Give a Man a Fish (My Perspective)

“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

The origin of this thought is highly contested. I have seen claims that that the adage is Chinese, Native American, Italian, Indian, or Biblical. Sometimes it is linked to Lao-Tzu, Maimonides, or Mao Zedong. Perhaps because of this universality, it is generally accepted as a truism and good guidance – often used as conservative justification for NOT giving free “hand-outs” to the needy.

The expression generally aligns with the Peace Corps goal of “capacity building” – training people to do a task rather than doing it for them. And, generally, I agree with it. Volunteers are trained to listen and understand what the community needs are and then cooperatively develop an inclusive plan to manifest the community desires or needs. While we will often work along side the community workers, we don’t do all the work ourselves. We train, teach, guide and make friendships as we go. We try to ensure that the project is sustainable in the long term by cooperatively developing a plan of maintenance or schedule of re-training when possible. I’ve been quoted to say “My job as a PCV is to make myself unnecessary.”. If I do things right, my community can carry on without me when I leave. I will have created “capacity” in the community that allows sustainability.

But, in my mind, the title proverb comes with some exceptions and caveats.

Sometimes, it is not enough to teach a man to fish. We must also provide the means for him to fish. What does it serve to teach a man to fish if he has no line or hook? Or if he does not live near any body of water? In my Water and Sanitation service, I have come across several communities which lack the resources to construct a water system. If I bring those resources in from outside via a grant program, I violate the capacity building axiom, but the community gets access to clean water service that was otherwise impossible. I will, of course, build capacity by training the users in proper maintenance, operations, accounting and other topics which will ensure the sustainable use of the system. I have provided the fishing line, hook and lake they needed to catch their fish and taught them how to use them.

Other times, a man might be incapable of learning to fish. An example of this is the design of a community water system. Design involves detailed calculations of pressure, volume and construction knowledge that is generally well above the education level of folks in a rural, third-world community. In such cases, I will make all the design calculations, often with the aid of online calculators to determine design and materials needed. I then make it a custom to show and try to explain them to an (often disinterested) water committee. The community will then do all the work needed to complete the plan carrying thousands of pounds of materials to site, mixing concrete, connecting and burying pipe, etc. But, the design phase is not worth teaching, since once the system is in place, those skills will rarely be used again.

And then sometimes, a man is just starving and needs a fish to eat. Right then. Right there. In those cases, I say throw the truism to the wind. If I have a fish or can arrange to get one, then my moral obligation is the give it to him. It’s just the humanitarian thing to do. An example of this is when I learned that there were 8 disabled folks in my first service site of San Luis de Canete who did not have wheelchairs. All had applied for the government mandated free chair, but none had been delivered after many years. I had the good fortune to connect with fellow Princeton Alumni Bill Farrell (P’77), who was on the board of the Wheelchair Foundation, who found me 8 beautiful wheelchairs in Lima – just for the taking. A generous and kind gift from those who had to those who had not. With the aid of my friend and socio Angel Garcia, we moved those chairs from Lima to San Luis and eight people got their free fish and regained their mobility. The project was not sustainable and I built no capacity. And I did not lose a wink of sleep over it.

So, while we might view the title proverb as ancient wisdom, we need to also acknowledge its flaws. And never lose our humanity or compassion.