Exit Strategy

JACMEL, Haiti — Haiti has approved plans for more than a dozen sprawling tent cities in and around Port-au-Prince, the first step in an epic relocation effort that could reshape the country as up to one million people displaced by the earthquake find new places to live.

Full text

Responsibility Grid for Haiti

It was an earthquake. A really big one. Turns out the reaction and response reaches every corner of the globe. Perturbative, this event has challenged the dimensions of security, of rules sets, of money, of infrastructure, and of resources; and the world is challenged to provide strategic flows of security, aid, money, the energy to run the country, the resettling of people.

Last week I felt that “What the world community does now, defines the dominant logic and emotion of “globalization.” At the very least “the world community response will be illustrative of the nature of the huge complex process of globalization.”

The affirmative burden of responsibility

In Haiti, I believe we are witnessing a full spectrum response, working across domains and layers of responsibility. We are prepared; but we come on the fly, as well, strategically self-organizing. Yet, as good as we do now, the questions are coming: Who should do what? And when? And how?

Going forward, What will be the dominant logic and emotion of mutually assured dependence? Where and with whom will we locate the affirmative burden of responsibility?

The following excerpts illustrate my observations of the last week. Each is linked to a full text post.

Thursday, January 14, 2010, at 5:40

Triage in Haiti

… What’s next?

To what will you commit?

For how long?

Just saying.

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Friday, January 15, 2010, at 9:30 pm

Layers

Perturbating the order of civilization

Doctors are on the way

After the aid rushes in

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Saturday, January 16, 2010, at 6:25 pm

Pocket Aces

Why why we make mistakes and the power of regret:

“If we are going to err at something, we would rather err by failing to act.”

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Sunday, January 17, 2010, at 3:06 pm

collaborate

The Crisis in Haiti

Initial Response

Sense and Structure

Global is Local, Strategically Speaking

Resilience, Revitalization

Social Networking: Enabling Resilience

Participate, React, Create, Connect

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Tuesday, January 19, 2010, at 4:04 am

Unintended Consequences by disownedlight

Earthquakes make bad laws

Immigrants and refugees: Who gets chosen?

A difficult question

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Tuesday, January 19, 2010, at 4:02 pm

Holocaust Memorial in Berlin

Let history show

When lessons are learned

The value of retrospect

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Tuesday, January 19, 2010, at 6:57 pm

Earthquake activity 13-19 January 2010

Who knew?

Earthquakes TW3: That was the week that was

Who you gonna call?

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Wednesday, January 20, 2010, at 10:40 pm

Disaster Accountability Project

Observers “R” Us

How to participate

Connect via Twitter and Facebook

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Thursday, January 21, 2010, at 9:53 am

An app for that

Regeneration

The poetic hymn

Underneath the hood

Code name: The Enterra

An app for that

The poetic hymn

“There’s an app for that.”

Underneath the hood

[black box matrix] + [secret sauce] = [recombinator], par excellence)

Code name: The Enterra

Prior art: An iPhone app, social networking recombinator.

Holocaust Memorial in Berlin

“It held the line against the bad, allowing for its deconstruction, and the universalization of our economic model, to be followed, through our continued success, by the universalization of our political model.”

via Thomas P.M. Barnett :: Weblog.

When lessons are learned

“Germany was a country where horrible crimes were committed in the second world war, and at least on the surface of it the republic we are now has dealt with many of those crimes. There were Nuremburg trials, “Entnazifizierung”, the 60s revolts of young people looking at their parents’ generation and seeing the Nazi horrors again. And now things are…calm? When I was a teenager and learnt about what happened in Germany between 1933 and 1945, I remember feeling the guilt. It’s just hard to believe that all this happened where you now sleep and walk and laugh. Berlin is a city where the Germans have put up many memorials, and I guess one of the reasons why I think it’s a great country now: Because people have tried to put up reminders not to accuse, but to warn us from making the same mistakes again.”

via kersy83, Flickr

The value of retrospect

Lessons learned, from epic war, or humanitarian disaster: What do you see?

Unintended Consequences by disownedlight

National Post, Marni Soupcoff, Monday, January 18, 2010
“Canada’s government is suggesting that significantly relaxing requirements (family-reunification requirements, in particular) for Haitians to come here as immigrants and refugees would be a good way for us to lend a hand.”

Immigrants and refugees: Who gets chosen?

Soupcoff writes, “The move would be tantamount to a lottery –one that ignores the massive problems faced by all the other millions of human beings the world over who suffer in equally perilous and excruciating circumstances.

“Why would we choose to embrace a crushed, suffering individual from Haiti over a crushed, suffering individual from Darfur, where hundreds of thousands have died? Or Congo, where millions have perished? Because the pictures from Haiti are more graphic and top of mind? Because on a gut level we’re more sympathetic to the casualties of natural disasters than we are to the casualties of man-made conflicts?”

A difficult question

How will we ready for the next time? “If we admit thousands of Haitian immigrants now, we’ll feel good about ourselves for a few months, and help some people. But what happens the next time there is an earthquake — or a war, typhoon, tsunami, or drought? What happens when those victims come knocking? On what basis do we say no?”

collaborate

“When disaster strikes the second disaster that looms is the efficiency and impact of the three R’s – Response, Recovery and Reconstruction. As seen by the poor response by FEMA after Hurricane Katrina, lives are lost when a coordinated effort is not conducted. In a developing country like Haiti the biggest danger is the effects of bad post disaster planning and construction.” – Cameron Sinclair, Haiti Quake: What Next?

Initial Response

“President Obama dispatched military relief vessels and warships to stand off the Haitian coast, pledging “the deep condolences and unwavering support of the American people.” Capitals from Brasilia to Beijing quickly put together aid packages and organized search missions in Haiti, where thousands of foreign residents remained unaccounted for. Within a fearful Haitian diaspora following the tragedy through grim television images, relatives scoured the Internet and taxed the already weak communications links to the country in search of information about their loved ones.” -Mary Beth Sheridan, William Branigin and Scott Wilson, Washington Post

Sense and Structure

“As with most every other similar event, the most important thing is sense and structure in the recovery. Clearly building codes are inadequate – get some Bay Area, and/or Japanese (or similar Quake Prone Zone) Architects and construction people in there, asap. to help guide at least the reconstruction of core infrastructure (hospitals etc).” – Peter Quodling, comment to “Another job for the SysAdmin”

Global is Local, Strategically Speaking

“[ ] perhaps the most inspiring dimension to the delivery of humanitarian assistance relates to the ever-widening sense of ownership by stakeholders. Everyone has the right to be involved in humanitarian response, irrespective of where it takes place: the individual donor, our neighbors, colleagues and friends. Their ability to identify and give to a philanthropic agency, a country, or a program has been widely enhanced in recent years through the proliferation of agencies and access to information.
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“The lessons we have applied have resulted in more effective humanitarian responses, but priority areas of concern must still be addressed. This final section will examine some of those and pose critical questions. Above all, we need to consider how to absorb diverse actors working together. We are all fond and capable of working in our own environments, but how good are we at actually collaborating, listening to each other, and finding ways to learn from each other?
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“A central issue in today’s emergencies is a consideration of an integrated approach, which combines political, military, social and economic activities. Undoubtedly, such approaches have, at face value, a much stronger chance of being effective as all interventions can be linked and reinforce each other.”

- Geoff Loane, The Evolving Humanitarianism

Resilience, Revitalization

Start with this question, “When you look at Haiti, and after the triage is done, and the people who need immediate medical aid get whatever they can, what ought we to do down there?

“[ ] it’s really getting beyond just the immediate recovery, and thinking about what’s going to make that place resilient, able to handle this kind of disruption again and again, because Port-au-Prince sits right along that fault line. We know it’s going to happen.
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“[Resilience], you’ve got to understand what that kind of revitalization is. You’re not rebuilding what was there before. You’re not restoring it back to whatever pristine quality it had before the disaster. You’re creating in effect social revolution, because you’re going to connect them up to the outside world and make the place attractive enough that people are going to come there with money and create connectivity.
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“The whole key is getting past the State Department, getting past USAID, getting past the non-governmentals, private voluntaries, the aid groups, getting to the point where people want to bring money there. And in some ways, you know, the tabula rasa sort of environment that Port-Au-Prince now faces does give them some opportunities amidst this horrific tragedy. I mean, there’s going to have to be everything rebuilt. So if you have that chance to rebuild, why not rebuild it in a way that makes it more resilient, and makes it attractive to outside investors.
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The question is asked,

“[ ] is there a person [ ] who, you know, if the President was looking around for someone to talk to, someone that stands up in your mind?

“TPMB: Absolutely, [ John F. Goodman, the Director of the Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance (COE) ]. General Goodman, a retired three-star, does a lot of work, does a lot of appearances. I just spent the last couple of days with him in Washington discussing this subject, because they’re trying to move on it as quickly as possible.” – snips from Thomas P.M. Barnett’s long view of how to revitalize Haiti

Social Networking: Enabling Resilience

Globalization. Humanitarianism. SysAdmin. Social Networking. The New Humanity. I don’t know what to call it, but, as Stella Terrill Mann muses, “Whatever God’s dream about man may be, it seems certain it cannot come true unless humanity cooperates.”

“As the horror of the earthquake in Haiti reverberates around the world, a number of intrepid locals, foreign reporters, and aid workers are tweeting from on the ground. Some are working to gather aid and funds, while others are simply trying to show the world what’s happening in Haiti. Still others are reporting on incidents in specific locations, in the hopes of assuaging the concerns of loved ones abroad (as of yet, very little information on those injured and dead has been released online).” – Jillian C. York, Haiti: Tweets from the ground

“Perturbating the order of civilization

“Beneath Nature’s ground, an earthquake in Haiti.
One so devastating, it shocks Culture into chaos;
local Governance has no assembly.
With its Infrastructure crushed,
there is no capacity for Commerce;
and Fashion has no market.

“Doctors are on the way, as is food and water. But who will administer the system? Who will provide physical security so medics can perform, food can be distributed? Who will provide governance, transparent rules, influencing this society to be civil? Who will provide money, for emergency funding and what comes after? Who will put together an infrastructure, supporting all that it takes for Haiti to manage and sustain its resources?

“After the aid rushes in, after the relief effort stabilizes, who will be the SysAdmin for Haiti, then? Time and responsibility: It’s so much more than the U.S. Marines and rinse, lather, repeat.” – Haiti: If not (long)now, then when?

Participate, React, Create, Connect

The earthquake in Haiti is an extraordinary challenge, and opportunity as well, for the global community. As I wondered on Twitter, earlier in the week, #Haiti: exodus or genesis? What the world community does now, defines the dominant logic and emotion of “globalization.”

The best action to take now is to bring forth sense and structure to the work in Haiti. That starts by asking, “How can we help?” – reply from @ZoeticaMedia

Layers of time

Your ecosystem is composed of layers.

Look to the layers:
there
you will find
time and responsibility,
the order of civilization.

I’ve come to think this way from my reading of Stewart Brand’s, Clock of the Long Now. Tell me what you see?

Order of Civilization

Beneath Nature’s ground, an earthquake in Haiti.
One so devastating, it shocks Culture into chaos;
local Governance has no assembly.
With its Infrastructure crushed,
there is no capacity for Commerce;
and Fashion has no market.

Doctors are on the way

As is food and water. But who will administer the system? Who will provide physical security so medics can perform, food can be distributed? Who will provide governance, transparent rules, influencing this society to be civil? Who will provide money, for emergency funding and what comes after? Who will put together an infrastructure, supporting all that it takes for Haiti to manage and sustain its resources?

After the aid rushes in

After the relief effort stabilizes, who will be the SysAdmin for Haiti, then? Time and responsibility: It’s so much more than the U.S. Marines and rinse, lather, repeat.