This week’s speaker was Mr. Andrew Alspach who was speaking on behalf of United Nation’s OCHA. OCHA’s main priority is information management, trying to manage information, save lives and reduce suffering in a disaster. He made it clear that he’s job is to coordinate different responses for different situations or disasters, his job isn’t responding to them. Andrew went into details on how managing communication and information for a disaster is their main goal and purpose. One example he gave was the amount of email’s they received during the earthquake that devastated Haiti. He said they were receiving about ten emails every minute. It was part of his job to make sure he knew what people needed, where they needed it, and who was responding. A major obstacle his group had to overcome was the fact that it was difficult for them to translate and understand the language the emails were written in. Thankfully there were many local and remote volunteers willing to dedicate their time and skills to help those who were in need.
At one point in Mr. Alspach’s presentation he said they are responsible for gathering, analyzing, and most importantly sharing information about the disaster. This information is disseminated throughout which ever humanitarian organizations are responding or helping. Just like our last speaker Mr. Olafsson for NetHope said, a lot of organizations aren’t willing to share information that would make responding more efficient. Andrew said that information in his line of work is the life and blood of his operations. Not only does it make Andrew and Gisili’s job hard when organizations aren’t sharing information, but in my opinion it is a shame. It’s a shame to think that these organizations are withholding very useful information so they could have an upper hand in their battle for publicity. Andrew said it’s difficult to know when organizations are hiding information, until it is too late. He also said there isn’t much the United Nation’s can do about it; has far as authority or reprimanding the organizations. He said at most they would stop funding the organization if they were purposely withholding information. I personally think laws or some kind of acts should be passed to make it illegal for humanitarian organizations to not share information with each other. The consequences should be more severe, not just a slap on the wrist. A time when people lives are at risk and people are suffering isn’t exactly a good time to be hiding information. Andrew showed some sort of a circular diagram that depicted his job. The diagram revolved around the people he had to deal with and the information he receives. First he had to convince the partners or organizations to share their information. He then has to manage the information and add value to it. Next he had to make sure the partners see benefits for providing information. I was sure if this benefit meant that the organizations see benefits, which I wouldn’t be surprised if that were the case, or if the people who needed help see the benefits. Finally the last part of the diagram was to disseminate the information quickly, to provide help to who ever needed help. Andrew had a lot to say during his presentation about the United Nations and OCHA. I noticed in his presentation and in Mr. Olafsson’s presentation a reoccurring problem. Organizations not sharing information with each other is the reoccurring problem I have been noticing and concerned with. We also discussed this problem in class a couple of times, which is why I decided to blog about it. My question to you is, do you think there should be punishment to the organizations not sharing information with each other?
That is a great question. I wish the answer could be yes. However, I believe that forcing organizations to share information would result in further damaging bad relations between some of the organizations. I would not be surprised if lawsuits would result. Not to mention, how could one judge whether information is being shared equally. Also, I am pretty sure that forcing individuals or organizations to share something they own is unconstitutional. I guess the court can force individuals and organizations to “handover” information, but like I said before, such action would most likely result in worsened relations. However, I do believe that less forceful, but still effective actions can be taken. Whatever the action is, it can only be successful if organizations benefit more from participating than they would otherwise. Essentially, there needs to be an incentive. A unification of organizations has to begin by example. Two organizations need to demonstrate that they are better off working together, sharing information—then most other organizations that continue to operate independently. Once a third organization sees the success of the partnership, the third organization will want to join. The trick is that as more organizations become interested, the organizations are attracted to one central group. It is possible and probably would be difficult to prevent other organizations from forming their own alliances as oppose to a single information alliance. In order for such process to occur, there would need to be a central organization that is willing and able to attract all other organizations. I see this entire process as the ideal way that information could actually be shared between organizations. However, there are many challenges that would result from such an alliance. For example, different organizations obviously have different standards. Also, the quantity of organizations coming together would mean that there would have to be a united group of head officials from each of the organizations.
ReplyDeleteIn my heart of hearts.... hell yes there should be a punishment for not collaborating when peoples lives are in danger or while working on a technology that could possibly save lives. To me it's no better than committing a murder for money, just hit men filling the pockets of the already rich.
ReplyDeleteIn actuality hell no there shouldn't be a punishment because that's not how the world works. We saw how hard it is for the UN to accept the ever growing place and ever growing need for technology and how slowly they are adapting. The same is true for collaboration between organizations. There would be information overload, secrecy, back stabbing and complete cannibalism until eventually there would be one and only one organization for better or worse with any input.
Trust me I would love a law that forces collaboration but good deeds do not bring about information. Nobody creates to feel warm and fuzzy unless it is already too late and a disaster is upon us. You create to make money to become famous and a little t help out. The most cutting edge technologies get grants and sponsors (money) to foster growth and innovation and maybe that tech will eventually help people but most of all it comes down to the bottom line.
Maybe one day when we put our differences behind us and we become a more universal people with a more collective set of goals this will be more appropriate. For now there will always be political agendas about and fledgling ICST's trying to make it big. But NGO's there should be a law that says they have to collaborate. They are supposed to be the ones who can take a moral stand and do the right thing.
The right thing is doing whatever you can to help save people and help the most people. But I am sure there are politics there too. Someday hopefully there is a law and it will be beneficial but I do not feel that time is right now.
Good post, very thought provoking.