Timothy Schwartz Bio

I’ve been researching and working in Haiti and the Dominican Republic  for 27 years. I wrote my Master’s thesis about the impact of emigration on sending communities in Haiti. I wrote my PhD dissertation about subsistence strategies, child labor, and marriage patterns in rural Haiti. I lived in rural Haiti for 5 years, first in the thatch roof hut with a Haitian family and later in my own homes. I spent over 1 year in a fishing community. I wrote a popular book about the humanitarian sector in Haiti called Travesty in Haiti,  an academic book about familial organization and subsistence strategies called Sex, Family and Fertility in Haiti, and most recently another book about the failures of the humanitarian aid sector in Haiti and the role the international media has played in that failure. That book is called The Great Haiti Humanitarian Aid Swindle Disgusted with development in Haiti, I crossed the border in 2001 and went to live and work in the Dominican Republic. The first year there, I lived in a squatter settlement at the edge of a batey just outside of Santo Domingo. I worked first doing Social Impact Assessments for the Secretaria de Medio Ambiente and private corporations. But I increasingly spent time living on a sailboat and working as a diver. Between 2005 and 2008 I also did part-time work as an engineer and report writer for an international Data Center engineering company. In 2008, with the election of Obama, I began to work in Haiti once again. By 2011, I had moved back permanently. Before the earthquake I had done at least 20 major surveys and research consultancies in Haiti. Since the earthquake, in the past 9 years alone, I’ve done at least 50 consultancies for more than 70 different organizations. These posts present what I believe are the most important lessons I’ve learned from my experiences and research on the island.