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a discussion paper by Bridget Walker, Responding to Conflict
Introduction
This paper presents a personal view drawn from my experience at Responding to Conflict (RTC) and with RTC’s partners around the world, in seeking and accounting for funding for work on conflict transformation. I shall also draw on my experience in the field of international development, as I feel that there are commonalities in the current funding trends, and in some of the key questions which arise. These include issues of donor conditionality, the impact of policy change in funding support, the growing trend towards a managerial approach, the challenges of assessing the impact of conflict transformation work and questions of accountability to stakeholders. I shall conclude by looking at the support that is needed for work on conflict transformation and consider some models for funding partnerships.
The funding relationship: some dilemmas
‘There is some scepticism with the organisation, not least from the trustees, as to the ultimate benefits that derive from this type of work. This was reflected in a recent assessment of the proposal for capacity building support. A recommendation has been made to the trustees to reject the majority of this application and instead fund a comprehensive evaluation of the organisation’s impact. The outcome of that evaluation will be important for future funding decisions.’
The above is an extract from a letter sent some months ago by a UK funding agency to a long standing NGO partner based in the UK. It concerned support for an international network with a mandate for peace building and conflict transformation. The questions raised illustrate a number of dilemmas for many of us involved with conflict transformation, whether we are responsible for making grants or for seeking funding either for our own work or that of our international partners.
Conflict transformation is not an exact field of endeavour. It does not fit the ‘boxes’ of development and humanitarian assistance, which are the categories most familiar to government and the larger INGOs. It is complex, sensitive and long term. It involves intervening in social processes where there are many actors, in a rapidly changing and often highly charged environment over which we have limited control. The ultimate benefits are unlikely to be evident within the three year life of most funding grants. So trustees of funding bodies, unfamiliar with this work, and under pressure to demonstrate accountability for public money through showcasing clear and positive achievements, become sceptical when these seem not to be forthcoming. They request evidence of impact.
In the case quoted above this scepticism extends not just to the work but also to the organisation carrying it out. For the bodies working with conflict may themselves not fit the usual categories. Networks, in particular, lack the familiar structure of lines of management and communication and the costs may appear to outweigh the benefits. Yet in the field of social development, networks have been shown to be particularly suited to bringing about change, operating as they can at many levels and with a range of actors. (Williams 2003). The primary focus for networks is not on rapid visible results but rather on building relationships, encouraging engagement, making connections, fostering learning, exchanging knowledge and experience and changing policy and practice. This involves many small, less visible processes, taking place, at many levels, with different players and extending over a period of time. Networks can provide space for experimentation and innovation. In the field of conflict transformation this also means room for risk taking and for being prepared to make mistakes.
Finally, if the activities of conflict transformation are unclear, capacity building to carry them out may also seem nebulous. The funder needs evidence that learning has been translated into practical action and the benefits measured. This raises questions about impact assessment. We need to be able to track change, to see what is happening and to whom. We need to know if our work is making a difference, what difference that might be, with what effect or benefit and for whom. Who gains and who, perhaps, loses? Whose impact is it and who decides? There is no easy way of doing this and the challenges of assessing the impact of conflict transformation work will be discussed later in this paper.
For the body seeking support there is a different set of concerns, of which capacity to do the work in hand and the financial means to support it are ever present and pressing. The organisations and networks established to work on conflict transformation and peace building are generally relatively small, overextended and under-resourced. They are responsive, with a culture of activism; time for reflection and reporting may feel like a luxury in turbulent situations. Resources are diverted into working on funding applications and other activities may have to be put on hold if there is a hiatus in financial support. The conditionality of an evaluation may lead the organisation to feel under judgement, and therefore less open to acknowledging weakness and shortcomings for fear of the financial implications. The potential for mutual learning is endangered by what is perceived to be an imbalance of power on the one side and accountability on the other.
The politics of funding conflict transformation
When RTC was founded in 1991 conflict transformation was little known or understood and relatively hard to fund. Now in the post September 11th world conflict has become popular with institutional donors and substantial funding has become available. On closer examination it would appear that this is often targeted towards activities that can be seen as linked to an international security agenda. This presents a dilemma for small organisations seeking financial support for an agenda of social change through conflict transformation. The debate about whether it is possible to accept funds from institutional sources and maintain independence is not a new one. Many of the larger INGOs have policies which limit such funding to a percentage of total income. In the specific circumstances of humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan and Iraq, Oxfam International and Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) have decided that they will not accept funding from governments active in the conflict ie the UK and the US. It may be easier for organisations with multi-million pound budgets to ride out the funding gap this could leave. For smaller NGOs and overextended networks, questions of funding are often also matters of survival. In the Middle East, funding support that previously had few strings attached, now comes with explicit political conditions. One institutional donor includes, in an annexe to the funding contract, a list of what it regards as terrorist organisations. It is a condition of grant that recipient organisations, project beneficiaries and their families should not have links with these organisations. In addition, all those bodies receiving funds must receive clearance by the donor, a process which involves taking details not only of staff members but also their families. Thus official aid is part of the armoury of intelligence gathering for the ‘war against terror’. This view of the world cannot comprehend the concept of state terrorism, which is a concern to groups working for peace in many places. It also does not take account of the need to work with all actors, including the ‘spoilers’ at some stages and in some approaches to conflict transformation.
It is no surprise that government funding is made within the framework of a government’s foreign policy goals. However, where governments lead the way others may follow, and there are indications that other major, non-governmental funders in the Middle East, (such as the Ford foundation) are setting similar conditions. There are serious implications for the NGO sector. One network, we know, which will not accept funding on these terms, may have to curtail its activities and make staff redundant.
In the UK the establishment of the Global Conflict Prevention Pool was designed to produce joined up thinking on conflict issues by the Department for International Development, the Foreign Office, and the Ministry of Defence. It would seem however that in the attempt to combine the perspectives of development, security and foreign policy the security agenda has predominated. The Pool has been under criticism for funding the purchase of military planes for the Government of Nepal(1) but the voices challenging a defence led approach, and offering alternative ways of understanding and addressing conflict seem muted.
New managerialism: new models of accountability
Just as the current international security agenda is influencing the funding environment, so too the domestic agenda of public sector reform has had an impact on the relationship between funding agencies and their programme partners. Throughout the public sector there is now a concern with demonstrating achievement, measuring performance, setting and meeting targets. Every level of activity has standards and certification. This trend affects the voluntary sector as well as government, international programmes as well as domestic agendas.
This links with the significant expansion of the NGO sector over the past thirty years, as it became a channel for more resources in the ‘privatisation’ of aid agenda. (Wallace, 2003). Many INGOs grew, in staff numbers,(2) in areas of outreach and themes of concern. Size and complexity affect the way an organisation can and does work. There was a need for internal organisational change to address issues of focus and procedure. In a process that has mirrored developments in the public sector, people from the business world were invited on to NGO trustee boards or joined NGOs as senior managers, bringing with them new skills and viewpoints. New procedures were introduced with the aim of making NGOs more efficient, effective and professional.
It can be argued that a management model designed for the commercial sector (and the military) is ill adapted to serve the needs of those engaged in social development in general and transformative work on conflict in particular, where processes are as important as products, and change happens at many levels and in many different ways. The managerial approach adopted by many agencies poses significant questions about power and accountability: who sets the agenda, who decides that an intervention is successful and on what criteria? How is accountability provided, not only vertically, to the funder but also horizontally to the wide range of stakeholders at their different levels? What space is there for experimentation and risk taking, when measurable impact has to be demonstrated within a three year period? How are unanticipated consequences regarded, and what is the approach to failure?
One curious feature of this trend to managerialism is that the funding bodies which espouse this approach, requiring detailed mechanisms for planning, monitoring, evaluation and reporting from their grant holders, are also often very reluctant to fund the management and administrative costs which this entails. Core costs have never been popular with funders, but it is a particularly ironic contradiction when management is regarded as essential but unfundable.
Another aspect of the managerial approach in the NGO sector has been an apparently endless cycle of organisational restructuring within the larger INGOs. This has an impact not only within the INGO concerned but also on relationships with programme partners. There is a rapid turnover of staff in the funding body, who are either redeployed in a different position in the new structure or move on to another organisation. This may be a further reason for the demand from the funding body for written documentation, with increasing emphasis on data collection and quantitative evidence, so that information is retained when people are transferred. Yet to the programme partner it often seems that knowledge of their work is patchy and the institutional memory of the donor fragmentary. In the three year life of a grant received from an institutional donor, RTC had 6 different grants officers. In another case there have been four different grants officers in as many years. This militates against building a meaningful relationship in which it might be possible to have an open discussion of some of the issues mentioned above.
Another factor is the workload faced by grants officers in many funding agencies. In one instance the agency has doubled its portfolio of grants while keeping the same staff establishment. This means that staff are frequently overextended, and simply do not have the time for meetings with their programme partners. The solution being proposed by some large funders is to reduce the number of grants to different organisations, to select key themes, and a few major spending partners and concentrate funding on them. This is intended to relieve pressure on the funder, to reduce what one donor has called ‘too many transactions’ to improve the quality of relationship and response and make space for organisational learning. It is not clear how the needs of the smaller organisations – and most conflict transformation practitioners fall into this category – will be addressed. For us too, there is a problem of proportionality. We must supply the same degree of detail, and thus spend the same amount of energy on a funding application for £15,000 or £150,000. Clearly the ‘one size fits all’ approach is not satisfactory. The solution suggested by one donor – to apply elsewhere – avoids the issue.
Terminology and mutual incomprehension
We have seen how difficult it can be to establish meaningful connections between the body making the grant and the recipient. There is also a dissonance in the language used. The vocabulary of management is different from the language of social change. It may appear to be neutral, objective, depoliticised, but it is a foreign tongue to many practitioners, articulating alien thought processes and masking uncomfortable and inequitable power relations. Many peace practitioners use story and anecdote to describe impacts. Their assessment is subjective and personal. Members of the ACTION(3) network have described the benefits in terms of the sense of solidarity and support they have received in what are often lonely and potentially life-threatening circumstances. RTC is currently working with partners in a programme entitled ‘Transforming the discourse of violence and despair’. This is not rhetoric, but a real need. A key point to emerge from a series of learning workshops held with grassroots communities in Africa was that building peace requires commitment, and courage and a willingness to challenge government or other powerful interests. In a workshop on conflict impact assessment members of the ACTION network (ACTION 2002) spoke of the moral dilemma of telling it how it is, when there is pressure from funders to demonstrate rapid and positive results. It is hard to maintain commitment in the long term when there are no immediate results, and often unrealistic to expect immediate results. These unrealistic expectations can undermine the hope that sustains so many peace practitioners in the face of ongoing and intractable conflict.
These management tools and frameworks do not readily accommodate the dynamism of transformative change. An example: a project changed considerably in the course of its development, these changes were discussed with the funder, and recorded in the written reports. The framework of purpose and objectives was amended. When the time came for external evaluation, however, the evaluator felt that the evaluation exercise must use the original rather than the amended framework. Not surprisingly the project did not come out well.
Failure - dangers and opportunities
There is strong pressure not to fail. Admitting failure is an expensive business as the Coalition for Peace in Africa (COPA) has learned to its cost. Serious problems five years ago led to the closure of the secretariat, a wounded membership and the sowing of doubt in the minds of donors. A clean up operation was instituted in 2000, the organisation was relaunched with checks and balances in place, and now has a vibrant programme running well regarded conflict transformation courses and programmes. But within the donor community reference continues to be made to the mistakes of the past, these cast a long shadow and there is a sense that the organisation is on permanent probation. Yet in the field of conflict transformation, as indeed in every human endeavour, mistakes are inevitable. For funders and practitioners alike there needs to be a means of acknowledging these and, if necessary, in the words of COPA, ‘cleaning up’. When failure is acknowledged and treated as an opportunity for learning, it can be transformed, as in the case of COPA, into growth and success. For this to happen, however, relationships need to be based on mutual respect and trust.
However, if failure is dangerous, success does not necessarily guarantee continued support. Funding decisions are made in the context of donor policies and these are subject to change. A conflict network which emerged well from an external evaluation, nevertheless did not subsequently receive support and then made the decision to close down. A combination of factors led to this decision, but these included external changes in the political context and funding environment, which were linked with internal capacity and resources to raise the required funds (Spearing 2004).
Doing good is not enough - the challenge of impact assessment
‘And if you cannot measure results, if you cannot show what you’ve done, other partners will be found. Why is that? Doing good is not enough. We have to show what kind of good we’re doing, in which sectors, in which communities, and whether the good has bad consequences, or bad side effects, that no one anticipated’ USAID, 2003 quoted in ODI (HPG Report 17, June 2004)
Earlier in this paper I mentioned the emphasis that is now given to impact assessment and the challenges that this presents to conflict practitioners. There are several issues to consider. At the ACTION workshop participants discussed a number of issues and dilemmas. Attribution is a challenge in many social processes where there are multiple actors and external influences. The less tangible aspects of these processes, like attitudinal change, are key to the eventual outcomes but hard to measure. There will be unanticipated results and their impact, whether positive or negative, needs to be acknowledged. Impact assessment should not be regarded as an external event but rather as an ongoing, dynamic and non-linear process involving all stakeholders. These are all issues which have been of concern to development practitioners, and much of the literature and work on impact assessment has come from the development field. There is a need to develop appropriate ways of addressing impact assessment in situations of conflict. There are insights from the field of humanitarian assistance. In a recent research report (ODI 2004) the Humanitarian Policy Group (HPG) suggests that while the concept of positive change is integral to definitions of impact in the development field, in humanitarian aid the aim is often to avert negative change. This is difficult to assess directly. Conflict transformation looks at both the positive peace impact and the negative violence impact. Tools specifically designed for evaluation of conflict work include those developed by the Nairobi Peace Initiative (NPI) and the work of Kenneth Bush in Canada (Bush 2003) on peace and conflict impact indicators. The Collaborative for Development Action, Inc (CDA) programme of Reflecting on Peace Practice, (www.cdainc.com) drawing on a wide range of case studies, concluded that it is not possible to have generic indicators for peace work as these need to be context and time specific. However generic criteria for effectiveness can be developed which show the connection between activities, often conducted on a small scale, in a given area, and progress on peace writ large. These criteria can be applied across a broad range of types of effort and context.
Reviewing the impact of our work is necessary for present learning and future action. Gathering and presenting the findings in a way that meets the needs of funders is time-consuming and labour intensive. There are moral dilemmas. As we have seen above, there is a temptation to tell only of success, to bend the truth since the funding environment appears to punish failure. In the face of changes in funding policies, there is a temptation to package the programme in a way that will attract funders. It is also a growth industry. The advertisement sections of the Wednesday Guardian and the news bulletins from BOND list many fundraising and reporting positions.
Dilemmas of accountability
Accountability covers a range of relationships. Many INGOs both make grants and seek funding, and face dilemmas around their accountability to sources of support, whether from institutional donors or the general public. RTC has sometimes had a dual role, seeking funds and making them available to partners. I would like to describe one particular experience which has been an important source of learning.
Following an international consultation with former alumni of its courses RTC decided five years ago to seek funds for a three year capacity building project and invited 30 participants from around the world to take part. It became evident at the first gathering of this group that participants wanted something more durable than a three year project. The ground work was laid for the establishment of a global network of conflict transformation practitioners. The original purpose of the programme had not changed but the proposed activities and anticipated outcomes had, and RTC was in the position of trying to meet the needs of both the grant making body and the developing network. At the second gathering of the group RTC felt it was important to provide information about our funding base, and the sources from which we derived our income, in order to address doubts and suspicions which had arisen, and to demonstrate constraints we faced in our accountability for the project grant. Among other things, we explained that a proportion of the project budget was committed to meet some of RTC’s management and administration costs. This was deeply shocking to many participants, who saw this as RTC taking money rightly belonging to the network they were beginning to establish. There was a struggle over ownership and a lot of pain and mistrust.
Some of the difficulties can be attributed to funding policies. In the first place, few funders will contribute to core costs, so it becomes normal practice to write in a percentage in a project application. It was salutary for RTC to realise that this did not feel normal to those with little experience of how the donor community works. Secondly, RTC had received a very much smaller amount than that requested in the application. The management costs were needed to keep RTC going, but were a much larger proportion of the overall total than would have been the case had the full amount been approved. In this instance it was not lack of funds which were responsible for the shortfall. Indeed, ironically, the funder subsequently informed us that our grant requests were too small for them to handle in future. Experience suggests that it has become almost a matter of policy for funders not to give the total amount requested. This leads to the temptation to inflate a funding application, so honesty is lost at the very start.
There are several lessons to be learned from this experience. There needs to be room for dynamic growth and change. RTC struggled to work with a changing agenda, supporting the development of the network, while trying to have a dialogue with a funder which did not have the capacity to be responsive and flexible. Reflecting on the experience RTC realised that grant holding for partners affects and can compromise a precious relationship. Our mandate is to undertake training and capacity building, support and accompaniment, and this sits uneasily with the role of administering or, from our partners’ perspective, policing the funding of their work. The strategic decision was made not to undertake further grant holding for partner networks when current commitments came to an end. This was not to abandon the pursuit of funding support which needs to be channelled through UK based charities. RTC held discussions with another UK based NGO, which has skills in organisational development and is able to offer a package of support, including grant holding, provision of development workers and places on its leadership training courses. RTC support continues through capacity building courses and accompaniment. This tripartite model may be a useful model to consider in examining the support that is needed for conflict transformation organisations in the global south.
Models of support
There has been a lot of critique in this paper about the dominant experience of funding relationships, and this trend gives cause for concern. But there are other models which continue to offer an alternative. The grant making trusts tend to have a different approach. Some, like the Quaker trusts, have a specific mandate to address peace and conflict and have an institutional understanding that has been built over many years. They offer both flexibility and continuity. They also offer the opportunity of building a relationship, not only over time but through face to face encounters with trustees. When such a relationship has been established, the basis on which decisions are made is very different. The organisation has built a track record which is known and understood by the funder. There is space for experimentation and risk taking. This positive feature of sticking with key individuals and known organisations can, however, be problematic for those outside these funding networks and seeking to find an entry point. Some of the grant making trusts can seem impenetrable, and some will not accept unsolicited applications. A further problem has arisen recently with the weakness of the stock market, which has also meant that there is less money available from these sources. Nevertheless, the grant making trusts remain a lifeline for many organisations in the conflict transformation field.
A new model of support is that of the Global Green Grants fund, which draws on volunteer advisers round the world linked in a network of regional and global advisory boards. Peacedirect is exploring new models of relationship and support through north south link groups and the building of a supporter base in the UK.
All these offer alternative models for funding and accountability which are more transparent and reciprocal.
Conclusion
Conflict transformation needs support that is based on shared values and commitment, a long term view, readiness to be flexible, to be open to change, to innovation, to risk. Those involved in the funding relationship need to be transparent, open to examination, accountable. There needs to be a relationship of mutual respect, to build trust and understanding. This seems to run counter to current trends. Many funding relationships are becoming increasingly asymmetrical. The current approaches of the mainstream funders, designed to produce evidence of achievement, have been found to constrain rather than to enable. There is a real danger here. Some of the most effective conflict transformation work has been unseen and unsung. It is increasingly difficult to obtain support for such work. There is frustration and a fear that in the future it may diminish entirely.
References
ACTION for Conflict Transformation (2002) Unpublished paper on Impact Assessment
ACTION (2003): Transforming Conflict: Reflections of Practitioners Worldwide, Phnom Penh 2003
Bush, Kenneth (2003) ‘Hands-on PCIA, Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ – quoted in unpublished evaluation report of COPA, Williams and Thomas (2004)
Spearing, Michelle (2004) Legacy and Learning Report, CODEP 2004, available from peacedirect (see www.peacedirect.org)
Collaborative for Development Action, Inc. (CDA): www.cdainc.com
Department for International Development (DfID): (2003) ‘The Global Conflict Prevention Pool: A joint UK Government approach to reducing conflict’
Global Greengrants Fund: www.greengrants.org
ODI (2004): ‘Measuring the Impact of Humanitarian Aid’, Humanitarian Policy Group Report No 17, June 2004
Peace Direct: www.peacedirect.org
Van Deventer, Fulco (2003) ‘Understanding Networks’
Wallace, Tina ‘Development Management and the aid chain: the case of NGOs’ in Oxfam Development in Practice reader Development and Management: Experiences in Value based conflict ed. Deborah Eade, Tom Hewitt and Hazel Johnson, January 2000
Wallace, T and Chapman, J (2003) ‘Some realities behind the rhetoric of downward accountability’, Working Paper presented at the 5th INTRAC Evaluation Conference
Williams, Sue (August 2003) ‘Thoughts on Networks in Conflict Prevention’
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