Peace Corps: The Need to Resist False Generosity

This week marks the 52nd Anniversary of the Peace Corps. It has also seen significant budget cuts kick in due to a gridlock in Congress. The timing of these two events is more than likely responsible for a recent HuffPo blog post written by the Director of Peace Corps. The post can be interpreted as a plea to spare the program from budget cuts. The Director uses the space to persuade readers by explaining the many ways in which Peace Corps service benefits Americans (by readying them for the work force) rather than discussing the dire need for help in countries where Peace Corps is present.

This particular post I'm referring to is far from unique.  In fact, it's seen all too often. If you scroll through writings of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCV) one can quickly find a common theme: My service was mostly a failure, but I learned a lot about myself. While I'm all for positivity, I can't help but be offended by this trending narrative.

Peace Corps has been in existence for 52 years, with very little to show for its work in regards to actual change. Many of the countries that were wretchedly poor 52 years ago are still wretchedly poor today. This isn't entirely Peace Corps' fault, and I certainly don't think that Peace Corps alone can enact massive changes. What disappoints me though is the way in which Peace Corps turns a blind eye to the fact that so little has been accomplished in the way of change. Instead of asking why such little headway has been made, Peace Corps prefers to tout the way our 27 month experience enhances the lives of those who are already quite privileged. The last thing Peace Corps should be doing is utilizing the poor and their downtrodden situation as a springboard to future economic opportunity for its American volunteers.

I could understand if plugging Peace Corps and the stories of its Volunteers was an occasional occurrence, but unfortunately this isn't the case. This rhetoric has created a volunteer-centric atmosphere within the program and the literature which comes from it. Most stories about our program entail the way in which an American roughs it in undesirable conditions for two years, seemingly forgetting that after our stint we are able to return to a much better situation (usually). Meanwhile, those we are supposed to be helping remain in an admittedly bad and unimproved situation. This should anger the hell out of us, especially when we look at why these people and places remain deprived.

I'll use the case of HIV/AIDS work as a case. Peace Corps places numerous volunteers in its health programs so that they can spread awareness and knowledge about HIV/AIDS. This is undoubtedly a noble effort, and it's something that Peace Corps should be proud of. However, Peace Corps is a government program. While thousands of volunteers were on the ground in the past decade trying to fight a runaway HIV/AIDS epidemic, the Clinton and Bush Administrations were busy making life difficult on countries like Thailand, South Africa, and Brazil that were trying to produce anti-AIDS medicine at affordable costs. Thailand ended up dropping their efforts altogether, and when Brazil pushed on with their iniative the US filed a complaint with the WTO citing patent violations. Ultimately, Brazil won, as the rest of the world was able see what America couldn't - that a 50% drop in AIDS related mortality (in Brazil) is more important that stuffing the already fat wallets of pharmaceutical companies (Fantu Cheru, 2002).

The point of this story is to highlight the US government's contradicting behavior (which goes beyond this instance). On the surface it seems like the government cares about the poor, and this is certainly the image it wants to project. In reality, its neoliberal policies continue harming millions upon millions of people around the globe, maintaining the very poverty its pretending to be fighting. This is an exercise which Brazilian educator Paulo Freire refers to as "false generosity".

For Peace Corps Volunteers - who are typically compassionate, smart, and idealistic - it's a tough pill to swallow. There are certainly sacrifices made by everyone who joins, and there are also challenges which make the job quite difficult at times. But we've signed up to struggle alongside the people we spend our 27 months with. Seeing that our fight is really little more than a facade should infuriate us, and we're doing the world a disservice by trying to spin this into a positive narrative. This includes our Peace Corps global director. Thus, when one of us attains access on a highly trafficked website, the story shouldn't center around the adventures of American PCV's, rather it should highlight the structural inequalities that require Peace Corps to exist in the first place.

After all, the goal is to END poverty and all that it entails. If Peace Corps still exists in its current form in another 52 years, than we've failed in our mission.