CHRISTIAN DAVID
rédacteur en chef

 
DAVID WINCH
Editorial coordinator
Field issue

English

PERSONNEL LOCAL ET INTERNATIONAL: ABOLIR LA DIFFÉRENCE.

Ce mois ci vous trouverez, dans votre magazine, une variété de sujets. Le dossier principal, préparé par David Winch, concerne le terrain.
Comment, cependant, parler du terrain sans évoquer le statut du personnel national (les «locaux»)? Plusieurs témoignages sur les théâtres d’opérations laissent apparaître un écart de considération et de statut entre les locaux et les internationaux. Cette différence entre la «plèbe» et la «noblesse» se ressent depuis les salaires jusqu’à la sécurisation des sites. Bien sûr il ne s’agit pas d’une généralité, tous les acteurs des entités présentes sur le terrain ne se comportent pas ainsi. Il ne s’agit en aucun cas de mettre en cause nos collègues internationaux qui démontrent leur courage et leur sens du devoir, mais de fustiger un système «à deux vitesses».
Comment justifier pour notre organisation et les valeurs qu’elle véhicule, que des inégalités et des discriminations perdurent en son sein? La notion des droits de l’homme peutelle être proclamée au monde si elle n’est pas appliquée en interne dans certains lieux ?
Chacun d’entre nous, sans distinction de sexe, de grade travaille pour la même cause. Chacun d’entre nous est membre d’une même famille des Nations Unies.
Pourquoi ne pas profiter de la richesse de la culture et de la générosité de nos collègues locaux sur le terrain pour mieux bâtir notre lien, mieux honorer notre Organisation et la rendre conforme à ce qu’elle doit être?
Une réelle prise en considération du personnel national est indispensable. Tant que cette mesure ne sera pas mise en oeuvre, nous serons toujours considérés sur place comme un corps étranger sans aucune attache ni intégration aux valeurs et aux besoins de la population locale.
Et si, justement l’efficacité sur le terrain de notre Organisation dépendait d’une vraie prise en compte de ce problème?

ABOLISHING DIFFERENCE: LOCAL AND INTERNATIONAL PERSONNEL

This month you'll find a variety of subjects in our magazine. The mainsubject deals with field service and was prepared by David Winch.
Nevertheless, can the subject of field service be broached without mentioning the status of national staff members, usually called “locals”?
Several reports from the field have led us to believe that a gap exists in both esteem and status of local staff compared to internationals. This difference between “plebe” and “noble” is felt all the way from salaries to security.
Naturally we can't generalize, because not everyone in the field acts that way. We shouldn't demoralize our international colleagues who demonstrate courage and sense of duty in the field, but we should break down/knock out this “two-standard system.” How can we justify our Organization and the values it decries when inequality and discrimination remain in its heart/soul/in the heart of it? Can the idea of human rights be proclaimed worldwide if, in certain places, we don't apply them ourselves?
Each one of us, without distinction of gender or grade, works for the same cause. We are all members of the same United Nations family. Why not profit from the cultural richness and generosity of our local colleagues in the field to build better bonds, to honour our Organization and conform to the image it should project? To truly esteem “local” staff members is essential. As long as this isn't put into practice, we will always be considered as foreign elements in the field, with no ties to or insight into the values and needs of the local population.
And what would happen if the Organization's efficiency in the field depended on a real solution to this problem?

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE

The field is often seen as the real UN. Given impossible tasks, and pulling through despite all obstacles. That is a resilient popular image.
Both a Secretary-General and a High Commissioner for Human Rights were killed on missions. Sinai, Kashmir, Congo, Cyprus: these are contiguous with the Organization, and symbolic of it decades later.
Hence our interest in focusing this issue of a Geneva-based magazine on “The Field/Sur le terrain”. Great things are achieved on missions. And, as in all human endeavours, there are also close calls and failures. Somehow, in this vision Headquarters work is secondary and at a distance from the action.
But the notion that only the hand that directly feeds the hungry is acting for UN ideals, is not legitimate. In fact, that hand is tied to a chain of transport and administration leading back through convoys of truck and fuel purchases, currency exchanges, accounting, lodging, hiring and firing, to reporting, translating and political decision-making. All of which have a name: administration.
At Geneva, we are doubly comfortable, doing Headquarters work in a peaceful and prosperous Host country. HQ can be too inward-looking, as in the running joke about the need to appoint an Under-Secretary-General for Ferney-Voltaire Affairs. But the truth is, two wings are needed to fly. We are glad to extend our focus this month to the work of our field colleagues.