The strength of Black Lives Matter protests that echoed around the world in 2020 shone a light onto the workings of humanitarian and development organisations - organisations generally seen as committed to the greater good and staffed by altruistic heroes who put others before themselves. Hence it is not surprising that many western INGO leaders finally have been forced into engaging in discussions to ensure their organisations are anti-racist.
This Aid Talks webinar seeks to examine why aid must be decolonised and the long overdue need for honest reflection, acknowledgement, and remedy for colonisation across all facets of modern life, including within the aid sector. The webinar will unpack language and terminology like: What is structural racism? What is decolonisation? What is decoloniality? What is White Gaze? And explore how colonialisation in the region has had an enduring legacy both on poverty and the development of racial hierarchies.
Our speakers will talk to their different contexts and address the barriers which stop or serve to act as disincentives for a more equal, anti-racist aid and development program and open the conversation on ways forward as part of building a reimagined aid sector.
MODERATOR
RODOLFO LAHOY JR. is the current Head of the Policy, Communications, and Training Team at IBON International, a Southern-based, capacity development organisation working with movements and CSOs for people's rights and democracy.
SPEAKERS
CAROL SHERMAN is a former co-founder of Aid/watch. She then went on to work with a variety of INGOs around the world, mainly in the position of Country Director. She is currently working as an independent humanitarian and development consultant.
EMELINE SIALE ILOLAHIA is the Executive Director of the Pacific Islands Association of Non-Governmental Organisations (PIANGO) and formerly Executive Director of the Civil Society Forum of Tonga (CSFT). PIANGO is a regional platform of national umbrella CSOs in 24 Countries and Territories in the Pacific. One of its focuses is advocating for the recognition of Civil Society as a critical development partner in our own rights and should be engaged in public policy decision making that impacts the life of our people.
FIRAS JABER is the co-founder of the Social and Economic Policies Monitor- Al-Marsad. Al-Marsad is an initiative to monitor policies in order to ensure the protection of the economic, social and civil rights of Palestinians. Its vision is a free Palestinian society where social justice is realized through critical development approaches.
KRISTER HOLM is the Regional Director for Asia of Diakonia. Diakonia is a faith-based Swedish development organization that works with local partner organizations, with a vision of a just, equal and sustainable world.