Humanitarian and International Development NGOs

Today the Hauser Center hosted Duncan Green, head of research at Oxfam GB, to discuss his new book, From Poverty to Power.  Lant Pritchett, professor of the practice of international development, offered a response.

Some quick reflections:

Duncan’s thesis is that development is best achieved through (1) active citizenship and (2) effective states.  While instinctively we might place these two in opposition to each other, they can be compatible and complementary.  To be successful in alleviating poverty, the two must combine to redistribute power within markets so that poor people benefit:

The impact of markets on poverty and inequality depends on whether poor people can exert influence over the way they operate.

Working from his thesis, Duncan offered the following pressing issues for NGOs (this is my interpretation):

• Inequality vs. poverty.  NGOs should focus on inequality, which puts their focus on the imbalance of power that leads to poverty, and forces them out of the mindset that poverty is just about lack of income or assets.
• Religious blind spot.  Whereas most NGOs focus on secular policy, much development takes place through faith communities and the influence they hold on people’s lives.
• Focus on urban areas.  NGOs suffer from “peasant romanticism,” focusing efforts on rural villages and communities, when most poor people are now found in urban areas.
• Making states effective.  NGOs may be too small to have much influence on states and make them effective (which begs the question - then who?).
• Migration.  The NGO community is mostly missing on the question of making migration a humane, dignified experience.  They have yet to take a stand in the hot political environment.
• Accountability.  NGOs are often less accountable then the actors and institutions that they accuse of suffering from a lack of accountability.
• Emergencies vs. long-term development.  Emergencies - whether complex political emergencies or natural disasters - are “shocks” that offer significant opportunity for systemic change.  Yet during the brief opening in the aftermath of crisis, NGOs focus on providing and restoring services - putting on the ground experts in providing relief - rather than bringing in the expertise - the economists, the policy analysts and developers - to effect structural changes that lead to successful long-term development.  Time to turn that on its head.
• New global institutions.  This moment of global financial crisis may be one of the few real opportunities to create new global institutions capable of regulating and redistributing power.  Otherwise such processes typically experience enormous resistance and are agonizingly slow.
• Overselling globalization.  Most development remains at the national level.  NGOs may be focusing too much energy and advocacy on international campaigns.
• Understanding change.  NGOs need better models for understanding how change occurs and being able to track progress.

Much food for thought.  I was especially struck by the point that the aftermath of emergencies is an  opportunity to advance social change.  It rang true - the social and government structures are so often unsettled, and those in charge more willing to incorporate new ideas and policies, especially if such policies reduce the vulnerability that the crisis has brought into such relief.   NGOs might make relatively easy changes to their approach and have great impact doing so.

I’m sorry we didn’t get to explore the question of accountability more deeply.  How are NGOs less accountable than they purport?

What jumps out at you?

Michael Edwards, who recently stepped down as director of the Governance and Civil Society Program at the Ford Foundation, explores similar issues in “Have NGOs Made a Difference?”*

He finds that development NGOs have been influential in getting the mainstream to address the negative aspects of globalization, commit to participation and human rights as basic principles of development, and grapple with the implications of critical global issues like climate change and poverty in Africa.

Yet he views their performance wanting on several fronts - mainly that they have not been innovative enough to fundamentally influence the political structures that perpetuate poverty and human rights abuses, nor change the power relations that define class, gender, and race.

He worries that their increasing reliance on government funds and concern about “market imperatives” - such as fundraising and brand identity - make them crowd out the participation and voice of indigenous and Southern-based civil society, even while increasing it is a stated goal.

An interesting aspect of this analysis is the apparent contradiction that the growth in NGO scale and capacity over the last 20 years has allowed them to be credible participants in influential policy debates - yet has also created organizational pressures that complicate (or, as Edwards argues, dilute) relationships with constituents and affect the willingness of NGOs to undertake certain strategies.

This is not a theoretical issue.  As Peter Bell, former president and CEO of CARE USA and a senior research fellow at the Hauser Center pointed out during “Are NGOs Changing World Politics?”: NGOs have evolved from being proudly apolitical and recognize the need to influence policy and governance, but they are often up against well-financed, organized lobbies.  Look at the difficulty in changing the U.S. Farm Bill, which has a significant impact on world food markets and global food security.  Scale, scope, and credibility help one compete.

They may also change an organization’s appetite for risk and make it more careful about protecting its viability and reputation.  Scale can tempt NGOs to be less of an alternative — less willing to advocate radical change or push constituents to the front of the debate — and more mainstream.

What’s an NGO leader to do?  Edwards points to the potential of strengthening relationships between NGOs and social movements.  In the U.S., NGOs helped incubate the ONE Campaign.  Even here, the need to improve public education about the complexities of development and guard against the urge to oversimplify are real.  Partnering with and building the capacity of social movements in developing countries is a long-term process, and critical policy decisions are moving forward now.

Peter Bell points to value of NGOs working in collaboration.  This holds promise for increasing influence but is unlikely to increase the “alternativeness” of the proposed solutions.

Much of the nonprofit literature on “scaling up” is concerned with how to do it.  While the possibility of mission drift is always mentioned in treatises on growth, I think we’d benefit from far more analysis about the changes in perspective that an organization is likely to encounter, and the mission-related strategic opportunities and pitfalls that “going to scale” might bring — and how to maximize the former while avoiding the latter.

* from Can NGOs Make a Difference? The Challenge of Development Alternatives, edited by Anthony Bebbington, Samuel Hickey, and Diana Mitlin.

Princeton recently announced plans to send a tenth or more of its incoming students abroad to do social service for a year, before they enter as freshmen (Princeton Plans for an Early Year Abroad).

While much of the nonprofit sector is worried about a looming leadership crisis (see Bridespan’s seminal report The Nonprofit Sector’s Leadership Deficit, and the Casey Foundation’s Next Shift), anecdotally I sense that NGOs working on international poverty are being inundated with energetic, smart students and recent graduates eager to work overseas. The problem with the pipeline for international organizations does not seem to be attracting the young talent, but developing the skills and experience that will make them effective in facilitating community development in remote and culturally diverse areas, a complicated undertaking.

Details were scant about where students will be placed and to what extent their experiences would be linked to their subsequent studies, but I suspect that an NGO or two will be consulted or involved in structuring this service abroad. If the service is intentionally integrated with Princeton’s curriculum and resources to help develop new leaders prepared for the difficulties of international development, it could be a boon indeed. Otherwise, what might be good for students could end up having questionable value for the communities being served and the sector.