Two recent opinion articles in Al Jazeera America explore two aspects of aid to the African continent, one potentially the flip side of the other.
The first, “When NGOs attack!“ by Sindre Olav Edland-Gryt, examines a number of recent satirical campaigns and websites that skewer the aid industry and its often paternalistic assumptions.
“The white tourist’s burden“ by Rafia Zakaria, on the other hand, takes up voluntourism – altruistic vacations that allow “wealthy Westerners [to] do a little good, experience something that their affluent lives do not offer, and … have a story to tell that places them in the ranks of the kindhearted and worldly wise.”