Thinking About Africa: Practitioners and Researchers

 

It occurred to me, based on having viewed an image on the internet of someone I used to know who is now a medical doctor, that you might be able to see the Africa philanthropy efforts that people do as having two categories that they all fall into:


1.  Practice--showing up in Africa with funds and a mission to help, and then getting to work executing on a vision


2.  Research--solving problems such that the resulting solutions that can be used by practitioners in the field


For a moment, I wondered:  Should I switch my ambitions to be a practitioner?  Should I go to Africa and try to impose my vision on the area, in a nice way?


I think the answer is:  No, I should be a researcher--that's where my competitive edge lies--but, IF I GO TO GRADUATE SCHOOL IN ECONOMICS, I would want to MAKE SURE that I absolutely got and stayed in touch with philanthropic practitioners who work for non-profits and fly to Africa to help, and, that I found out what THEIR PROBLEMS THAT THEY ARE FACING ARE, and then TRY TO SOLVE THOSE PROBLEMS.


That's a good way to never run out of things to research, among other things.


I'm still on hiatus regarding reading MWG.  I've got nothing but time right now, but I'm going to just relax and do random things rather than using my brain to study.  I did 25 push-ups today by the way.

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