Mind the Rich-Poor Gap
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- Published on Monday, 22 March 2010 20:54
- Written by Todd Schweitzer
There are actually two Dominican Republics, and they bear little resemblance to one another.
One of them looks a lot like the U.S. These Dominicans live in high-rise condominiums in the city and houses in the suburbs. Their neighborhoods have great roads and reliable electricity and water. They drive to work. They order Papa John’s Pizza and watch HBO. They shop organic.
The other one looks like a poor, developing country. These Dominicans live in houses made of cinderblock, sheet metal, wood, or a combination of the three. If they live in the city, they travel to work by cramming seven people in shared taxis, normally an 80s-model Corolla. Their neighborhoods are without electricity for about twenty hours per day, and the water may be on for three days per week.
A Gringo’s Perspective on the Developing World
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- Published on Monday, 08 February 2010 20:46
- Written by Todd Schweitzer
For the last 2 years, I have lived and worked as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Dominican Republic. A central tenet of the organization is community immersion: the volunteers are successful not because of any extraordinary knowledge or project budget, but because they live as a member of the community in which they work. I have had to adapt to a different lifestyle, bizarre foods, weird illnesses, and the biggest spiders I’ve ever seen in my life.
But my blog will not be about my Peace Corps service. I want to use my experience in a developing country to talk about the perceptions that we (citizens of the industrialized countries) have towards the developing world, and the realities of life in those countries.
What Corruption Means
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- Published on Tuesday, 02 February 2010 20:49
- Written by Todd Schweitzer
Political corruption is a persistent problem in virtually all countries in the developing world. First, it is a drain on the economy. It is more expensive to do business in a climate of corruption, so there is less investment and fewer jobs created. Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and aid agencies are reluctant to donate, knowing that some of their funds will end up in a bureaucrat’s Cayman Islands bank account. It disrupts the democratic process when favors and votes can be bought. It also can lead to social instability: the poorest citizens can’t obtain permits, licenses or social services, public goods don’t reach them, and they can no longer trust the ballot box. It is simultaneously a cause and effect of many of the larger problems that people in developing countries must confront daily.
