Multi-actor engagement : All Articles

Brazil launches online multistakeholder dialogues for Rio+20

25 April 2012

The Government of Brazil, as host of the June 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20), has opened nine online thematic "Sustainable Development Dialogues" to generate ideas and set the stage for the civil society discussions to be held in Rio de Janeiro from 16-19 June 2012, immediately preceding UNCSD. The Dialogues are grouped under the following themes: oceans; food and nutritional security; sustainable development for fighting poverty; sustainable development as an answer to the economic and financial crises; sustainable energy for all; water; the economics of sustainable development; sustainable cities and innovation; and unemployment, decent work and migration.

Evaluation for equitable development results

01 April 2012

This wide-ranging publication aims to contribute to the international debate on how to achieve equitable development results by conceptualizing, designing, implementing and using evaluations focused on human rights and equity. It does so by offering a number of strong contributions from 27 world-level experts and senior officers in institutions and governments dealing with development and evaluation. The authors also presented their contribution in a series of webinars that are available for download on the My M&E web portal. The book complements an earlier manual “ How to design and implement equity-focused evaluations,” published in 2011.

What future for Vietnamese bamboo?

25 March 2012

Government intervention – essential for an enabling environment

In eastern China, thousands of smallholders generate substantial incomes from bamboo. But across the border in Vietnam where conditions are, if anything, more favourable, smallholders are moving out of bamboo. An opportunity will go to waste here unless local authorities take the initiative.

LenCD case stories database

24 March 2012

Case stories are an important and accessible way of sharing experiences and learning lessons. Many organisations publish case stories on their websites, but finding these stories has always required a good deal of research.

LenCD (Learning Network on Capacity Development), has been building up an index of case stories including material from the United Nations Development Programme, the Task Team on South–South Cooperation, SNV, the World Bank Institute, ECDPM, and other sources.

More than 500 case stories have now been catalogued and are searchable by country and by keyword on www.lencd.org/case-stories.

Feature: Making markets work for smallholders?

23 March 2012

Capacity and agency

The polarised debate on how markets can work for or against the interests of small-scale farmers, presents major challenges for practitioners. This article aims to rebalance our thinking about smallholders and markets.

Strengthening pastoralist voices in Tanzania

14 February 2012

This booklet, and its accompanying DVD, reports on the ‘Strengthening Voices’ project, underway in two districts in northern Tanzania. The project aims to strengthen the capacity of pastoralist communities and local governments to shape strategies for adaptive environmental management and poverty reduction in Tanzania’s drylands. At the core of the project is a training course that explains the economic and ecological processes at the heart of pastoral systems - clarifying the rationale that underpins pastoral livelihood strategies.The course is based on a similar initiative that has been field-tested and run in the Sahel region of West Africa since 2000.

Building capacity for competitive agricultural systems and enterprises in West Africa (Video)

30 January 2012

This film presents four examples of Agri-Business Clusters in Ghana and Togo. They illustrate the experience of entrepeneurial individuals in building small to medium scale businesses through new relationships with colleagues and so-called Agri-Business Cluster and Value Chain partners. 

Capacity building for local NGOs: A guidance manual for good practice

15 January 2012

In the early 1990s, as Somaliland emerged from civil war and conflict, indigenous non-governmental and community-based organisations mushroomed. International organisations began targeting reconstruction and development aid through local organisations and quickly came to realise the need for institutional strengthening and capacity building. To coordinate these efforts, a number of organisations came together to create an international NGO forum known as the Capacity Building Caucus (CBC) in 1999. The aim of the CBC was to ensure learning from best practice, coordinate, capacity-building activities, and eventually to promote sustainability through a ‘training of trainers’ programme for Somali capacity- building officers.

This package of manuals was developed in part as a curriculum for the training of trainers programme, and in part for use by individual local organisations to assist them in the ongoing process of developing their own capacity.

CAPACITY → RESULTS

30 November 2011

This new publication from the Learning Network on Capacity Development (LenCD) features case stories on capacity development and development results. The collection showcases how endogenous investments in capacity development have led, over time, to produce short, medium and long-term sustainable results.

SNV Practice Brief: Supporting domestic accountability

25 November 2011

Accountability can be an abstract concept, but it comes alive for ordinary citizens if it involves looking at whether (and how) funding for services is distributed and spent at the local level. This Practice Brief is the first of a new series prepared by practitioners working with the SNV Netherlands Development Organisation. It helps to shed some light on what support organisations can do to amplify the voice of local stakeholders in demanding greater accountability from governments and service providers.

Capacity development for education for all (CapEFA): Translating theory into practice

24 November 2011

UNESCO's Education for All Global Monitoring Report (2011) suggests that national barriers to Education for All (EFA) have been largely under-estimated and that, over the past decade, insufficient attention has been paid to strategies for overcoming them. The recently launched publication “Capacity Development for Education for All: Translating Theory into Practice” offers an opportunity for UNESCO to reflect upon its capacity development approach while bringing together some of the crucial achievements and lessons learned through the CapEFA programme.

Training opportunity: Facilitating value chains

10 November 2011

Enterprise Development through Value Chains and Business Service Markets: A Market Development approach to Pro-Poor Growth is an 8-month distance learning course offered by the International Training Centre of the International Labour Organisation (ITC ILO) in Turin, Italy.  The course will appeal to professionals involved in developing and implementing Value Chain and enterprise development projects. The course starts on 19th March 2012 and will comprise four modules of two months each.

In and above Conflict - A study on Leadership in the United Nations

27 October 2011

Peace is seldom concluded when a peace deal is signed. The principal external role in consolidating peace frequently falls to United Nations (UN) missions and agencies. Their ability to achieve this task is contingent on many factors including resources and cohesive international political support. It depends most critically on effective leadership. What are the unique, defining challenges to UN leadership in conflict and post conflict environments? How have effective UN leaders approached these challenges?

Evaluating capacity development

13 September 2011

Why evaluations seldom satisfy – could we do better?

As capacity development becomes mainstreamed in international development assistance programmes, demand for the systematic evaluation of capacity-development initiatives is growing. Doug Horton explains how the evaluation of capacity development can be improved.

Interview: Changing the sanitation mindset

12 September 2011

Abadh Kishore Mishra, Regional director, Regional Monitoring and Supervision Office of the Department of Water Supply and Sewerage in Surkhet, Nepal
 

Water and sanitation in Nepal’s Midwestern Region
 

In the past, efforts to improve access to sanitation in Nepal’s Midwestern Development Region were hampered by fragmentation and by the rigid mindset of some development agencies. This changed when the country’s Regional Monitoring and Supervision Office at the Department of Water Supply and Sewerage stepped in.
 

Facilitating resourcefulness: Synthesis evaluation report of Dutch support for capacity development published

29 August 2011

A long-awaited evaluation report of Dutch support for capacity development carried out by the Policy and Operations Evaluation Department (IOB) of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been published. The report synthesizes the findings of seven separate evaluations carried out since 2008, and covering 26 individual case studies. The evaluation is the result of collaboration between IOB and six Dutch NGOs (Agriterra, Netherlands Commission for Environmental Assessment, Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy, Partos, PSO, SNV) and the Ghana Ministry of Health.

Changing minds: A guide to facilitated participatory planning

26 August 2011

This book draws on the work of thinkers and doers throughout the world who have grappled with the challenge of planning complex institutions, especially health systems and development projects. Their problem: Conventional planning methods often do not work. The solution: Involve all the key stakeholders in making the plan. The challenge: Devise a planning system that the principals and stakeholders can trust, and that is inclusive, balanced, and dynamic.

Building competitiveness in Africa's agriculture: a guide to value chain concepts and applications

15 August 2011

Using real examples, mostly from African countries, this book reviews and illustrates a range of concepts, analytical tools, and methodologies centered on the value chain that can be used to design, implement, and evaluate agricultural and agribusiness development initiatives that strive to enhance productivity and competitiveness.

Taking responsibility for complexity

21 June 2011

Implementers of development policies and programmes must deal with interdependent problems, navigating nonlinear and often unpredictable change processes, involving a diverse range of stakeholders. The point of departure of this ODI discussion paper published in June 2011 is that the main problem is not (necessarily) intractable problems, or poor application of the right tools, but rather use of the wrong tools for the job. Rather than specify what problems should be considered ‘complex’, the paper aims to give readers the tools to decide for themselves whether an issue faced is complex, and to provide guidance on what to do if it is.

An innovative methodology for assessing multi-stakeholder networks

24 May 2011

In this informative blog post, Steve Waddell reflects on a recent study focusing on the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder relationships, which he describes as a notoriously under-developed field. The study was commissioned by the International Land Coalition, a multi-stakeholder network aiming to promote secure and equitable access to, and control over, land through advocacy, dialogue, knowledge sharing and capacity building. The blog explains the unique methodology developed by iScale (a global network that works to advance the effectiveness of social change efforts through process, methodological and technological innovations) for conducting such assessments.

Theory of Change: A thinking and action approach to navigate in the complexity of social change processes

22 May 2011

Jointly published by Hivos and UNDP, this guide synthesizes the core of the methodological contents and steps that are developed in a Theory of Change design workshop. It is aimed at the rich constellation of actors linked to processes of social development and change: bilateral donors, community leaders, political and social leaders, NGO’s representatives, community-base organizations, social movements, public decision makers, and other actors related to social change processes.

Strengthening stakeholder ownership for capacity development results: A conceptual framework

19 May 2011

This 48-page paper published by the World Bank Institute (WBI) in May 2011 seeks to deepen understanding of the importance of stakeholder ownership in achieving development goals. It describes the conceptual framework and processes that underpin WBI's approach - the Capacity Development Results Framework -  which aims to bring about development outcomes by supporting institutional change.

Organizational learning in Mexican agriculture

15 April 2011

To be an effective poverty alleviation instrument, agricultural policies (including research, extension, and innovation) must be based on an evolutionary approach that emphasizes experimentation, learning, and active interactions among diverse partners. However, most agricultural research and extension policies and institutions in developing countries lack the necessary flexibility to implement such an approach. Instead, they apply uniform recipes and struggle with organizational rigidities and other problems. Notable exceptions to this trend have been the Mexican Produce Foundations (PFs). 

Online discussion: Is capacity development on the brink of maturity?

21 March 2011

We are pleased to invite you to participate in an online discussion on some of the issues tackled in "Capacity Development in Practice", the resource volume for practitioners.

Evaluation of capacity-building impacts of Belgian NGO Partnerships

04 March 2011

This report describes the results and conclusions of the evaluation of Belgian NGO partnerships and capacity development (CD) commissioned by the Belgian Directorate-General of Development Cooperation and carried out by a consortium led by HIVA at the University of Leuven. 

Multi-stakeholder learning partnerships in support of small-scale farming

22 January 2011

The December 2010 issue of "Farming Matters", a quarterly magazine published by the Centre for learning on sustainable agriculture (ILEIA) addresses the theme of "Partnerships for learning." Some questions raised in this issue include: what do the many different people and organizations labelled as "stakeholders" in small-scale family farming learn from each other? How do they learn to work together to create more sustainable agriculture? What drives them to collaborate? 

Call for applications: Establishing multi-stakeholder partnerships to promote demand-driven agricultural innovation and research

17 January 2011

The second phase of the Platform for African-European Partnership in Agricultural Research for Development (PAEPARD) is a European Commission-funded (FP7) programme to support partnerships for agricultural innovation. PAEPARD II nurtures partnerships to increase the quantity and quality of joint proposals (leading to more funded initiatives). 

The programme has issued a call for applications from innovative partnerships interested in seeking funding under this window. The deadline for applications is 28 January 2010.

Multi-actor systems as entry points to capacity development

26 December 2010

Reasons for a revision of intervention logic

It is often assumed that capacity development starts from within individuals and organisations and then permeates into society. But capacity also comes about through interaction between actors. This suggests that a change in intervention logic and repertoire can boost effectiveness.  

What it takes

26 December 2010

Competencies needed to design and facilitate MSPs

Multi-stakeholder processes (MSPs) are playing an increasingly important role in sustainable development. Designing and facilitating MSPs depends on a set of diverse competencies.

Case studies: Multi-actor systems as entry points to capacity development

21 December 2010

The following case studies from Ethiopia, Uganda and Kenya provide some real-life experiences of how multi-actor capacity development takes place. 

Steve Waddell (2011) Global Action Networks: Creating our future together, Palgrave Macmillan

16 December 2010

This book seeks to provide guidance for those engaged in multi-stakeholder processes at the global level through Global Action Networks (GANs). Steve Waddell sees GANs as communities of like-minded people from different backgrounds working together to address global challenges such as climate change, deforestation, the international financial crisis and poverty. GANs bring together people working with government, businesses and NGOs.

Paradox or synergy?

13 December 2010

Multi-stakeholder partnerships as a donor strategy

The Interchurch Organisation for Development Cooperation (ICCO) is a Dutch donor agency engaged in facilitating and funding multi-stakeholder partnerships. Its unique approach has been adopted by five other organisations in the ICCO Alliance.

How do our readers see us?

10 December 2010

Coming up to the end of 2010, we decided to ask our readers what they thought of Capacity.org. So far, there has been a tremendous response, in English, French and Spanish. As we go to print, we have had a high level of response from staff and affiliates of SNV and ICCO and we are still receiving responses from ECDPM policy makers and other personnel. We would like to thank everyone for taking the time to respond and pass on their opinions and ideas.

The Change Alliance

10 December 2010

The Change Alliance is an emerging global network that aspires to increase the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder processes (MSPs) working for transformational social change, particularly in complex settings.

The dynamics of change

10 December 2010

Dealing with power – the key to successful MSPs?

For over ten years, Wageningen UR Centre for Development Innovation (CDI) has been offering capacity development programmes to support the practitioners of multi-stakeholder processes (MSPs). One of the most important functions of these programmes is to prepare facilitators to work with power and conflict in order to bring about successful outcomes.

Working with power and love

09 December 2010

Solving our toughest problems - uncoventionally

Conventional approaches to solving problems cannot deal effectively with increasingly complex social crises. Our efforts to address ‘tough’ issues in this way often cause us to become ever more confused, polarised and stuck.

From token inclusion to transformative engagement

09 December 2010

Urban planning in India

Although labelled ‘participatory’, many urban planning processes in India involve only select elite groups. This article explains what is required to achieve genuine participation involving all stakeholders, including the poor and the marginalised.

Facilitating multi-actor change

08 December 2010

In the practice of capacity development, we have seen a gradual shift away from training individuals to strengthening organizations. Currently, the emphasis seems to be shifting again; from working with single organisations to facilitating multi-stakeholder processes (MSPs). But it would be a mistake to assume that MSPs are just the latest fad in the discourse on capacity development (CD). In fact, they have always been an integral part of human interaction. MSPs spring up whenever people or organisations see that collaboration can help to seize development opportunities.

Facilitating WASH forums

08 December 2010

Practical guide to capacity development in a sector context

09 November 2010

This guide, published in May 2008, was specifically designed for practitioners working with capacity development (CD) processes. The target group is staff and managers in public organizations who are or want to be change agents or change managers, consultants, as well as staff from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) or other development partners who wish to support CD processes.

Perspectives on partnership

08 November 2010

Empirical studies of partnerships are few and far between. This Working Paper by the International Potato Center in Lima, Peru, reports on a wide-ranging review of the literature on partnerships and other closely related forms of collaboration.

Supporting the creation and mobilisation of practial knowledge for social change

08 November 2010

Conventional methods such as surveys, questionnaires, and focus groups offer little scope for imagination or originality in search for solutions which are meaningful and relevant to the people involved.

Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict

08 November 2010

GPPAC is a world-wide civil society-led network which aims to build a new international consensus on peacebuilding and the prevention of violent conflict. It was established in 2003 in response to the call of former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in his Report on the Prevention of Armed Conflict (2001). GPPAC strengthens civil society networks for peace and security by linking local, national, regional, and global levels of action and provides an effective vehicle for engagement with governments, the UN system, and regional organizations.

Case study: mediation and collaboration for fishery resource management

08 November 2010

The case study describes the design of the workshop and reflects on the learning process that took place. In this description, the focus is on the different facilitation steps and emerging elements or lesson of multi-stakeholder learning processes. The workshop was held in the beginning of 2002 and was one of the results of a collaboration between the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Universidad Católica de Valparaíso's Escuela del Mar (School of the Sea).

Networks and Capacity

08 November 2010

A theme paper prepared by ECDPM for the study ‘Capacity, Change and Performance’

Mapping Dialogue: Dialogue Tools and Processes for Social Change

08 November 2010

This is a document from a research project profiling dialogue tools and processes for social change

Work the Net - A Management Guide for Formal Networks

08 November 2010

This guide describes how formal networks can be set up, managed and used.

Parliamentary outreach and advocacy in India

08 November 2010

CUTS is a civil society organization that strives to influence national policies in the areas of international trade, competition, consumer protection and economic regulation.

Puntland Health Partnership Programme

29 October 2010

Somalia’s maternal and infant mortality rates are among the highest in the world. Working with local NGOs and health centres, the Puntland Health Partnership programme is succeeding in improving access to quality services for thousands of women.

Providing education for all

29 October 2010

There is now global consensus on the need to enhance education for girls, particularly through well coordinated partnerships. Nitya Rao and Ines Smyth assess the experiences of a number of partnerships in promoting girls’ education.

Getting to partnership

29 October 2010

Whether or not the label ‘partnership’ is appropriate, the message in this issue of Capacity.Org is clear: in service delivery relationships matter. But less plain are processes that create successful interactions between diverse organisations – communities, ministries, local governments, aid agencies, NGOs, private sector contractors, etc. We therefore need to look at the neglected use of skilled, professional support to help organisations learn to work well together.

Engaged or divorced?

29 October 2010

In many countries non-state providers play a vital role in the delivery of basic services. Based on research in six countries, Richard Batley assesses how governments could work in partnership with non-state providers and promote better services for poor communities.

Building a shared vision for change

29 October 2010

In promoting a community-based approach to natural resources management, the ISDA project has learned that influential ‘champions’ are essential for building an agreed vision for change, and for getting the changes to stick.

Experiences with networks in Ghana

29 October 2010

Throughout Africa civil society networks are successfully engaging with the state and attempting to influence public policy in order to accelerate poverty reduction and national development. Drawing on the experiences of civil society networks in the PRSP process in Ghana, this article discusses whether engagement has actually led to their empowerment.

Building cross-sector partnerships

29 October 2010

Can partnerships between public, business and civil society organisations be more effective than single-sector initiatives in addressing the challenges of sustainable development? For any organisation that decides to venture into cross-sector partnerships, The Partnering Toolbook is a good place to start.

Networks and partnerships

29 October 2010

Networks and partnerships may offer a perspective that may help us in understanding organisations, both large and small, and in shaping our efforts to improve their performance.

Accountability builds legitimate government

29 October 2010

Strengthening the accountability of government officials to their constituents provides an important impetus to boosting their capacity to govern effectively. However, as examples from Iraq and Indonesia show, the legitimacy of the government is an important criterion for success.

Tracking progress in advocacy

05 October 2010

This INTRAC paper, published in December 2009, introduces the scope of, and rational for, engaging in advocacy work as part of development interventions

Partnerships for service delivery: what makes them tick?

29 August 2010

Issue 27 of Capacity.org addressed the roles of networks and partnerships in capacity development. To take the discussion one step further, and make it more concrete and specific, this issue focuses on the role of partnerships in the delivery of basic services.