The literature offers a number of recommendations on community engagement in the extractives sector. The following are particularly relevant to fragile and conflict-affected contexts:Engage with local communities as partners in preventing and managing conflict, rather than approaching them as a threat or risk.Distribute any benefits from the project (including jobs, development ...» more
Helpdesk Reports
These rapid-response reports provide digests of key research findings, lessons and expert thinking on specific questions from development practitioners and policymakers. If your question is not already covered below, ask us for a report (free for staff of agencies that we have existing arrangements with).
Donor Activities Supporting Women in Elected Political Spaces
Donors mainly engage in the following types of activities to promote women‘s participation in electoral politics:Training women already in or aspiring towards leadership rolesStrengthening the capacity of women‘s groups to monitor government commitments on gender equality and women’s empowermentUsing the media to disseminate information and change attitudesSupporting networks ...» more
Civil Society Funding Mechanisms
Two general points emerge in the literature on civil society funding mechanisms. The first is that support to civil society actors is desirable and should be continued or scaled-up. Civil society is considered to play a key role in development and the theme of ‘partnership’ is widespread in the literature. Secondly, capacity building is an essential component of all support to ...» more
Impact of International Volunteering
There appears to be little robust evidence on the impact of international volunteering on development, poverty alleviation or awareness-raising. Nevertheless, from the literature identified in this report, the following direct and indirect impacts were most commonly noted:Direct services related to capacity building and technical transfersPositive effects on host community ...» more
Money Laundering and Poverty Reduction
The general conclusion of this report is that there is no discernable link between money laundering and poverty, or by extension, between anti-money laundering (ALM) initiatives and poverty reduction. There is however some debate on the impacts of money laundering on economic growth and development more generally, split into two broad camps.Firstly, it is argued that money ...» more
‘Voices of the Poor’ in Southern Africa
No recent 'voices of the poor' type studies for the SADC (Southern African Development Community) region have been identified during the research for this query. Additionally, none of the experts who contributed to the research knew of such a report or of similar research projects currently underway. Several Africa-wide studies published by Afrobarometer, which include ...» more
Methodologies for Measuring the Value of Civil Society
The rise of social entrepreneurship and venture philanthropy has led to an explosion of interest in the area of measuring value and calculating the impact of non-profits and social organisations. There is enormous interest in generating and developing rigorous quantitative tools to assist in accurate measurement of impact and value and a significant number of organisations are ...» more
Donor Support to Non-state Providers of Security and Justice
The following recommendations on on donor support to non-state providers of security and justice services in fragile and conflict-affected states are made in the literature: There is a need for a ‘pragmatic realism’ approach, meaning that in addition to supporting state institutions, donors proportion a significant percentage of assistance, in the short- to intermediate-term, ...» more
Evaluations of Donors’ Peace-building and Conflict Policies
There is little information available online about the process or findings of reviews of donor policies on peace, conflict or peace-building. The vast majority of evaluation reports that are available in this area are at the level of programme or project evaluation, rather than overall policy-level or thematic evaluation. Few materials are available online that have explicitly ...» more
Regional Security Architecture
Regional organisations have in recent years focused increasingly on the promotion of peace and security. They may be considered more effective and legitimate external actors than the United Nations and other international actors. They are also more likely to have an interest in preventing, containing or resolving conflict and insecurity in their regions. Although the vast ...» more
Violence Against Women Interventions
There are few rigorous evaluations of interventions and approaches to prevent or respond to violence against women (VAW) – and even less that engage in a comparative analysis. There are, however, a number of evaluations that focus on individual projects in specific countries. Some general findings on effectiveness and best practice in addressing violence against women can be ...» more
Climate Change and Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe is vulnerable to climate change principally through shifting rainfall patterns and extreme events. Increased incidence of drought is expected to be a particular problem. Other potential changes include increased temperatures, localised floods and decreased/varying river flow. Climate change is expected to pose a particular challenge for food production. Reduced ...» more
Gender and Growth in China
The first half of this helpdesk research report provides case studies examining the links between economic growth and gender equality in China. Most resources focus on the economic reforms associated with WTO accession and examine their gendered impacts. They all find that China’s impressive economic growth has failed to benefit men and women proportionately. Several authors ...» more
Climate Change and Migration
The difficulty of making predictions of future patterns of climate change migration springs principally from the fact that, methodologically, it is very difficult if not impossible to unpack the different environmental drivers and triggers of migration. People move for complex sets of reasons of which a changing environment is only one. As such it is important to try to ...» more
Gender and Elections in Afghanistan
Press coverage around the recent presidential elections in Afghanistan emphasised the low turnout of women voters, highlighting the shortage of female staff at polling stations, proxy voting by male family members, and the threat of retributive violence against women voters and candidates as key factors. However, the academic literature is largely silent on these issues, both ...» more
Experience of Compacts
International Compacts are mutual agreements between the international community and national governments that set out a framework of shared responsibilities, commitments and benchmarks against which both donors and government can be held to account. The term ‘compact’ has recently gained in prominence through the high-profile compacts developed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They ...» more
Poverty and Vulnerability Monitoring
It is very difficult to compare the specific tools and methodologies used for poverty monitoring (PM) with those used for vulnerability monitoring (VM), as they are so diverse. However, it is possible to make some general observations in relation to differences between the 2 broad approaches:In essence, the 2 approaches are monitoring different concepts. Poverty can be seen as ...» more
Peacebuilding and Access to Justice in Sri Lanka
Since the signing of a ceasefire agreement in 2002, many donors have sought to facilitate the peace process through peace conditionalities, i.e. the provision of aid tied to commitment to conflict resolution and peace. Much of the literature stresses, however, that political and diplomatic actors and processes and efforts to address structural causes of conflict are also ...» more
Urbanisation and Urban Poverty in Bangladesh
Access to housing and security of tenure is a key issue for the urban poor of Bangladesh. Often they are forced to settle in informal settlements on marginal lands where they fall prey to mastaans, or middle men, who charge extortionate rents for land and services and often use coercive methods. These settlements often have little or no access to basic services such as water ...» more
Institutional Assessment of the Police and Justice Sectors
This report includes coverage of a number of donor designed frameworks for assessing the policing and justice sector. According to much of the general academic and policy literature on SSAJ programmes, substantial reform of the police force is only possible when reform of the justice system is administered at the same time. However, whilst the underlying principles for the ...» more
