The Drum Beat 835: Local Fingers in the Global Wind

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  "If we truly want to make aid inclusive, local voices need to be at the center of everything we do. We’ve got to approach this work with intention and humility … to interrogate the traditional power dynamics of donor-driven development and look for ways to amplify the local voices of those who too often have been left out of the conversation." - Samantha Power, United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator (from Moving Toward a Model of Locally Led Development: FY 2022 Localization Progress Report [PDF]), summarised here.
   
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  Trying to detect trends in local, national, and international development can be like dunking your middle finger in a glass of water, holding that finger up to the wind, and feeling the on-rushing air hit that upraised, round digit at every one of its 360 degrees at the same time. Not helpful for finding your direction. In fact (excuse the Kiwi), absolutely bloody useless!
   
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  As just a few examples, take the following Development choices and try to figure out the overall trend: Expand government investment; cut government expenditure? Rights; needs? Single-issue push; cross-cutting, underpinning forces? National policy development; community action? Refine messages; expand dialogue and debate? Long-term development focus; short-term emergency focus? Reinforce the culture; challenge the culture? Generate wealth; equitably share wealth? More drugs; increased accurate information about the present drugs? Citizens lead; technical experts lead? Social; individual? All the above? Ha!
   
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  So, when you see a set of coherent development principles you really like from a large and influential development agency with big money attached, it is natural to ask if it is a passing trend or the beginning of something that will really stick. Can you wet your finger, hold it to the wind, and over time still feel the same direction of the energy that has been generated?
   
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  I really hope that the recent USAID policy and operational principle of localisation sticks like the toughest super glue all over the full range of local, national, and global development organisations, policies, resourcing/funding, and decision-making processes, and how local and issue-specific organisations that are making a difference are engaged and worked with.
   
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  From the USAID website: "Shifting power to local actors, including, with an inclusive development lens, those from marginalized and underrepresented groups, and promoting space for them to influence and exercise leadership over priority setting, activity design and implementation, and measuring and evaluating results ... Channeling a larger portion of funding directly to local partners while ensuring accountability for the appropriate use of funds and achievement of development and humanitarian results; ... Serving as a global advocate and thought leader, using our convening power, partnerships, voice, and other tools of development diplomacy to catalyze a broader shift toward locally led development."
   
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  This approach shares some key and common principles with a social change strategy - for example (from both quotes above): "[ensuring] local voices ... [are] at the center of everything we do"; "amplify[ing] the local voices of those who too often have been left out of the conversation"; prioritising "those from marginalized and underrepresented groups"; and "promoting space for them to influence and exercise leadership over priority setting". Compare these elements, for example, to this explanation of social change. Those quotes could be straight out of this diagrammatic representation of social change.
   
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  Moving on to mouths and money. No use having these principles if the organisation announcing them does not, as the cliche goes, put their money where their mouth is! And USAID is doing just that. In the recently released USAID request for proposal (RFP) called GH [Global Health] Social and Behavior Change Activity, there are 123 mentions of "local" and a heavy emphasis on the other principles highlighted above. This award is worth around US$325 million over 5 years. It is far and away the largest social change and behaviour change funding and partnership opportunity. Money ... meet ... mouth!
   
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  Of course, there are concerns. Just three:
   
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  Local cash flow: Given the financial rules and procedures that are essential elements of any large, functional bureaucracy, how do you shift large numbers of comparatively small levels of funds - e.g., 500 grants of US$250,000 - and still meet all the procedural and accountability requirements? There are ways to do this, such as proposals made over the years for a Social Change Fund run by an independent organisation that handles all of this and is accountable to the grantee for the full amount.
   
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  Twisted direction: It seems clear from the USAID outlines of "local" that the intent is to support the priorities that are locally chosen as most important - for example: "promoting space for them (marginalized and underrepresented groups) to influence and exercise leadership over priority setting." We all know that things can get twisted: that this intent could be re-interpreted to become the localisation of the priorities, goals, strategies and programmes of the organisation(s) with the money. Please, no! But we need to be aware of the possibility.
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  Role with it: This new approach from USAID provides an opportunity for the large, northern agencies that are essential and valued parts of the Development landscape to rethink their roles and strategies. Thankfully, there is a lot to grab. Think, for example, of the more equitable, dynamic, two-/all-way, discursive, engaging, and participatory processes offered by the virtual world/environment and compare them to the traditional Global HQ/Country Office development, dissemination, and pushing of policies and approaches. The localisation approach is chock-full of opportunity for change for all.
   
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  Further hope comes from knowing that there is huge experience to draw from. Below, just from 2024, you will find some of the action and thinking shared through The CI platform that stress the value, in all ways - from essential development principles to effective and efficient action - of the strategic direction that USAID has set and is pursuing. There is much more!
   
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  * Innovation for Dialogue: Creative Experiences to Encourage Participation - "We must initiate innovation processes that invite citizens to create or reinvent communication channels and become a part of the media."
   
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  * Activating Spaces, Scaling Up Voices: Community-based Monitoring and Planning of Health Services in Maharashtra, India - "[W]hat does it take to enable broad-based, participatory, officially mandated citizen oversight, at scale?"
   
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  * VARN 2023: When Communities Lead, Global Immunization Succeeds - "It is clear that community-centered solutions will be critical to truly understand community needs and co-create local, people-centered solutions to boost vaccine demand and coverage."
   
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  * Community Health Workers as Rights Defenders: Exploring the Collective Identity of the Mitanins of Chhattisgarh, India - "It is unusual to see state-funded actors mobilizing around the denial of people's social, political, and economic rights, or taking action to defend those rights; Mitanins are thus an exception to the norm."
   
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  * The Potential of Community Radio in Fostering Economic Empowerment of Youths in The Cape Flats Communities - "Bush Radio has a strong representation of young people in the driving seat in the production of these programmes, giving youths a voice to be heard."
   
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  * Trust, Equity and Local Action - Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic to Avert the Next Global Crisis - "The IFRC's [International Federation of the Red Cross] experience with community health systems, including preparedness and community engagement, illustrates the vital importance of working at the local level and how effective community-based interventions were often the most effective during the COVID-19 pandemic."
   
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  * Leading from the Frontlines: Community-oriented Approaches for Strengthening Vaccine Delivery and Acceptance - "Policymakers, researchers, and local organizations should adopt local approaches to provide communities both a voice and resources to turn their needs and ideas into action. This comprehensive approach can amplify local voices, identify local concerns and advocates, and leverage 'bottom-up strategies' to co-design successful interventions to facilitate long-term change."
   
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  * People-centred community health systems: What new ideas/changes are you seeing that are moving us into the future? - "The COVID19 pandemic has been the biggest disaster in living memory, on almost any measure… It has had an impact on the health and wellbeing of all citizens. The pandemic's indirect impacts have touched the lives of virtually every community on the planet. COVID19 prompted a greater need to go beyond a disease and biosecurity focused approach that fails to address mental, social and ecological conditions that affect risk and vulnerability."
   
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  Please let me know what you think. Just send an email to drumbeat@comminit.com. We will collate and share your feedback. Thanks for joining the conversation.
   

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