the community vs. the public
Thursday, I was surprised to find that the health clinic where Aminata works doesn’t keep soap in the bathroom. When I complained about this to Aminata and the other nurse assigned to the vaccinations room, they offered me soap from some private stash in their cupboard. “No, no, I have my own soap too… don’t you think there should be soap in the bathroom, in general?” I asked. Aminata laughed and replied, “You want to go buy us some soap?” …implying that the center was just too poor to afford soap.
I’m kind of skeptical that it costs that much to keep a couple of locally-made bars of soap lying around, especially when several of the health center’s offices have air conditioning units that run even when it’s not that hot yet (like now). It’s odd to see the standard for-good-health-wash-your-hands and steps-to-prevent-H1N1 signs in the halls, when there isn’t soap in the bathroom.
There are a couple of reasons this situation interests me: 1, it’s not like Senegalese households don’t have soap, or even, as in the case of the two nurses, that individual health workers don’t believe that it’s important to wash their hands with soap afterwards. It’s an issue of believing in the importance of providing soap to The Public. 2, this relates to other issues with working for the “public good” or respecting “public space” as well.
For example: as in many other developing countries, trash litters most of the streets in Dakar. Even Aminata will throw plastic containers out of taxi windows without feeling guilty about it. But at home, people never leave trash lying around. Rooms and bathrooms get cleaned every day, laundry is always washed on time…
I feel like this phenomenon is especially puzzling because Senegalese society (as I’ve experienced it) is very community-driven—even more so than Indian society, I’d say. In India, people definitely respect family opinion/”listen to their elders,” and follow other related stereotypical developing-country values. But in Senegal, some random child from a woman’s husband’s village—not a blood-relation—could suddenly start living with her, even if her own husband happened to be working in the United States (as is the case with Aminata’s sister Athia). It “takes a village to raise a child;” a two-year-old could be looked after by a combination of adults while the kid’s mother works semi-permanently in a city several hours away. Even strangers look out for one another. I—a foreigner—am living with a relatively random Senegalese family, and I get the impression that regardless of their financial circumstances or life insecurities, I could stay as long as I wanted. (Incidentally, Senegal is officially known as the land of teranga, or hospitality.)
…But this strong sense of having a stake in community welfare hasn’t automatically translated into an investment in what I’m going to call “public resources.” Few or no (I’ve gotten really vague responses on this) schools actively encourage volunteer programs along with whatever sports/artistic activities they might offer. People leave televisions and fans running if they don’t personally pay for electricity according to usage. Sewage constantly spews into the streets (Dakar’s well-known for its “open sewers”).
This relates to the way people perceive public office or government too: according to Aminata, before Senegal’s current president Abdoulaye Wade took office, people had no idea/interest in what a president was supposed to contribute to the country.
Now, I don’t doubt that this is changing even as I type, following the usual trickle-down trend of people copying the wealthy/educated according to their own changing wealth/education. Plenty of Senegalese are beginning to engage in political debate, and put their faith in things like the education system and “family planning” (the phrase people use to refer to contraception in general, not just the Catholic version). But that’s not the point—the point is that all of this seems to be taking place on a path that doesn’t overlap with the existing one.
I feel like there is still something missing in local development research + practice if such a rich tradition of community-focused living hasn’t made it incredibly easy to, say, leave soap in public restrooms. Some dots need to be connected.
