Non-governmental organization
organization independent of any government, usually created to aid those in need
QuotesEdit
- I just don’t understand why international NGOs need hundreds of people sitting in the North with huge teams to support Southern NGOs on the ground. Most of the resources get tied to these headquarters and little goes to the South. Real decision-making about what needs to be done and how is still decided by HQ-based Northern experts.
- Amitabh Behar, as quoted in The Stories behind Oxfam’s Withdrawal from 18 Countries (May 27, 2020) by Niduk D'Souza, Nonprofit Quarterly
- Going into this system means you cannot be against it. It's good to keep a non-governmental free organisation without money from the government, and without having to play the political games. Just to be free and to have the possibility to discuss and control each decision of the political system from the streets... It's the best and most powerful place to be.
- Oksana Shachko, as quoted in Interview: Speaking of Femen-ism (3 August 2015), Luxemburger Wort.
- The best known, and most effective, NGOs today are little more than end runs around democracy, in that they are financed and controlled by governments, corporations, and billionaires, and reflect their interests instead of the traditional grassroots NGO. No one elects these NGOs, yet they are granted a power that is far out of proportion to their physical numbers of staff. Corporate media has teamed up with these very same powerful NGOs to create a closed loop in which they are the default go-to people to speak on issues that matter to corporate or government (or billionaires’) interests. By appealing to these NGOs, a pre-arranged narrative is put into place by the corporate media, completely sidestepping citizens and the democratic process. As many on the left have pointed out, they are a burgeoning class all their own. Besides promoting and protecting the interests of the elites, they also serve to offset the overproduction of elites in the West today.
- Niccolo Soldo, Saturday Commentary and Review #73, Substack, 13 February 2022
- To reiterate: NGOs that have a prominent place in western media reporting represent the very same interests that own that same media. What I want to implant into your heads today is to automatically ask yourself this question any and every single time an NGO representative appears on TV or in print in mainstream media: who funds their NGO, and how do their interests align with the narrative that it is pushing? In short: to whom are they responsible?
- Niccolo Soldo, Saturday Commentary and Review #73, Substack, 13 February 2022
