I would like to share a video from TED because I think it will give some perspective on some of the points made in class today. In that video Hans Rosling does a fantastic job of analyzing data on the levels of development of countries through out history. I share it because there was some questions that came up in class that call for an answer in relative terms. For example, quality of life and happiness. In the example of the South American Yuka farmers, when asked what they needed, they only asked for simple tools to harvest Yuka, perhaps in their minds it was on the top of the list and they really had no concept of anything else. Im sure that no one would argue that there is so much more that we could have offered them that would have made their quality of life better on our terms, but simple yuka harvesting implements satisfied them on their terms. So you see, a persons needs can be relative. Just like in this video he brings up the point that Africa isnt to far off track when it comes to how long their countries have been established and how developed they are. What alarms the public is the disparity that exist between Africa and the developed world. As a concession to that though, people are also alarmed by, human rights abuses, unchecked conflict, week and dysfunctional governments that you could argue where not present in other countries at Africa's level of development.

Before development begins there are a few questions that need to be answered that are not easy that also call for relative answers. "What do we think they need?" and "What do they think they need?" Rather then the illusive question "What do they need, period?" that calls for a non normative answer. There is a very interesting case study done by some PBS journalist about a development that completely failed. I believe that it failed because going in to it the developers were mirroring the village people and providing aid that they thought was beneficial, but only on their terms. They did not realize that the question "What do they need?" is not the same in everyones eyes. I said in class "Don't forget to bring the anthropologists along!" and if you watch the video there was an anthropologist that did her research in that village that provides and explanation for why that aid effort was such a failure. In the end there is no silver bullet for that question we just need to realize the nature of it and do our best in answering it within the limits of the human capacity.