The power of participatory monitoring and evaluation: insights from south-west China

This article examines the capacity-building experiences of two research teams in Yunnan and Guizhou provinces in south-west China who used participatory monitoring and evaluation (PM&E) to strengthen their development research, particularly in the area of natural-resource management (NRM). The authors describe their efforts to incorporate PM&E practices in their work. The process proved challenging, despite political and economic changes in China that aim to allow more space for local voice and decision-making power in the management of natural resources and other village affairs. Institutionalising PM&E has still a long way to go and will require more field practice, greater integration in the processes of organisational development, and stronger connections with agendas of political change.     

The World Bank's land of kiosks: Community driven development in Timor-Leste

The World Bank's Community Empowerment and Local Governance Project (CEP) was the key donor programme to assist with community reconstruction in a newly independent Timor-Leste. Commencing in 2000, the US$18 million project provided funds to over 400 local development councils that had been newly created to meet their community's development needs. Rather than creating genuine participatory structures, tight deadlines to disburse project funds and bureaucratic project rules reduced the councils to little more than transmission lines to Bank-controlled dollars. By bypassing existing governance structures, including that of the fledging government, the councils also bypassed sources of local legitimacy and technical knowledge, which resulted in community conflict, indifference, and poor project sustainability. The CEP's poorly administered microcredit scheme led to a proliferation of unviable kiosks—underlining the folly of hastily attempting to construct a market economy on a deeply scarred subsistence economy.     

Community sustainable-development indicators: a useful participatory technique or another dead end?

This article undertakes a critical re-evaluation of a DFID-funded project in South Africa which ran between 1998 and 2001. The evaluation sought to test whether the development of community-led indicators would improve governance. Since the project ended, a series of papers have been published that are critical of such participatory methods, arguing particularly that they are apolitical and adopt a technocratic approach. In the light of these criticisms, this article re-assesses the DFID project, following on from the initial evaluation carried out by the author in 2001. Sobantu, a black township in Pietermaritzburg, was one of the original project sites. It was chosen as the subject for research because the local implementing agency was a politically astute, well-connected institution that understood the political nature of the process required to develop the indicators. Although the project achieved some positive outcomes, the long-term commitment to the indicators has since been compromised. This was in large part due to the inability of community members to engage meaningfully with key municipal service providers. However, recent changes to the South African planning regime might provide opportunities for the indicators to become more useful again.     

At the root of participatory approaches: uncovering the role of accompaniment

This article examines the impact of a participatory development project in rural Uganda and offers explanations for the results obtained. Though successful in facilitating the creation of specific goods and services, the project did not fully realise its intended outcome: empowering local actors and generating lasting human development. These mixed results were the consequence of inconsistent dialogue and listening among the actors, often resulting in a lack of genuine accompaniment. In evaluating community engagement through the lens of accompaniment, the study considers the potential for participatory approaches to overcome often-asserted criticisms, namely the presence of dependency and elite capture.     

Transdisciplinary innovation research in Uzbekistan – one year of ‘Follow-the-Innovation’

In 2008, a German-funded interdisciplinary research project in Khorezm province, Uzbekistan, initiated a participatory approach to innovation development and diffusion with local stakeholders. Selected agricultural innovations, developed by the project and identified as ‘plausible promises’, have since then been tested and modified accordingly by teams of researchers, local farmers and water users. This paper discusses the challenges faced in this process of joint experimentation and learning between researchers and local stakeholders whose behaviours, attitudes and actions are heavily shaped by the local context, academic discipline and hierarchical culture of knowledge governance.     

Pledges not kept: JICA's project challenges in Ghana

Japan's project aid initiatives for capacity development still occupy a large part of the aid discourse of the country's development cooperation programme. Over the years, Japan's development rhetoric has been significantly adapted to the wider policy shifts of Western donor countries and has introduced in its programme and project documents such terms as ‘ownership’, ‘needs-based approach’, and ‘participatory’ initiatives in order to achieve more ‘sustainable’ results. Furthermore, the importance of ‘institutional memory’ has been repeatedly highlighted by Japan as an important element for greater project effectiveness. This article investigates how this development rhetoric translates in Japan International Cooperation Agency's (JICA) project practice in a three-year community-based initiative in rural Ghana. The results illustrate that despite the short-term benefits the project has brought to the targeted communities, the development practice of JICA falls short of its discursive representation and more effort is needed by JICA toward a more committed and inclusive project practice.     

Stakeholders’ relations and power dynamics in development cooperation: lessons learnt from Egypt

One of the key factors why international development cooperation programmes do not achieve sustainable results is their failure to respond to the dynamics of local stakeholders’ relations. This article highlights the case of a fruit and vegetable market in an informal area of Greater Cairo that was redeveloped by a programme supported by German International Cooperation. Although the market was developed using participatory methods, the vendors deserted it. Analysis reveals the conflicting interests of vendors and the district administration were reflected in divergent models of market operation. The paper recommends that development cooperation recognise the legitimacy of existing power structures and stakeholders’ relations.     

Community assessment of NGO housing delivery: lessons from Port Vila,Vanuatu

This article reports on a 2016 field-based multiple case study of three communities in peri-urban Port Vila, Vanuatu. It offers robust empirical evidence that participatory planning, partnerships, and programme evaluation, as espoused in the literature from the last two decades and readdressed in Habitat III Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, is not regularly occurring in aid-based housing programmes. The study identifies that in sacrificing consultation – community cohesion, capacity building, resiliency, and innovation, are also sacrificed. This research differs from peer literature by employing an inductive and underutilised methodology, storytelling, and by focusing on an at-risk country which receives little academic, NGO, or development attention.     

Communication strategy for community development: a case study of the Heifer project – South Africa

ABSTRACT

The objective of this qualitative pilot study was to develop a model to be used by a development agency in formulating communication strategy for community development, providing direction to development communication (DC) specialists/facilitators to play a more strategic role in the development process. Based on the findings of a literature study on communication strategy for development, as well as a case study on The Heifer Project – South Africa, the researchers suggest that an existing model for developing corporate communication strategy (Steyn 2000a) can be used for this purpose.

A major insight that emerged from the study was that the existing model for developing corporate communication strategy might also be applied in another context (with slight adaptations in terminology), namely to formulate ‘corporate’ communication strategy for the community/action group involved in the development project – more aptly to be called ‘development’ communication strategy. Such a strategy would make the participatory approach to development, and especially the participatory communication approach, even more ‘participatory’, since the strategic information on issues and stakeholders will be provided by the community and its designated communicator(s) themselves.     

Mapping the road to development: a methodology for scaling up participation in policy processes

Understanding local variability in context and mobilising local participation to define development agendas are widely accepted development strategies. There remain, however, significant challenges to the systematic and effective inclusion of local communities and households. Projeto MAPLAN, a pilot project in Ceará, Brazil, is a joint effort of the public sector and civil society designed to create a process of participatory development planning which integrates local-level contextual variations. In this effort, the use of a Participatory Geographic Information System (PGIS) stimulates the participation of community members in analysing their needs, goals, and priorities. The visualisation of these factors through easily understood maps facilitates communication and contributes to a democratic and transparent planning process, thus permitting the articulation of local priorities with the state-level planning apparatus. MAPLAN represents part of a shifting paradigm for rural development planning in the state and provides the tools for the effective inclusion of citizen voice in development policy.     

Strategic planning through a participatory learning and action framework: a Kenyan study

This paper reflects on the use of a participatory learning and action (PLA) framework in a strategic planning process (SPP) at a primary school in rural Kenya. Successes and challenges are discussed, focusing on the barriers to fully implementing the PLA framework. Additionally, lessons learnt and ways forward for participatory SPPs are outlined. The PLA framework allowed the project stakeholders to engage in a planning process that gave participants a voice in the process. Although PLA methodology faces shortcomings, the application of this model is a step towards making community development more sustainable.     

Skills development in South Africa: Group Five's social investment project

The boom in the construction industry in South Africa has drawn attention to the need for skills development. This article reports on an evaluation of the ‘People at the Gate’ training programme initiated by Group Five in Gauteng and Mpumalanga Provinces. The programme aims to empower unemployed local community members in areas where the company operates. The programme targets women and men who come to the company's sites looking for possible employment and are unable to be accommodated due to their lack of skills. The study evaluated the difficulties that trainees are faced with during and after the project; employment opportunities that are created; and the skills most needed in different trades and provinces.     

Poverty elimination,North-South research collaboration,and the politics of participatory development

This paper reflects critically on issues of North-South collaboration and participatory research arising from a project on participatory and sustainable local-level environmental management in the peri-urban area surrounding Kumasi, Ghana. Rapid immigration, uncoordinated conversion of farmland to housing, intensified resource exploitation, and declining water quality and availability are particularly pressing problems there. Collaborative research arrangements with local partners as well as sustained participatory relations with selected village communities were central to this project. More generally, the paper reflects on institutional issues relating to the dichotomy between research and development assistance projects, and their implications for project evaluations.     

Active citizenship or passive clientelism? Accountability and development in Solomon Islands

Active citizenship and participatory community-development approaches have evolved partly in response to perceived aid-dependency among rural communities. In Solomon Islands these methods have met with mixed success. This article reflects on the frustration often felt by local and international development workers when working with rural communities. It questions some of the assumptions that shape the way in which development workers and programmes understand the types of community which make up Solomon Islands.     

Can technology change the existing culture? Case study on Bangladesh’s public sector

This article highlights the challenges development aid donors can face in Bangladesh’s post-colonial culture, as well as substantiating how lack of quality control in an aid project can influence local values, beliefs, and subjective experiences. The article also suggests that improving quality control, such as through monitoring and evaluation (M&E), can generate greater impact of development aid resources.     

‘Communities of practice’: prospects for theory and action in participatory development

‘The myth of community’ permeates both the understanding and the practice of participatory development. Yet the idea that communities exist as coherent units of people who inhabit bounded geographic spaces and are ready to be mobilised for development restricts the very agency that participation promises. This article offers an alternative model of community: one that is more compatible with the ideal of people-centred, participatory development. Using Etienne Wenger's concept of ‘communities of practice’, and drawing on narrative theory and cognitive approaches to policy analysis, the article argues that community should be created and sustained around shared meanings.     

Towards formulating effective research and development national strategies in Arab countries

Extremely weak R&D has a negative impact on growth and development in Arab countries. Developing a better R&D strategy could enhance capacity and effectiveness of R&D. The failure of the previously developed strategies in Arab countries was due to lack of vision, incorrect identification of R&D priorities, and disregard consulting stakeholders. This article discusses the challenges of developing R&D national strategies in Arab countries including identifying R&D priorities, managing stakeholders, assessing the current situation of R&D, and defining objectives of the strategies.     

Positioning independent community media: Findings from a case study of six small South African newspapers

Abstract

This article brings defining aspects of ‘community media’ – as proposed by a group of media stakeholders – into dialogue with research findings from a study on small ‘independent media’. One significant difference between the two media sectors is that the former is usually understood as being driven by commune-style ownership and community control, and the latter by private ownership and profit-driven control. We argue that perceptions constructed by this difference potentially marginalise small independent media organisations. It may compromise their access to funding as well as obscure how, and how much, they contribute to their communities. We find that the six South African small independent newspapers in this research meet defining criteria for ‘community media’. Research findings on issues such as social responsibility, participatory democracy, media diversity and the generation of skills and wealth demonstrate how the principles and practices of the two media sectors overlap. So we propose ‘independent community media’ as a more inclusive and appropriate concept and term for small community-oriented publications, irrespective of their ownership profiles or relationship to profit. Independence is also examined – particularly how the newspapers balance editorial independence with outside control: this reveals inequitable practices currently threatening some newspapers’ survival and success.     

Framing participation

Major efforts have been made bydevelopment organisations tomake their systems ofproject and programme management more participatory, in order to be accountable to local participants (or beneficiaries), while also creating opportunities for them to shape their own processes. These measures may look participatory, but have in effect become new (and often costly) forms of management and control, which do not result in great benefits for project participants. The authors argue that the dominance of three components- projects, professionals, and organisations-has beentaken for granted; andthat theyinvolve practices and processes which are primarily instruments of control, rather than of participation. Attempts to generate participation will thus require a fundamental change in the way in which these components operate. Inthe meantime, the authors call for attentiontobe paidtothe ways inwhichthe current tools of participatory development, including PRA, can be used to promote either participation or control, depending on how they are used.     

Participatory Communication,Theatre and Peace: Performance as a Tool for Change at the End of Conflict

This article presents insights on a participatory theatre initiative implemented in Kenya, with the aim of understanding the changes that were initiated towards the re-establishment of peace between communities. The project was carried out in the aftermath of the post-election violence that took place in the country between 2007 and 2008. Amani People’s Theatre organised a number of theatre-based activities adopting a participatory approach, which ensured the involvement of community members from different tribes. Participants used the plays to re-enact the events, experienced during the conflict and the issues that still affected their communities as a result of those events, and worked together on finding solutions. The article begins with a literature review on Theatre for Development and its progress towards a more participatory approach. This is followed by an introduction of the project and the context in which it took place. The study design and Theory of Change developed for the analysis are then presented, opening the path to a discussion of the findings generated through that framework. Lastly, final reflections bring to light a number of issues that must be considered when working with participatory theatre in peace interventions.