Summary
What are some structural things that are wrong in development aid and in civil society?
Which mindsets most need to be decolonized when it comes to the relationship between global South civil society organizations (CSOs) and INGOs?
Global North-founded INGOs need to be reimagined. How, in turn, do global South-founded NGOs have to change to take over many roles that INGOs currently still fulfill? And how do they need to recalibrate their power relationships with INGOs?
In this NGO Soul+Strategy podcast episode, I interview Charles Kojo Vandyck, a development practitioner based in Ghana, a leader at the West Africa Civil Society Institute (WACSI), and a thinker on alternatives to development and alternatives to INGO models.
Charles’ Bio:
- Development practitioner, based in Ghana, who is on a mission to drive transformative change within civil society
- Head of the Capacity Development Unit at the West Africa Civil Society Institute (WACSI)
- Core team member, RINGO project – Reimagining International NGOs
- Founding Member of the International Consortium on Closing Civic Space (iCon)
- Trustee of INTRAC and an Advisory Board Member of Disrupt Development
- Host of the podcast Alternative Convos, which focuses on social cohesion as well as social change in Africa. You can find Alternative Convos on Spotify
We discuss:
- The West African Civil Society Institute (WACSI), based in Accra/Ghana, is a regional organization focused on civil society support and institutional strengthening
- RINGO project: the Reimaging the INGO project is a collaborative global project among civil society leaders to prototype new models of INGOs that shift power to the global South and equalize relationships between global South and global North NGOs as well as funders
- According to Charles, here are some of the problems with current models of development and aid architecture: a projectized approach to development; local expertise of people is insufficiently recognized in project design; the ad-hoc and short-term nature of money flows; the presence of dependency cultures; lack of asset-based models to development (instead of deficit-based ones)
- The policies and ways of working of INGOs have to be part of what needs to shift
- The RINGO project helps to identify areas of stuckness and develop prototypes for alternatives
- The hardest nuts to crack within the RINGO project are related to structural racism
- Global South NGOs also need to change their models: they need to invest more in talent development and succession planning, to help generational shift from founders to successors; develop their skills in intersectoral as well as intersectional approaches to development; and invest in technology skills.
Resources:
Charles’ LinkedIn Profile
Podcast Alternative Convos – on Spotify
WACSI Website
Reimagining the INGO Website
YouTube video of this podcast
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Email Tosca at tosca@5oaksconsulting.org
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