SHOULD HUMANITARIANISM BE QUESTIONED?

Transcription

1 SHOULD HUMANITARIANISM BE QUESTIONED? Post-earthquake Haiti as a case study Mariana San Martín Introduction Humanitarian aid expanded significantly after the end of the Cold War. 1 In a context of increased levels of foreign assistance, this phenomenon begs analysis, as it helps determine the future of many countries and people and represents a key variable in the logic of the current international system. Humanitarianism appeals to moral purity and impulse to respond to suffering. As a consequence, its defining principles are neutrality, independence, humanity, and impartiality. 2 Though these are attractive ingredients, many are hard to achieve. Independence is especially difficult to achieve when humanitarian activities are tied to donor preferences, as aid organizations require funds to develop and implement those activities. Another key factor that impacts aid organization approaches is the decision-making process. Decisions are taken quickly with the intent of helping more people, which explains why humanitarian aid is often not participatory but rather speaks in the name of the weak and vulnerable. So as to further explore the issue, there are some aspects from humanitarianism that can be questioned, which are highlighted by the scholars Michael Barnett and Thomas Weiss: those related with politics, power, and ethics. These categories encompass the problems that are faced by humanitarians, and are central to the question of humanitarianism and its effectiveness. 1

2 From there, this paper will consider a key aspect that determines humanitarian agencies dynamics, priorities, and actions: the relationship between aid organizations and donors. As Barnett and Weiss establish, the compromises that organization make with states and donors slowly corrode their core values and beliefs. Building on this argument, the paper will examine how conditionalities and donor interest can bias the actions of aid organizations, exploring this process through a case analysis of the earthquake response in Haiti.First, this paper will differentiate between the power, politics, and ethics that underlie humanitarian assistance by establishing two main divisions: the power and politics reflected in actions and donor conditionalities, and the ethics reflected in humanitarianism s legitimizing discourse. Second, it will look at the core conditions that donors put over humanitarian action in Haiti, in particular the political environment. Donors, through the decisions taken at the International donors Conference Towards a New Future for Haiti held in March 2010, and through the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission (IHRC) 3 and the Haiti Reconstruction Fund (HRF) established that they will disburse the substantial reconstruction budget of almost 10 billion dollars only when a specific political environment is established. As the earthquake occurred in the final months of President Rene Preval s mandate, the long-term reconstruction process was supposed to start after the newly-elected government takes office. The availability and use of money pledged by bi-lateral and multi-lateral agencies, international organizations and individuals is subject to guarantees regarding the proper use of funds by the Government of Haiti. At first, this meant waiting until scheduled elections in November 2010, almost a year after the earthquake, however, the long-term reconstruction process will still have to wait for two main reasons; fraud allegations during the November elections and the threat of violence reinforced international concern around political instability impacting the reconstruction process, and the election run-off between the two 2

3 leading candidates, Michel Martelly and Mirlande Manigat, which were carried out on March 20, 2011 to determine who will take office in May. Once these concerns over governance and stability are resolved, the money for long-term reconstruction is expected to be delivered. This focus on the political environment however raises concerns over the priorities of the international community in addressing the immediate needs of the people. The main concern seems not to be those in need of assistance, but rather the prioritization of political factors. Despite how these actions might help Haiti s stabilization over the long-term, they have little to do with the humanitarian provision of basic relief to people, which is typically the domain of international humanitarianism. Aid organizations do not show in their actions an exclusive commitment towards the people they see in need but rather to surrounding variables that contribute to relief in a tangential and more long term way. In contrast to the principles on which humanitarianism stands, notably immediate response to humanitarian crises, the help of humanitarian organizations in Haiti is circumscribed to basic day-to-day needs such as providing food and water to people despite the most pressing fact that they continue to live in precarious tent cities well over a year after the earthquake. As humanitarianism is constantly being reshaped, it is important to analyze the ways in which aid can be improved. This paper will conclude with an overview of proposed alternatives for advancement of the humanitarianism practice and concept. As conditionalities are key roadblocks, the main concern should be to reduce or neutralize them. Consequently this paper will focus on the transparency and the accountability that information and communications technologies (ICTs) can provide. ICTs bring not only new opportunities including greater transparency around donor actions, likely increasing awareness and public scrutiny of development activities and impacting public perception of donors and their long- 3

4 term public image, but also challenges to the status quo, and how donors and aid organizations interact, going forward. How Humanitarianism Leads with Power, Politics, and Ethics The logic that predominates in humanitarianism, its values and conditionalities, relates to the United States (US) emergence as the sole superpower after the Cold War and the expansion of its influence to the rest of the world. 4 Since then, humanitarianism has found itself pushing a development model built on democratic systems, market-oriented economies and removing government distortions, and expanding this model s values and logic. Alastair Greig, David Hulme and Mark Turner highlight the fact that there is an assumption often woven into aid efforts that there is a unique path towards modern development that poorer countries must follow. 5 These objectives rest not only in donor interests and in the real material interests of power, but sometimes in the ethics and discourse of aid agencies, which may truly believe that this model represents the best way of providing relief to those in need and rebuilding a country over the long-term. Donor interests further impact the efforts of humanitarian organizations with conditionalities that often determine how humanitarian action is conducted. In analyzing the aspects of power, politics, and ethics present in humanitarianism, this paper will consider power and politics as undercurrents of rhetoric to legitimate action, and the ethical element as part of the associated public discourse. Uvin contends that the disconnect between rhetoric and practice indicates that practitioners are blind to their own exercise of power. 6 Yet the arrangement is seemingly comfortable for everyone: humanitarians do not put their values 4

5 into play and can claim to act in good faith, while donors can hide political intentions, whose impact is felt in how aid organizations approach humanitarian action. Humanitarian actors can believe from the conditionalities that guide their actions that a determined political or economic system is the best one that can be achieved by any society, even as this may change the native conditions of a country. 7 Within this discussion, there are several key characteristics of politics and power. The issue of politics and political influence runs through the entire concept of humanitarian assistance, though humanitarians portray their efforts as apolitical. 8 Even when expanding and challenging humanitarian norms, changing national laws, or defending moral claims, humanitarians are behaving in a political way, as occurs in many post-conflict environments. That is why aid agencies must recognize and accept that there will always be a political side to aid, and consider how their policies are related to broader political goals. 9 From here, any attempt to change structural conditions is a political exercise of power. 10 As the scholar Janice Gross Stein establishes, humanitarian organizations resist acknowledging their power because it conflicts with the core ethics of service that shape their culture. 11 However, achieving humanitarian goals requires power, even more so when different agencies have to struggle for the same resources and benefactors. 12 From here, the political side of aid must be recognized and made explicit for a better approach to humanitarian situations. Conditionalities Peter Uvin highlights the fact that donors commonly impose tied aid 13 conditions. 14 Reinforcing this, Alina Rocha Menocal and Andrew Rogerson 15 establish that tied aid is one of the Global South s 16 main problems and one of the most important issues regarding aid 5

6 reform. In addition, Wallace, Borstein and Chapman argue that when aid is tied to conditionalities, it does not allow governments to take responsibilities over their own policies, thus reducing their accountability towards their own people. 17 This factor is therefore a major determinant in the way aid is currently carried out. Maggie Black contends that the existence of tied aid has reinforced poverty on numerous occasions, perpetuating the superiority-inferiority dynamic between donors and receivers (it could be added here that one third of the aid is in technical cooperation, which means well-paid experts from developed countries who answer to rich countries bureaucracies). 18 In terms of donors political conditionalities, after the Cold War the way of understanding the world dramatically shifted and concepts of democracy, good governance, human rights, corruption and accountability become the centerpieces of aid strategies. Andy Knight stresses that governance, in relationship with democracy, became a political conditionality for bilateral and multilateral aid distribution. 19 Democracy is also viewed as a key variable for achieving the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). From this perspective, Dambisa Moyo also highlights the importance of these terms. For example, the author stresses that although aid did not always yield the expected sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction, policymakers, in the aftermath of the end of Cold World, prioritized concepts like governance and the maintenance of the status quo over possible changes often to the detriment of growth and development. 20 Regarding democracy, Oval Stokke establishes that in the 1990 s, the political system gained an increasingly key place within the development concept. 21 With democracy s ascendance, human rights became the second pillar of political liberalism and good governance the third. These three dimensions paved the way in which donors analyzed the situation. From 6

7 here, as this paper s case will show afterwards, democracy is a key issue in post-earthquake Haiti because it is the main conditionality for releasing aid to start the reconstruction process. In relation to economic conditionalities, Tina Wallace, Lisa Borstein and Jennifer Chapman point out that in the 1990 s, the Bretton Woods institutions equated economic growth with development. 22 They attempted to achieve growth (and thus development) through liberalization and privatization, giving the leading role to the private sector instead of supporting governments. Under this approach, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) started to perform a central humanitarian role, replacing governments as the key players in providing services and aid to populations in need, and filling in the gaps caused by market failures, as happened in Haiti. All this was reinforced by the ascendance of economic rhetoric centered on the efficiency and effectiveness of the markets. 23 Furthermore, the demands of donors for visible results affect the aid process. Donors want to see positive effects in the field in order to prove that their money is being well-spent. They present their arguments under the guise of accountability, value for money, and other value neutral performance measures. 24 These donor demands can change how humanitarian organizations perceive themselves, their principles and practices, and emphasis on concrete, rapid and visible results can sometimes be detrimental to the aid process. Economic constraints result not only from donors, investors, and the business sector, but also from the tendency among aid agencies of economic self-preservation. As Barnett and Weiss argue, aid agencies are generally more worried about their own survival than they are about the survival of their beneficiaries. Some post-development theorists also establish, with respect to the way development is being carried out nowadays, that it sometimes does more harm than good and that aid can be interpreted as advancing donors interests. 25 Therefore, though it is normal that aid agencies want to survive in order to continue pursuing their job, 7

8 they have to be aware of the bias that this goal may create in their actions. The increase in humanitarian aid has been accompanied by an increase in the conditions and restrictions on how aid must be used. This trend is evident in the case of Haiti, where the majority of the aid is only committed but not yet dispersed, based on political conditionalities. 26 As this paper has discussed, the conditioning of relief funds for Haiti shows how aid faces the risk of following the priorities of donor agencies, where their interests rather than the needs of affected populations may end up driving many of the critical decisions regarding when, where, and how aid is distributed. 27 The onus nonetheless remains on humanitarian organizations to remain committed to their main objective of helping people in need. Discourse The issue of discourse and rhetoric on the part of aid agencies and their donors must be addressed. This refers to the image that aid agencies create through discourse, both in the way they see themselves and in the public image they create. Additionally, as Uvin establishes, power and political objectives combine with discourse in areas such as human rights, free trade, good governance, and democracy. 28 The discourse of both aid agencies and donors is intended to demonstrate their real and profound humanitarian ethic (clothed in the language of moral duties, obligations, and responsibilities), even if underneath the surface of this discourse lie the fundamental issues of power structures, and political and economic interests. 29 The discourse of humanitarianism has several purposes, but needs to be carefully analyzed along with rhetoric in order to uncover what lies beneath. First discourse creates and simultaneously defines social reality. 30 By this process, aid organizations construct the reality that will be assessed, including its problems and solutions. Organizations can designate a 8

9 situation as an emergency, for example, or design the criteria for determining who receives attention and who does not. 31 This shaping of reality has material consequences like turning one group into the beneficiary of aid in detriment of other or helping some countries instead of others. Second, discourse helps aid organizations build their identity; it empowers and legitimizes them, and provides them a social purpose. Power is inherent in this discourse. It rests in the professionalized language of organizations, their authority of expertise and moral standing, and it derives from their neutrality and good intentions. These purposes of humanitarian discourse should be made explicit and taken into consideration, in order to correct the biases that they may create. Case Study: Post-Earthquake Haiti In the case of Haiti, the key challenge is determining when and under what circumstances to begin reconstruction. Given that the most important assurance for donors is political stability, people will receive most of the aid after the new government takes office, currently scheduled to happen in May Only a small part of the promised budget has been given and used for survival matters like the provision of food, water and cholera control, as donors still consider political uncertainty a lack of guarantee on the good use of their money. A conference was held in March 2010, where over 150 United Nations member states and international partners promised $5.3 billion over the next 18 months to begin recovery efforts. The total amount pledged over the next three years and beyond added up to US$ 9.9 billion from countries and international organizations. 34 Money pledged, however, does not always make it to those in need, as happened in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch in Central 9

10 America in 1998, where only one-third of the nine billion promised was actually provided and used in humanitarian aid. In the case of Haiti, six months after the earthquake only two percent of the given money had been used in the country. 35 Almost nine months after the earthquake, still less than 15 percent of the world s total promised budget for 2010 had arrived. 36,37 Also, because of the political violence that erupted after the accusation of fraud in the first round of elections in November 2010, many organizations left the country and stopped their projects due to security matters. As of January 2011, a year after the earthquake, almost one million refugees were still living in tents on the street among the debris, more than 1,100 settlement camps still remained, and only five percent of the rubble had been cleared. 38,39 Regarding shelters, mainly what have been given were tents and tarpaulins, while 30,000 transitional shelters are being built in the country. 40 The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) highlights its mission during the first year as supporting the government in humanitarian assistance, addressing the cholera epidemic, disaster preparedness, security, and elections. 41 Simply put, money is being used solely for people s survival. At the same time that aid has centered on supplying food, water, and combating cholera it has also been applied towards mitigating political turmoil, highlighting the mixed priorities of humanitarianism. Though its aim should be assisting the poor and needy, the case of Haiti demonstrates how donor requirements condition the way in which aid is handled (in this case mainly by waiting for a specific political context before finally providing long-lasting help). Leaving people to survive in crowded, leaky tents, living in misery, and being exposed to all kinds of threats to their physical and mental well-being is not the way in which humanitarianism should handle 10

11 a reconstruction process for which they supposedly have almost $10 billion dollars to spend. 42 Challenges and Opportunities in Humanitarianism The concept of humanitarianism and practical methods of approaching this issue must adapt to new contexts and situations and learn from past experiences to become more effective. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) can play a critical role in improving the implementation of humanitarian aid programs. ICT use has been expanding in exponential ways throughout different fields, from mere technology to fields like business, arts or just social uses, and now international aid. The benefits of using ICTs can be seen through the diverse uses that these technologies can have. First, ICTs can improve transparency and accountability in all parts of the humanitarian aid process. Closely related, ICTs can improve collaboration and increase the number of small donations from individuals. Haiti s case shows several examples that illustrate how this can take place. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) already have online guides with suggestions for how to donate and information on various aid organizations numbers like the committed and dispersed money or the projects they are conducting. 43 Donors can also go through recognized organizations or through pools like the Central Emergency Response Fund or the Emergency Relief Response Fund. OCHA has an online database in real-time that shows the reported international humanitarian aid. OneResponse shows numerous options for humanitarian assistance. 44 These are useful tools for tracking organizations actions. 11

12 Another similar example is Relief Oversight, a data application that is collectively generated and easy to use, and which monitors activities and organizations effectiveness. 45 These information sources allow people to track resources and money and monitor how their contributions are spent, improving transparency and accountability. A final example of the use of these technologies is the Red Cross use of text messages, social networks, and the internet to raise money in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti (they raised $7 million in 24 hours through text messages, with each text representing a contribution of $10 to the Red Cross, added directly to the user s phone bill). 46 Also, the ICTs can help reformulate the way we understand and conduct humanitarianism. It creates more horizontal aid, meaning that the help is provided by peers and the broad community along with NGOs that are empowered by ICTs, while encouraging cooperation through these means and impacting how aid is being carried out. Technologies can help aid organizations provide food more efficiently, map the areas affected by a disaster, incorporate new information as it become available, translate information to Creole 47, and track the money donated. 48 Technology is changing how and where volunteers participate. Ushahidi is a clear example of how the many uses of ICTs can be applied in Haiti. Ushahidi is a platform where the affected people can upload small incidents and useful information from the ground (such as finding missing people, reporting road conditions, the status of the food s delivery, hospital locations, etc.) from which a map is created. 49 The site s functionality stems from its unification of disperse information in crisis situations, from where aid is dispersed according to people s cooperation and information. The platform also incorporates and makes available information from newspapers, people, NGOs, Twitter and relevant social media sites. After the earthquake, the platform helped 12

13 coordinate information to assist Haitians that were trapped under the rubble and keep their families updated, highlighting the potentialities of ICTs in emergency situations. There are also other platforms provided by the Internet with the same aim. One is CrisisCamps, which stems from a global volunteer network called CrisisCommons and maintains the objective of encouraging technology innovations that can help achieve coordination in crises. 50,51 Additionally, to coordinate humanitarian responses and NGO work, there are two organizations called OneResponse and ReliefWeb. 52,53 Also, for contributions in mappings, Google Earth, OpenStreetMap and GeoEye exist. 54 Lastly, an example of how some organizations have leveraged these technologies and achieved improved results due to their use of these technologies is the American Red Cross. As Wendy Harman, the person in charge for overseeing media established at the NTC Conference 2011, their new media strategy includes the use of tools like Twitter for connecting with people in emergency situations, from where they sometimes receive up to 50 tweets a minute. All these are examples of the potential that these new technologies can have in humanitarian aid and cooperation. Conclusion As it has been evidenced, it is a fact that political and power interests are constituent elements of humanitarianism. Even if aid organizations aspire to an apolitical ideal, the humanitarian assistance process requires them to respond to donor interests, turning them into political actors. Particularly in the nation-building process, framing the new government and state requires technical decisions that are deeply political and go from the type of political and economic system that will be applied, with the prevail of certain industries and 13

14 companies, to the place of religion, school content, and the historical account. Accordingly, the way humanitarianism has dealt (and is still dealing) with post-earthquake Haiti illustrates how aid priorities can be biased, causing them to work against their goodwill and discourse in order to meet donors concrete conditions. Often, this acceptance of donor conditions operates to the detriment of the people the aid organizations are supposed to help. In moving forward, humanitarianism must refocus its priorities and act consistent with its espoused objective of assisting people. Here is where ICTs can become useful instruments, though their use for international aid is still emerging. Haiti s case shows the potential of these tools as well as some lessons on how to use them in the best way possible; however this is just the beginning. From here, and with the help of ICTs for transparency and cooperation among people, humanitarians do not have to be the only ones that impose restrictions and conditions to those that give them money and allow their work to continue; they can also rely on the potential of these tools for giving people control over donors requirements and actions. Furthermore, aid organizations have to become more aware of their own political roles and preferences when approaching different places, realities and peoples. As the examples of the ICT platforms that were used in Haiti s case show, these technologies have a huge potential in playing a key role in the challenge of uniting and coordinating cooperation. This is why OCHA, among other international organizations, is paying critical attention to ICTs and the possibilities, trying to create a platform for unifying the rest of these technologies in the future. The role that ICTs can have is not only due to the magnitude and vastness of the scope that these technologies can have but also for the accountability, transparency, coordination, and cooperation that they allow. These tools can play a central part in the current responses to crises, as they enable innovation and agility where NGOs stumble, as the Ushahidi platform showed. 14

15 Consequently, though the process and impact of humanitarianism can be questioned nowadays for multiple reasons, there is still hope for improvement. There is a vast range of new possibilities to enrich the efficiency and effectiveness of humanitarian organizations and allow them to act in greater accordance with their aims and the goodwill they promote. Such changes would benefit not only humanitarian efforts, but the global community through the greater global transparency that humanitarianism can achieve, helped by people s contributions through ICTs. 1 Michael Barnett, and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); page 4. 2 Ibíd., page 4. 3 After the earthquake, the Haitian parliament approved a special "Emergency Law" that gave power to this commission, which represents donors and is working with Haiti s government. The law gives the commission the power to "carry out the Development Plan for Haiti" until at least August Greig, Alastair, David Hulme and Mark Turner, Challenging Global Inequality: Development Theory and Practice in the 21st Century, Palgrave, New York. 5 Greig, Alastair, David Hulme and Mark Turner, Challenging Global Inequality: Development Theory and Practice in the 21st Century, Palgrave, New York, page Uvin, Peter, Human Rights and Development, Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press, 2004, page Uvin also establishes that the nature of this is political and not technical. 8 Michael Barnett, and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); page Barnett, Michael and Snyder Jack, The Grand Strategies of Humanitarianism, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss (editors) Ithaca: Cornell University Press, Gross Stein, Janice, Humanitarian Organizations: Accountable-Why, to Whom, for What and How? in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss (editors) Ithaca: Cornell University Press, Ibid. 12 Hoffman, Peter and Weiss, Thomas, Humanitarianism and Practitioners: Social Science Matters, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss (editors) Ithaca: Cornell University Press, This refers to foreign aid that comes with strings attached. This type of aid must be spent in a certain way that is established by the donor, and from where it benefits economically. 14 Uvin, Peter, Human Rights and Development, Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press, 2004, page Menocal Rocha, A,, Rogerson, A., Which Way the Future Aid? Southern Civil Society Perspectives on Current Debates on Reform to the International Aid System, Working Paper, January This term establishes a socio-economic and political division, referring to the least developed countries. 17 Borstein, Wallace Chapman, The aid chain, Chapter 2 (p.19-48), Kampala, Uganda, Black, Maggie, International Development, Rawat Publications, 2005 p Andy Knight, Democracy and good governance, en Weiss, Thomas & Daws, Sam, The Oxford handbook on the UN 20 Moyo, Dambisa, Dead Aid, Penguin Books,

16 21 Stokke, Oval, The UN and Development. 22 Borstein, Wallace Chapman The aid chain, Chapter 2 (p.19-48), Kampala, Uganda, Michael Barnett, and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); page Gross Stein, Janice, Humanitarian Organizations: Accountable-Why, to Whom, for What and How?, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), page Greig, Alastair, David Hulme and Mark Turner, Challenging Global Inequality: Development Theory and Practice in the 21st Century, New York, NY: Palgrave 26 Financial Tracking Service of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 27 Barnett, Michael and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2008, p Uvin, Peter, Human Rights and Development, Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press, 2004, page Michael Barnett, and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); page Michael Barnett, and Thomas G. Weiss, Humanitarianism: A brief History of the Present, in Humanitarianism in Question: Power, Politics, Ethics, Barnett and Weiss, eds, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); page Íbid.; page Financial Tracking Service of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 33 According to World Health Organization s (WHO) estimations, more than 4000 people died and more than were infected. 34 International Donors' Conference Towards a New Future for Haiti, 35 Haiti Earthquake Six Months Later: Where and How to Donate", ABC News, July 8, Jonathan Katz and Martha Mendoza, "Haiti Still Waiting for Pledged US Aid", September 28, Numbers are not that clear regarding this issue. Different organizations indicate different donations quantities, and there is also a difference in the amount of money that they said was given, in contrast to the one that is waiting for the ideal conditions so as to start the reconstruction process. Other problem while analyzing data is that some donations are counted several times. For example, individual donations can be counted in NGOs numbers and by USAID, or a European country in itself, as part of the EU and as pat of WB s total. 38 Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Haiti Earthquake response Report (as of 8 Jan 2011), 39 Nicolas García, "Haití reconstruye su futuro con escombros", February 10, 2011, 40 Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Haiti Earthquake response Report (as of 8 Jan 2011), 41 Fact Sheet "MINUSTAH's Post-earthquake activities", January 10, 2011, 42 The reconstruction process is centered nowadays in the cluster approach. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) establishes that this approach s aim is to clarify the division of labor among organizations like UN, NGOs, Red Cross and other key humanitarian actors, and better defining their roles and responsibilities within the different sectors of the response. 43 Financial Tracking Service of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 44 One Response, 45 Relief Oversight, 46 Red Cross, 47 The language that is spoken in Haiti by almost twelve million people. Creole and French are Haiti s two official languages. 48 The language that is spoken in Haiti by almost twelve million people. Creole and French are Haiti s two official languages. 49 Ushahidi, 16

17 50 Chrissie Brodigan, "Apps of kindness: Crisis Camp Launches 3 New Web Apps for Haiti", February 17, 2010, 51 Crisis Commons, 52 One Response, 53 Relief Web, 54 GeoEye, 17