Poverty reduction

The idea of poverty reduction naturally attracts all kinds of angels – in NGOs, government departments and international financial institutions – but their ministrations are frustrated by many obstacles. These include the narrow and static way in which economists define the poor; the remoteness of the poor, their social invisibility and elusiveness to most forms of targeting; and the absence of political will to engage in poverty-reduction policies. The angelic response to these obstacles has been to trumpet a global campaign of poverty reduction with millennial goals, international aid targets, and poverty-reduction strategy papers. It would be better to re-discover the language of risk, vulnerability, and social insurance. The message of the association between risk and reward, and the collective need for social mechanisms that will allow individuals to bear increased risk without exposure to irreversible damage, is the one that really needs to be delivered.     

Participatory risk assessment: a new approach for safer food in vulnerable African communities

Women play the major role in food supply in developing countries, but too often their ability to feed their families properly is compromised; the result is high levels of food-borne disease and consequent limited access to higher-value markets. We argue that risk-based approaches – current best practice for managing food safety in developed countries – require adaptation to the difficult context of informal markets. We suggest participatory research and gender analysis as boundary-spanning mechanisms, bringing communities and food-safety implementers together to analyse food-safety problems and develop workable solutions. Examples show how these methodologies can contribute to operationalising risk-based approaches in urban settings and to the development of a new approach to assessing and managing food safety in poor countries, which we call ‘participatory risk analysis’.     

Design for development: a review of emerging methodologies

This article reviews current methodologies for the design of development projects and identifies foundational reasons for conflict between design approaches and participatory methods. A number of alternative approaches to the design of interventions in social systems are examined, and the potential application of some of these new ideas within a visioning process that is based on communicative rationality is explored. We conclude that there are many problems to be overcome before describing a complete design methodology which moves away from the objectivist basis of existing design systems, and that the new approach will need to address power relationships and the consequent and interrelated problems of accountability and trust.     

Meeting the challenges to scaling up HIV/AIDS treatment in Africa

AIDS-related morbidity and mortality not only affects individuals and their families, but is rapidly undermining African states' capacity to develop. Stemming the impacts of the pandemic has therefore become a major concern. This calls for meeting the needs for care and support of those affected, and increasing the access of persons living with HIV/AIDS to effective treatment. Provision of such complex medication in resource-limited settings is a fairly recent phenomenon. In this context, the article builds on emerging experiences from the field in identifying issues and challenges that need to be addressed in order to facilitate the scaling-up of HIV/AIDS treatment in Africa.     

Can we measure civil society? A proposed methodology for international comparative research

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in the concept of civil society in development and governance circles. Broadly understood as the space in society where collective citizen action takes place, civil society has, in fact, proved an extremely difficult concept to define and operationalise. This article proposes a framework and methodology for measuring and comparing the state of different civil societies around the world. It concludes with a discussion of outstanding questions and challenges, drawing on preliminary insights from current efforts to apply the approach in more than 50 countries.     

试论会计资料勘验

经济犯罪案件所涉及的会计资料与经济犯罪案件侦查的内在联系使得会计资料勘验能够从主体、行为、结果、时间、地点、手段、方法等多个方面全面客观地反映经济犯罪事实的全过程。经侦民警可以根据案件提供的线索从款、物和单位三方面灵活运用会计资料勘验。具体运用在侦查实战中,会计资料勘验与初查的关系以及会计资料勘验实施的范围和时机的把握又是会计资料勘验的难点和必须解决的问题,同时也是提高会计资料勘验运用水平的关键。     

Wiki approaches to wicked problems: considering African traditions in innovative collaborative approaches

Wicked problems are complex problems that are seemingly impossible to solve. However, an analysis of selected traditional African philosophies provides insight into how certain traditions may be applied in a practical sense to address social and environmental problems. Further, many newer collaborative and ‘wiki’-based solutions provide a natural way for Africans and other global actors to participate in lessening the impact of global wicked problems. Ushahidi and the Geo-Wiki Project serve as examples of organisations that have provided a platform for this type of open development.     

Joint (ad)ventures and (in)credible journeys evaluating innovation: asset-based community development in Ethiopia

Acknowledging debates about what constitutes effective and useful evaluation practice, this paper explores the particular challenges of evaluating an innovative approach to community development for multiple stakeholders with different interests and different levels of confidence in particular evaluation methodologies. The innovation – applying an Asset Based approach to Community Development (ABCD) in an Ethiopian context – presents further challenges to evaluation because of its open-ended nature and problems of attribution. On the other hand, the culture of risk-taking encouraged by the supporters of innovation provides the space for genuine lessons to be learnt about failure as well as success.