence over the decisions that are made by the governmental bodies. Political bias is similar to the income inequality in several ways, which in turn is also the basis of social inequality. The social difference is not only based on the income of an individual or a family, but also the gender, race, and ethnic background. Women around the world are victims of abuse, violence and discrimination. Within the villages of Africa, genital mutilation of a female from the age of 2 years is practised, violence against women and the violation of the human rights (Yoder, Wang & Johansen, 2013). Women have to fight for equal pay, for the right to vote, for having prestigious jobs and equal status in the society as the men where they live. People face discrimination due to the difference in their ethnic background, like the Aboriginal and the Torres Strait Islander people of Australia, the native inhabitants are the victims of discrimination. They have less access to education, health care services and so on as compared to the other inhabitants of Australia. Thus, they have several health issues like high mortality rate among both the infants and adults, death due to the curable diseases. Racism is another form of discrimination due to the difference in the skin colour of the people. Often people with dark skin colour are discriminated by the people of white skin colour. This results in stress among the people who are distinguished and thus suffers several issues like lack of sleep, anxiety, cardiovascular diseases. The discriminations mentioned above are the causes due to which a community lacks in its development. These issues should be sorted out so that the development of the population is not hampered.
International aid project like the USAID takes into account these issues and works on it to sort out the problems, which is beneficial for the community. The USAID project helps Pakistan, Afghanistan, Africa, Asia, Europe and Eurasia, Latin America and the Caribbean and Middle Eastern countries. It gives not just access to food to the people but also food security that is having both physical and economic access to the food to lead a healthy life, which is productive. It provides food and other necessary services to the countries, which had faced any natural calamity. USAID provides children and youth education, and the most vulnerable and marginalised individuals have more access to quality education. By this, they gain skills, which are required to obtain employment, lead productive lives and contribute to the society n a positive manner. As a result, 6.8 million children, among which 49% is female, and 51% is male are provided with early grade reading instructions, 22.6 million children who live in the conflict and crisis areas are equipped with education, who might have dropped out of school. The project also helps people to acquire knowledge about how to maintain and get benefitted from the natural resources like forest and water bodies, on which every individual depends upon (“What We Do”, 2019).
Types of Discrimination in Society
The aid project gives equal opportunity to all the underprivileged individuals without any biasness. This results in the development of all the individuals and so a community. In many countries, the government is very weak and corrupt; it does nothing for the welfare of its underprivileged people; the aid project helps these people in fighting for their rights and welfare. So if this project discriminates people on any basis, it would not be a humanitarian project but one which has its benefits and sees the profit. Thus USAID, helps people without discriminating people on the basis of their sexual orientation, race, ethnic background, skin colour and so on, due to which all the victimised individuals get benefitted (Hoang & Oosterhoff, 2016).
The people who aid the victims too face some problems while providing the services (Korff et al., 2015). They face the challenge of security, though humanitarian in nature they are not spared by the armed forces. They lack transportation infrastructure too. The roads are poorly maintained, bridges are not in usable form, transportation between cities are not well maintained. The aid workers travel in convoys. They lack respect amongst people, so they are even attacked. The workers also face internal threats like sexual violence from other aid workers. The time, money and skills are also constraints of the aid project. To handle conflicted areas, one needs to be skilled well so that they can manage more people efficiently in a short period of time, also with less financial help. The aid workers should encourage the people to come forward to be benefitted from the service and also to help others get benefitted from it. (Knight & Gitterman, 2013)
Some of the problems and limitations of the aid workers can be overcome by positive collaboration and cooperation (Namakula & Witter, 2014). Several policies have been initiated to determine and manage risks like inter-agency guidelines on gender and community-based approaches; investment in common and more comprehensive needs assessments based on risk-oriented approaches. By building knowledge about coping strategies among the aid workers, it will enable them to manage and cope up with risks and the stress (Young, Pakenham & Norwood, 2018).
Thus to conclude, it can be said that international aid projects help to develop an individual, which results in the development of the community and the country as a whole. These projects provide the deprived ones with education, skills, food, shelter, clothes and many other basic needs that are required to lead a healthy and prosperous life. The individuals with the help of these projects incur in themselves knowledge, skills courage and confidence to do jobs so that they can be live a healthy independent life. This way these international aid projects helps a community to develop. Though the aid workers face many challenges doing this humanitarian job, there is an increase in this type of projects and people willing to join these programs to support it and make the projects successful.
References
Faust, J., Grävingholt, J., & Ziaja, S. (2013). Foreign aid and the fragile consensus on state fragility. Journal Of International Relations And Development, 18(4), 407-427. doi: 10.1057/jird.2013.23
Green, G., & Haines, A. (2015). Asset building & community development. (4th ed., pp. 1- 10). Sage.
Hermano, V., López-Paredes, A., Martín-Cruz, N., & Pajares, J. (2013). How to manage international development (ID) projects successfully. Is the PMD Pro1 Guide going to the right direction?. International Journal Of Project Management, 31(1), 22-30. doi: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2012.07.004
Hoang, T. A., & Oosterhoff, P. (2016). Transgender at Work: Livelihoods for Transgender People in Vietnam (No. IDS Evidence Report; 167). IDS.
Knight, C., & Gitterman, A. (2013). Group Work with Bereaved Individuals: The Power of Mutual Aid. Social Work, 59(1), 5-12. doi: 10.1093/sw/swt050
Korff, V., Balbo, N., Mills, M., Heyse, L., & Wittek, R. (2015). The impact of humanitarian context conditions and individual characteristics on aid worker retention. Disasters, 39(3), 522-545. doi: 10.1111/disa.12119
Mkandawire, M. T., Kayembe, A. E., & Katombosola, B. (2016). Does development aid help poor countries to develop? a critical analysis of Africa’s situation. American Scientific Research Journal for Engineering, Technology, and Sciences (ASRJETS), 26(2), 53-66.
Namakula, J., & Witter, S. (2014). Living through conflict and post-conflict: experiences of health workers in northern Uganda and lessons for people-centred health systems. Health Policy And Planning, 29(suppl_2), ii6-ii14. doi: 10.1093/heapol/czu022
Phillips, R., & Stein, J. (2011). An Indicator Framework for Linking Historic Preservation and Community Economic Development. Social Indicators Research, 113(1), 1-15. doi: 10.1007/s11205-011-9833-6
What We Do. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.usaid.gov/what-we-do
Yoder, P., Wang, S., & Johansen, E. (2013). Estimates of Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting in 27 African Countries and Yemen. Studies In Family Planning, 44(2), 189-204. doi: 10.1111/j.1728-4465.2013.00352.x
Young, T., Pakenham, K., & Norwood, M. (2018). Thematic analysis of aid workers’ stressors and coping strategies: work, psychological, lifestyle and social dimensions. Journal Of International Humanitarian Action, 3(1). doi: 10.1186/s41018-018-0046-3
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