Author Archive:
Andrew Kingman
Resilience is not the goal – systems change is
Occasionally, the development ‘industry’ can send me into full-on ‘grumpy old man’ mode – and some of the patronising ill-informed programming around ‘resilience’ is an example of why. The excellent discussions facilitated by colleagues from …
Catalytic philanthropy: a breakthrough model?
In a Stanford Social Innovation Review article published in 2009,[1] Mark Kramer summed up conventional philanthropy as a process of deciding how much money to give to which non-profit – the basic transaction involved in …
‘It’s our turn to eat’: reflections from the AGN
The opening plenary of day two of the African Grantmakers Network Assembly, held 29 October to 2 November in Johannesburg, South Africa, focused on youth – or, more specifically, on the relationship between elders and …
‘It’s our turn to eat’: reflections from the AGN
The opening plenary of day two of the African Grantmakers Network Assembly, held 29 October to 2 November in Johannesburg, South Africa, focused on youth – or, more specifically, on the relationship between elders and …
More Than Good Intentions – How a new economics is helping to solve global poverty
The publisher’s gushing blurb, suggesting that Dean Karlan has developed ‘an entirely new approach’ to making aid effective, may embarrass the economist in years to come, but nonetheless this is an important book. First, through …
Doing ourselves out of a job?
I remember talking to the Women’s Institute in Youlgreave, a tiny English village, on a cold, wet night in October 1990 about Village Aid, a new NGO I had established to work in The Gambia. …
The World Social Forum
The World Social Forum (WSF), held in Kenya 20-25 January, had its usual mix of peoples and causes, and Kenya added an unmistakable African flavour. There was also an overwhelming set of 1,000+ meetings to …
Filling gaps and making spaces: Strengthening civil society in unstable situations John Twigg (ed)
Essentially the proceedings of two one-day seminars held in January 2005, this book is a most valuable resource, not least because it is an example of the sort of creative, stimulating investment in learning that …
Grantmakers East Group shifting east?
Despite the full attendance at the Grantmakers East Group annual meeting in Sofia – itself on the new border of the proposed limits to an expanded European Union – it was noticeable that representation from …
Johns Hopkins first East Africa findings published
According to Professor McCormick, Director of Kenya’s Institute of Development Studies, civil society in East Africa is ‘under-researched and little understood’. The publication of the Johns Hopkins Comparative Non-Profit Sector Project (CNP) comparative study has …
