Skip to content

Preorg!

Defragmenting our selves

Menu
  • Social movements
  • Self help for the apocalypse
  • Organising renters
  • Research notes
  • Scholar Activist Network
  • Archived posts
    • About
    • Co-operatives
    • Economic organising
    • Journalism
    • Non-profit organising
    • Taking power
    • People in orgs
    • Social media and orgs
Menu

Bringing anarchy to NGOs

Posted on 16 July, 2013 by preorg

Or somewhat more democratic and inclusive forms of organising anyway – this article is interesting:

Carne Ross: our forms must reflect our fundamental political values

I’ve thought a fair bit about the prospects for making NGOs more cooperative. Campaigning NGOs could have much more of a two way decision-making process with their donors and supporters. ‘Charitable’ NGOs could allow those they are helping to become more a part of the organisation. This would help them to live their stated values, being supposedly in favour of equality and empowerment and so on.

The main barrier seems to me to be the status that attaches to a professional expert, and the fact that democratisation, in sharing the expertise around, would undermine the status of the professional. How NGO professionals see themselves is very important to their participation in the industry, and to become a mere facilitator rather than an expert would be considered by most a step down.

It would be nice if they could consider it a step up. That would require a bit of cultural change, a shift in what we all value.

Related

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

  • What will it take to build a renters’ movement?
  • Renters, landlords, the people who love them, and the win
  • Can LRU grow it’s more precarious and vulnerable renter membership?
  • Whatever happened to the pandemic rent strike? – a view from within LRU
  • The space for a right to housing
Interested in Besson Street? Try here
© 2022 Preorg! | Powered by Minimalist Blog WordPress Theme