Samuel Maruta of the Southern Institute of Peace-building and Development (SIPD) from Ruwa, Zimbabwe has conducted research about the role of community-based organizations (CBOs) in community development and the nature of their operating environment. He points to the need for a paradigm shift among development actors in favor of CBOs, and for CBOs to build their capacities in critical areas of… Continue

I finished the book weeks ago. When I closed Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel’s “More Than Good Intentions: How a New Economics Is Helping to Solve Global Poverty,” I had many notes and reactions jotted down but they hadn’t yet gelled. Something just didn’t sit quite right with me and I was having trouble articulating it.



Of course that’s related to… Continue

In the midst of media blitzes such as the current one, I long for something real and human more than ever. The following story from the “Readers Write” section of The Sun Magazine, fit the bill for me yesterday. And I was delighted to come across this poignant personal story from its pages on the experience of being at the receiving end of help. It offers… Continue

(Whispering.) “Psst, excuse me, but actually it’s not ‘your’ program. And if you think that it is, we may have a problem on our hands.”

Many would argue that who owns what in development is a key aspect, if not the aspect, to a project’s or program’s success.



And so a person’s choice word choice when describing their work or do-gooder endeavor can actually reveal quite a lot.



Some may think I’m just being…

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I’m sharing an interesting discussion that’s been going on via the LinkedIn Africa NGO Network group, "Why is development aid having corruption problems in Africa generally?". Some of the key contributions on root issues follow below.…

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A wannabe hot-shot technical advisor, I had just enough knowledge to be useful and just enough naïveté to be dangerous.



I was new to the country office and eager to demonstrate my monitoring and evaluation (M&E) prowess.



The task at hand was completing a mid-term review of a “problematic” implementing partner whose work focused on HIV and food security programming. There was no baseline, but go for it.



Oh, and this particular country office needed to put…

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The World Bank/IMF Spring Meetings start this week. My colleague, Tom Grubisich and I have put together a panel during the Civil Society Policy Forum entitled, "Winds of Change: Will it bring a new development paradigm?" It will take place on Friday, April 15th at 2pm EST (6pm GMT). The session overview, webcast links, and bios of participants (an exciting group if I do say so!) are featured below.



A livestream of… Continue

A Day Without Dignity is a counter-campaign to TOMS Shoes A Day Without Shoes “awareness raising campaign” i.e. commercial. Today Saundra Schimmelpfennig at Good Intentions Are Not Enough is asking people from areas that receive shoe drops and other forms of charity, the…

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The storm that has devastated Japan is hardly past. But as charities appeal and the public offers up their support, I cannot help but think of the three friends in southern Africa,…

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A former colleague recently shared with me a report from dlalanathi (meaning “play with us” in isiZulu), an organization in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa that trains and mentors local community carers of children to use play to have meaningful conversations with children about death.



Founded in December 2000, dlalanathi has experienced tremendous growth over the past decade. dlalanathi’s annual budget went from US$3,784.00 in 2000… Continue