A community of 1,367 families were uprooted from central Phnom Penh in June 2006 and forcibly relocated to open swamp land in Andong, 13 miles from the city and their livelihoods.

Why? To make way for a shopping mall that is yet to be built.

Acclaimed photographer Emma Hardy traveled to Cambodia to capture the story of this community and others, fighting to reclaim their rights to own, inhabit, and work the land they once owned. She describes what she saw in Andong slum:

“Seven years on, these families are still waiting for public services. Their latrine is an open field. Water for washing and cooking is piped in rickety plastic hoses at uncertain times of day and stored in large open earthenware jars standing in shockingly-polluted water. In the rainy seasons most makeshift homes are practically submerged in sewage water. In drier months, the stench is overwhelming. Dysentery is rife. Dengue fever and cholera are chronic. These relocated communities have not, to date, received ‘even one grain of rice in compensation.’”

Below are five photos from Hardy, some of which will be featured in a pop-up gallery exhibit in Washington, DC, from April 10^th to the 21^st. (See invite here.) The exhibit was created in support of Oxfam’s efforts to bring attention to global land grabs and was first featured in The Economist’s Intelligent Life magazine.

The pictures speak for themselves.

(1) Street view, Andong slum

(2) Woman collecting water snails for food

(3) Slum dog

(4) Sor Sat, Executive Director of the Cambodian non-profit, Action for Environment and Communities, after a long meeting

(5) Daughter of land activists at a meeting

Around the world, a rush to grab land is underway. Land the size of the California, Texas, Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico combined was sold off globally in the last decade, enough to grow food for the one billion people who go hungry today.

The World Bank influences how land is bought and sold on a global scale. It has the power to step in and play a vital role in stopping land injustice.

Now, just before the World Bank/IMF Spring Meetings, encourage the World Bank to take action to halt the speed and scale of land grabbing around the world. Let them know the world is watching. Add your voice here.

Who are the real drivers of progress in the developing world?

I can tell you one thing—it’s not us.

But most international development organizations will not tell you that. Some will portray those they are trying to help by victimizing them, i.e. “look at these poor, suffering, devastated people.” Others will romanticize the poor, i.e. “despite having nothing, they are so happy” or “an entrepreneurial spirit is what keeps the poor alive.”

These reductionist perspectives may momentarily make us feel something, but without enabling the empathic concern to take the next step, they easily can do more harm than good. Many of my fellow aid bloggers have written over the years about the stark contrast between what their organizations have in their marketing campaigns and the complex reality of programs on the ground.

Aid need not be seen as the solution, but rather as one of many tools for those at the forefront of change to use. So we asked here on Oxfam America’s Aid Effectiveness and Creative teams, what would our depiction of effective aid look like then?

This week we embark on an effort to show what we mean to policy makers in Washington D.C. In DC’s airports, metro stations and publications, ads superimpose DC-insider buzzwords such as “job creator” and “beltway outsider” with decidedly non-DC imagery—people surrounded by fishing boats in Ghana, a plant nursery in Tanzania, a roadway in Malawi.

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