Comments on: Accountability in the aid industy

By: voice « bala’s blog

voice « bala’s blog — Sat, 30 May 2009 06:08:56 +0000

[...] ago when i was reading the blog “culture matters” i came across an excellent post on accountability here is a part of that post got my interest How much power are you willing to yield to others? How [...]

By: joanab

joanab — Thu, 21 May 2009 12:06:16 +0000

I just tried to order In the River They Swim a few days ago, but was told it is unavailable! Thanks for pointing out the reference, I’ll try to get the book some other way.

By: Wednesday Round Up #64 « Neuroanthropology

Wednesday Round Up #64 « Neuroanthropology — Wed, 20 May 2009 22:14:09 +0000

[...] Joana Breidenbach, Dead Aid Aid slows growth and makes poor people poorer, argues this post over at BetterPlace.Org (which looks pretty cool itself). For more, see the follow-up at Culture Matters [...]

By: Alexander Roberts

Alexander Roberts — Wed, 20 May 2009 00:35:55 +0000

I would recommend an essay called “Our Greatest Fear” from the recent release “In the River They Swim: Essays from Around the World on Enterprise Solutions to Poverty.” The collection of essays is quite fascinating but I particularly enjoyed the referenced piece as it really is an insider discussion about where aid fails, not only the people it’s trying to serve, but the people in the field itself who are trying to impart a difference.

By: joanab

joanab — Mon, 18 May 2009 09:52:53 +0000

Hi Lee,
I would argue that, whoever is responsible for service delivery should make sure that the services are good (and that accountability is not a mere formal managerial procedure). I think that for some areas governments are the ones which should carry responsibility (such as installing and enforcing the right legal and financial frameworks to encourage those approaches which work in poverty reduction and social justice), but we see that in many fields, social business solutions may be more appropriate and effective.

I am very excited about the whole social entrepreneur scene (Ashoka, Schwab foundation, Acumen fund etc.)and developments like companies targeting the bottom of pyramid market, as covered by such blogs as next billion: http://www.nextbillion.net/blog

At the above mentioned conference there was an exchange about the impact of the large NGOs, with one participant asking: does it really matter, what you – the large NGOs – are going to do? Will it matter to the poor in Africa? And the answer was: no. Solutions to poverty will come from elsewhere.

This is not to say that some of the large NGOs are not trying very hard to embrace a new culture of acciountability and change their corporate culture. But here they face the same difficulties as all large organisations: that the forces securing the status quo are very, very strong.

By: Lee

Lee — Sun, 17 May 2009 19:30:28 +0000

This sounds really exciting, and I’m obviously all in favour of increasing accountability to individuals, but I can’t help wondering what affect this could have on government accountability. Would it just encourage the mentality that NGOs and not governments should ultimately be responsible for service delivery?