From old dinosaurs to development professionals

& marketeersSome consequences of ‘professionalisation’ in

the NGO sector

Professionalisation

The changing context The rise of the aid industry The prevailing business model

then The chance to reprofessionalise…

Divergent trends

Federation & merger

Fragmentation & localisation

The emergence of an industry

1970s to late 1980s - A time of heroes – liberation theology, liberation struggle, radical politics

1990s – A time of unplanned but fast growth and developmental expertise and professionalisation

2000s – A time of expansion, federalisation, systematisation, growth at all costs, boom and bust

Size matters – in Ethiopia

Income and expenditure by INGOs outperformed all the country’s other foreign exchange earners with the single exception of cash transfers from Ethiopians living abroad.

In 2006/7 $537 million in foreign exchange brought in, more than $100 million more than Ethiopia’s largest export earner – coffee - & $160 million more than the next three export commodities combined.

Investment from NGOs now ‘equivalent to 25% of the government’s annual budget’.

My potted story…

1983 A teacher – watched BandAid in 1985 1986 Live Aid School run – raised £4,000 1988 To Sudan (VSO) – behind enemy lines in

Eritrea to meet rebels 1990 Masters in Education at Bristol 1991 Joined Christian Aid Horn of Africa – ‘just

wars’ 1995 flew into Nuba Mts with rebel leaders

under the Sudan Govnt radar 1998 Joined CAFOD – spent next years

bringing in PCM, security management etc. 2004 Back to Ethiopia – to help build ‘strong

civil society’ holding the state to account.

Mark Duffield

‘Development is a new religion. Trying to take a critical view of NGOs is like trying to tell people that God doesn’t exist. We’re dealing with a perception that the NGOs can do no harm, that they exist only to do good…they are above politics, on the margins always doing good.’

Peter Gill

‘You ask Mr X what he does, and he says “I own my own NGO,”’ Tamrat Giorghis, managing editor of Fortune newspaper said. ‘The barber shuts up shop one day, and goes off to form his own NGO. There are lots of clever students in school and all they want to do is to get into an NGO – either that or an embassy job or the UN.’

Classic Drama triangle

Victim

RescuerPersecutor

The bigger picture…

We want more impact on our priorities and to survive competition…we want to be at the ‘top table’ to have more clout

We have to develop more procedures, strategies – to control diversity, ensure conformity and ‘fit’

We become bigger and more dominating – over our local constituencies and our partners, even national governments – and our identities become ‘submerged’

From INEPD web-site

Your donations are helping to support Tanya support Maria to go to school and face grinding poverty with dignity. There are thousands more children like Maria do you want to leave them hungry tonight? Donate Now!

Rolling with the dynamic…

Federalisation and merger

Fragmentation & localisation

A smaller, more accessible world

A smaller, more accessible world

A smaller, more accessible world

A smaller, more accessible world

The good news…

However much we try to control, to consolidate and federate, we will inevitably fragment…

Context and local (level) identity will win out…

So what are the opportunities for reprofessionalisation…?

3 offerings

‘Pedagogy of Solidarity’

Renewing and redefining the values which started the ‘industry’

Tariq Ramadan “One should begin with the being,

the smile, the dignity, the culture that fashions the person…not reduce him to a sum of needs which ‘I’ support.”

…of marketing

“Ah – but you need to get people’s attention first! …and for that you have to start with ‘the need’.”

John Bird “Suddenly the public were offered an

alternative….This is what I did not understand. That we created an appetite among the public, or in enough of them, to say ‘Yes, let’s give this fighter support’”

…participation

The ‘X’ Factor

John Bird again…

“I once wrote disparagingly about this desire for people to be ‘on stage’ instead of in the audience. Now I begin to feel that it is not as bad as giving voyeurism the upper hand. If the next decade is about anything it is about participating. Getting involved.”

A renewed activist triangle?

Social Activist

Social ActivistPersecutor

Facilit

ator