The system labels communities dealing with violence, poverty, or weak governance as those having “needs,” while outsiders are those with the resources and expertise who come to help. This deficit-based lens has a totalizing effect, making it more difficult to see, much less build on, the resources and potential already present within communities “in need.” This way of seeing supports a hierarchy built into the status quo: international experts are at the “top” of a system of knowledge, capacity, and resources, and local communities are at the bottom. The system we were trained to work in
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