How far should they go?
I first came across this article last August and immediately related to the interesting argument. While working within the community development context in Toronto, I constantly found myself struggling with the whole “pay or don’t pay per-diems” issue. I constantly asked myself how sustainable it was. Was it hurting or helping the programs? If we didn’t have the money would community members still care enough about their community to participate? How should they be calculated? And what happens when they are seen as salary? All challenges I found while working in Toronto.
Recently a woman I work with who is also a community worker in Ghana brought the article back to me asking me my thoughts - As we debated the issue I quickly found my thoughts on the issue only become more confused, likely due to exploitation and misuse I found myself witnessing within many projects here in Ghana, compiled by the hardship and economic challenges I found many of the community members facing, who heavily relied on these payments (not to say this isn’t an issue in many other countries etc). My issue was no longer really with community members but rather NGO staff and other stakeholders ( eg. Government officials, chiefs of communities etc). Particularity with organizations funded my large International organizations which seem to pay ridicules per-diems to employees so much that it’s almost expected even as we go through funding challenges with implementation of projects.
Anyways I really could rant and rave about the subject but I think the article lays it our pretty well!
http://www.coady.stfx.ca/coady/features/0810/perdiem
Enjoy!
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