ABSTRACT
There has been widespread critical reflection on the character and role of international humanitarian organizations. Continuing presence of neocolonial agendas and imposed structures, external control of resources, and racist practices have been charged. At the same time, there is a general concern for identifying best practices in the working relations between external organizations and national institutions and programs. Emily Welty’s doctoral research on the Mennonite Central Committee in East Africa informs her assessment of the present book’s essays. Both the essays and Welty’s research reveal a preference for committed non-professional volunteers who fit local programs over trained specialists as a deeply held tenet of MCC programs and policy. Despite Welty’s criticism of the imbalance of gender in the book’s authors, the chapters illuminate MCC’s continual quest for more appropriate methods of relief, development, and peacebuilding in the general effort of dismantling structures of neocolonialism, sexism, and racism in its humanitarian programs and in the societies with which it interacts.
