In the world of development and social change, “top-down” = bad. It tends to suggest expensive solutions imposed on communities by government agencies or others with little regard for or involvement of local knowledge and input. Invoking bottom-up, grassroots, or community-driven approaches is, across the non-profit sector, a surefire way to garner consensus and make friends. But is it top-down always wrong, and is bottom-up ever sufficient?
As I leave Ecuador, World Learning´s Winari staff are assembling a series of workshops with Ecuador´s national child labor agency. The goal of these workshops is to transfer Winari´s knowledge, methodology,and lessons to the agency with long-term responsibility for eradicating child labor in the country. Winari, like every such intervention, is a short-term engagement (four years, in this case). When the time comes for the project to pull up stakes, they need to ensure that the baton is passed on effectively, that there is capacity and commitment at every level to continue and build on the success of the project to date - in effect, institutionalizing successful models so they become the new norms.
And so, Winari has to work it from every angle. From individual schools to communities, parents, teachers, indigenous organizations, national agencies, the private sector, and government - a project like Winari must build capacity at every level of society to inherit and sustain the models that effect change. It´s not enough to develop specialized curricula if there isn´t sufficient funding to hire teachers and train them properly to deliver it. It´s not enough to help more of these students obtain a secondary education if there´s not the economic development to provide them jobs when they graduate.
It seems to me (IMHO as a non-development-professional), this is where bottom-up meets top-down and it´s also where the rubber meets the road for true social change. And this is, I think, the sweet spot where World Learning does its very best work. Whether the focus is children, HIV/AIDS or some other global challenge, our approach is to build capacity and enhance civil society to carry the weight of change forward.
Bill Drayton of Ashoka recently described social entrepreneurs this way (paraphrasing): Social entrepreneurs aren´t satisfied giving people fish or even teaching them to fish. Social entrepreneurs won´t rest till they´ve overhauled the entire fishing industry. I think that´s what Winari´s doing here in Ecuador and what our development projects are doing the world over. And I can tell you one thing from watching it happen on the ground this past week: It´s hard work.
Tags: worldlearning
April 2, 2008 at 2:33 am
It is indeed sad that development paradigms come in and out of the limelight quicker than Mugabe can print money to stay in power. From Walt Rostow’s controversial early work in economics detailing the stages of economic growth, to farcical structural adjustment policies, to the latest policy fad finally comprehending that governance does matter and development investment is not apolitical–we continue to search.
John wisely points us to a great dichotomy of perspectives that unfortunately come at odds with one another instead of working together to provide a solution. Strident development purists will argue that the community must drive its own development and that policy merely interferes with what the community wants to achieve. Then there are structuralists who claim that only enlightened officials can possible know how to “fix the problem”, whatever that may be. Both are wrong.
No matter what the solidarity intellegensia wish to consider “pure” development, the glorified community is part of a nation that has laws, duties and responsibilities. The question is not how to separate the community from government but rather how to get it plugged in and hold them accountable. This can only be achieved when individuals are citizens with enforcable rights, own private property, and act in a balance of political power. Until then, the rubber is missing the road and development theorists will continue to espouse new theories to define the problem.
Remember the wisdom comes from the fraternity that gave us “Sustainable Development”, one of the most abused and contradictory terms in the lexicon. Did anyone ever stop to consider that if it is not sustainable, it is not development; it’s a waste of time and money and billions has been invested in an oxymoron. Go figure.
April 2, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Overhauling the entire fishing industry is hard work…no doubt. I think the key thing to keep in mind about “where bottom up meets top down” is that “top down” is the way its been done for years and “bottom up” was a much needed reaction/ response trying to give the disenfranchised a voice. What we are now talking about, and doing, is a transcendence and merger of the two extremes…a balancing act that will take the best practices from both to reach a new “overhauled…industry.”
Although it is important to understand the past, to learn from successes and mistakes (and there’s been many lessons to learn from in the development realm), I would hope that we not dwell too heavily on the mistakes of either “top down” or “bottom up” to the point of paralysis…but instead that we learn and internalize so we can find the right meeting ground.
April 2, 2008 at 4:27 pm
I agree with Alejandra about the importance of compromise and moving forward with a new development paradigm. We have been struggling back and forth for years on a neoclassical (market-based) vs. institutional (sociological) approach to development, and it’s clear that as long as we continue to talk about development in the ways practitioners have always used, we’ll continue to be stuck in between the past and the future, unable to migrate to a hybrid of development past. The reality that the masses are calling out for a bottom-up approach is clear, but the reality that the majority of development funding comes from the top-down school of thought is also very real. There are opportunities here to have a broader conversation, to speak of development in new ways, and to truly embody this new paradigm of development where we all have voices that are valuable and the success of true, sustainable development is dependent on everyone involved. The question is, what can we do as a global community to nurture this process and keep its momentum going?