So, the World Bank is wanting to help people in poor and undeveloped countries? Great! Always good to hear when someone wants to help. However, these big, global organizations have a way of not actually helping a whole lot. Pledging money, sending investigators and doing some studies don’t actually do much to really help. Yet, perhaps this time will be different, so let’s give the World Bank the benefit of the doubt and take a look at what they are proposing. 

Turns out what they are proposing is a study of economic inclusion programs. These programs typically operate by trying to introduce jobs into third world countries and training people to be able to work them. What the World Bank is attempting to do is to actually do a full study of whether or not these programs are working. You know what that means – they’re going to need a lot of data. This is where we start to get into the problems. They are collecting data of course – as they should – but they are collecting it from the 219 economic inclusion programs already underway in over seventy countries on multiple continents. But, is that really the best approach? Why get data from these programs that by their own admission, they aren’t even sure whether or not they are working?

Why not do something really crazy? Something like…getting the data from the people they are trying to help? That seems nutty, right? If you want to get the real picture of the way things are really happening on the ground you should talk to the people on the ground. That way the World Bank, or anyone else genuinely interested could find out from the actual people if their programs are working. If they are working, in what way they might be working. What actually sets them apart so they are effective? Or if one is failing miserably, they can tell you why. After all, if a program isn’t very good at its intended purpose the people running it aren’t likely to be fully honest about it. That’s just human nature. 

And who knows what the World Bank might find out? They might actually get some real answers about how to really go about developing programs that will really help people. Or they might find out something truly startling – that maybe people don’t even want them around. It is possible that people are happy with where they are at. It may be that people like being a tribe living in the jungle, or the desert, or wherever. It reminds me of a couple of things. One, an anecdote I read a long time ago about a pair of people trying to figure out how to incorporate a rural area in Russia into the global economy. Finally, another party asked what was wrong with just leaving them alone? The response was incredulous.

But of course, there are people who want nothing to do with the modern world. There are plenty of groups that simply reject it. Think of the Amish. They have chosen to live another life that is separate from the developed world. By modern standards, they are indeed poor, yet they are happy and content. Why do we assume that the people in what are considered undeveloped countries are any different?

Naturally, we shouldn’t assume that they don’t want something different either. That’s why we should go out and get that data so that we can be sure. In fact, why not go through TARTLE so that the World Bank or whomever can get the best possible data straight from the source and actually pay the people for it, thereby doing some real economic inclusion.

What’s your data worth? www.tartle.co