12-10-2008

You have $100 dollars to give to projects that respond to hunger. How much would you spend on charity and how much on justice? Would you spend it all on soup because people are hungry now? How much would you spend on justice work to address why people are without food?

You have $100 dollars to give to projects that respond to hunger. How much would you spend on charity and how much on justice? Would you spend it all on soup because people are hungry now? How much would you spend on justice work to address why people are without food? It's a question of band-aids or trees. One development and peace group uses cut-out images of band-aids and trees to help young people think about charity and social justice. Participants in a group exercise are given two toolboxes to fix a poverty-related condition: a box of treatments -- the band-aids -- and a box of prevention options -- the trees that represent the creation of an environment where people flourish. What action is easier to do? What actions help people in the long term? Why are band-aids important? Why is prevention important? Their point is, both are necessary, but do different things. Charity helps people survive an immediate crisis. Justice work tackles the causes of the problem through education and advocacy. It's true in developing countries and in New Brunswick. When we bring canned goods to the local food bank or write a cheque for a homeless shelter, we don't kid ourselves that we are eliminating poverty. Neither should it be a substitute for asking why there is hunger and for taking action to change what creates poverty. Poverty is too readily accepted as "regrettably accidental or natural or inevitable, rather than the outcome of conscious policy choices", as former United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour says. A New Brunswick union leader said recently that at the end of a work day, nobody should have to go to a food bank in order to eat. Nor should a parent have to rely on a charity to provide their child's school supplies during the school year. We could all add to that list of what shouldn't be. Some New Brunswickers rely on food banks and other services provided by organizations or government because of low-wage jobs and low social assistance benefits. A single person's basic welfare is $285 per month. The minimum wage rate of $7.75 an hour, even for someone working full-time, does not cover the costs of food, housing and energy for even a small family. Combine that with the shortage in child care services, with literacy and upgrading needs, and we've got poverty that begets poverty that begets poverty. The preferred route out of poverty is a decent-paying job for those who can work, and decent levels of assistance for those who can't. When there are holes in the social safety net, we depend on community groups and charities to plug them. Last year, New Brunswick's voluntary organizations told the Community Non-Profit Task Force, "Help us put ourselves out of business". They called for a coherent poverty reduction strategy and urged the government to fund community economic development so that employment provided livable incomes. A serious public debate on poverty is called for, according to the Common Front for Social Justice, the organizers of New Brunswick's second Provincial Poverty Summit in Moncton on Oct. 17-18. They want to get everyone talking about the value of justice versus charity. They want us -- individuals, organizations and governments -- to ask ourselves some tough questions about whether our efforts are actually helping. Are our efforts charity or justice? Are our efforts helping people or just helping us feel good about ourselves? There are lessons to be learned from the fight against poverty around the world. The international community has come to consider poverty reduction as a human rights obligation -- not just easing suffering and promoting healthy socio-economic development. Public policy-makers are urged to effectively tackle poverty because it is a violation of human rights -- both a cause and a consequence of deprivation. For much of the world's population, who lack the basics of food, shelter and clothing, the opening line of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights -- 60 years old this year -- "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights", are just words on paper. Since the Universal Declaration, an impressive array of binding international agreements signed by Canada provide a series of interconnected rights: to life, liberty and security of person, to the highest attainable standard of health, to just and favourable working conditions, to adequate food, housing and social security, to education and participation in the democratic process. Consider the middle-aged woman with no job and no dependent children who lives with an abusive husband. She feels trapped because of what he'll do to her -- if she leaves and if she doesn't leave -- and because she does not think she will find affordable safe housing and does not know how she will live. Consider the welfare recipient whose benefits are cut off because she is sharing an apartment with her employed sister. Her forced financial dependence threatens her right to dignity and to make personal choices. A human rights approach to poverty seeks to empower the poor and make public authorities accountable for fulfilling their obligations to citizens. There will always be a place for charity, says Louise Arbour, but charitable responses are not an effective substitute for enforceable human rights guarantees. Since 1987, the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty on Oct. 17 highlights the links between poverty and human rights. * Elsie Hambrook is Chairperson of the New Brunswick Advisory Council on the Status of Women. Her column on women's issues appears in the Times & Transcript every Thursday. She may be reached via e-mail at acswcccf@gnb.ca