Did I fund Organization X?
We need smart people to identify what works, yes. We also need these same smart people to utilize their skills to meet organizations where they are, rather than trying to form them into versions of ourselves.
We need smart people to identify what works, yes. We also need these same smart people to utilize their skills to meet organizations where they are, rather than trying to form them into versions of ourselves.
Challenging bonds of poverty & oppression is about extending to people the feeling that they matter.
Ideas, challenges and insights from managers of online communities related to international development shared with us as we develop The Barefoot Guide Online Community.
When the level of community ownership of a program or organization is adequately established, a certain amount of trust can then be relied upon for accountability in a small grants scenario.
“We all want to support the kind of people whose good work would not stop if you paid them to quit. That’s what small grants can do best.” ~Chet Tchozewski, Global Greengrants Fund
Are we overlooking the capacity of local NGOs? Rather than being the lowest common denominator of international assistance, indigenous organizations should be regarded as the fundamental unit of effective development aid.
Organizational development is a discipline that needs to become more central to the practice of the development sector as a whole, not just a small professional enclave.
A local sovereign organisation is an authentic expression of the will and voice of its own constituents. While it may accept funding to provide services, it is not a surrogate vehicle for the projects of another agency’s purpose.
Sovereignty is both a quality to be developed and a right to be respected and defended. It is a particularly powerful concept when applied to organisation, suggesting authentic qualities, describing a home-grown resilience, an inside-out identity, the idea of an organisation being the expression of the free will of its own constituents.