Drinking the Kool-Aid: How Race, Gender, and the NPIC Create a Recipe for Low Accountability
Social Sciences
Community Studies
This paper blends personal vignettes with a conjunctural analysis to examine barriers to accountability within non-profit organizations. Based on six months of participant observation at an urban farm in the Lower Ninth Ward, the findings demonstrate that political economic dynamics can interesect with intimate interpersonal dynamics to prevent accountability despite failed visions and undelivered promises. This paper incorporates analytical tools central to the Community Studies program, like Critical Race Theory, Feminist Studies, and Critical Food Studies, to locate the dynamics that enabled the executive director to silence critique and minimize oversight. Specifically, the paper examines how white privilege, gendered discourse and the Non-Profit Industrial Complex (NPIC) interact within a post-Katrina setting to position the executive director beyond reproach. These findings point to the difficulty of holding non-profit leaders accountable in post-disaster situations and in a non-profit sector that often fails to engage the needs of local communities.
