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This book discusses effective social innovation strategies facilitated by civil society organisations (CSOs) to tackle India's significant urban sanitation challenge. It presents the contours of an ecosystem that includes citizen participation and strengthening community-managed systems for improved sanitation and public health.The book analyses case studies of effective sanitation programmes as well as experiments with innovative ideas in different regional contexts by CSOs to meet the contextual needs of the community and to ensure access to safe sanitation, especially among the urban poor. It highlights the challenges and the need for active participation of communities for change in behaviour, increasing institutional capacities of municipalities for standardising and scaling up strategies which work. The authors highlight the need for designing low-cost solutions, organising informal sanitation workers, serving marginalised communities and building effective alliances between communities and institutions to influence public policy. Rich in empirical data, this book will be useful for scholars and researchers of urban studies, public policy, governance, political science, development studies and sociology as well as for CSOs and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working on urban sanitation, urban planning and public policy.

In Changing the Subject Srila Roy maps the rapidly transforming terrain of gender and sexual politics in India under the conditions of global neoliberalism. The consequences of India's liberalization were paradoxical: the influx of global funds for social development and NGOs signaled the co-optation and depoliticization of struggles for women's rights, even as they amplified the visibility and vitalization of queer activism. Roy reveals the specificity of activist and NGO work around issues of gender and sexuality through a decade-long ethnography of two West Bengal organizations, one working on lesbian, bisexual, and transgender issues and the other on rural women's empowerment. Tracing changes in feminist governmentality that were entangled in transnational neoliberalism, Roy shows how historical and highly local feminist currents shaped contemporary queer and nonqueer neoliberal feminisms. The interplay between historic techniques of activist governance and queer feminist governmentality's focus on changing the self offers a new way of knowing feminism—both as always already co-opted and as a transformative force in the world.

This book deals with the dynamics of local-level politics in China and India. China introduced new policies to restructure local politics in 1978. In place of communes, civil society organizations and cooperatives were introduced in villages. More changes came about with the introduction of the Organic Law of the Villagers'Committees of the People's Republic of China in 1998. The new local power structure includes state-sponsored institutions like Villagers Committees and the traditional civil society organizations (CSOs) and non-government organizations (NGOs). As in China, local politics in India undergoes considerable changes during the last few decades. Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) were reformed in 1992 with a constitutional amendment act. CSOs and NGOs were allowed to function. Against this background, the present book is undertaken with the objectives first, to present two different models of local politics and second, to compare the two, finally to focus on the two different models of development. This book will interest scholars of rural governance, rural transformation, and the role of the grassroots CSOs and NGOs in shaping development program and growth in the two large countries in Asia.

NGO managers in the developing world play a crucial role in reaching diverse high-risk groups. Yet to date there has been no empirical study of what makes these managers effective. Here Farhad Analoui and Shehnaz Kazi present the first qualitative, empirical insights into this key question. Focusing specifically on managers of HIV/AIDS NGOs in India - one of the world's largest developing nations - this book considers how such managers are perceived by outsiders, how their work is or could be influenced by government-level intervention or international-policy-level drivers such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and how such managers perceive issues that influence their ability to manage their organisations effectively. Through individual, collective, and focus-group interviews with managers and staff at four NGOs, the authors build a startlingly rich picture of aid workers'and managers'fears and hopes. From this data, the authors confirm eight parameters of effectiveness, three interrelated contextual factors, and discover a culturally adjusted new framework for analysis of the NGO managers behaviour at work. For its wealth of qualitative empirical data with broad-ranging implications for all developing countries, Managing NGOs in the Developing World is a must-read for researchers, students, and practitioners interested in the intersections between human resource management, international development, and sustainable development.

This book is an ethnographic exploration of slum children's participation in NGO programs that centres children's narratives as key to understanding the lived experience of development in India where 50% of the population is under the age of 25. Weaving theoretical and methodological interventions from anthropology, childhood studies and development studies with children's own narratives and images, the author foregrounds children's lifeworlds whilst documenting the extent to which these lifeworlds are shaped by the twin forces of marginalisation and aspiration. The book documents NGO campaigns targeting child marriage, sanitation and hygiene, gendered violence and bullying, and depicts and examines children's sometimes enthusiastic, sometimes reluctant, and sometimes indifferent approach to narrating and performing development. It assesses the way in which children from four slum communities in New Delhi navigate the multiplicities and contradictions of development by analysing the stories, posters and performances children produce for NGOs. Moreover, the book argues that engagement with children's narratives and performances provide valuable insights into how development attains meaning, garners consensus, fails, succeeds and circulates in a myriad of unexpected ways which consistently defy any assumptions about ‘underdeveloped'subjectivities.The first book to interrogate the substance and subjectivities produced in the development of NGO organisations offering extra-curricular programs directed towards more intangible and experiential ends, it will be of interest to researchers working in anthropology, development studies, childhood studies and South Asian studies. The book also speaks to scholars working on issues of poverty, rural-urban migration, gender justice, slums and youth.

This book explores what difference development aid has made to the size, complexity, style of functioning, values and future direction of the NGO sector in India. It does this, first, by giving a comprehensive documentation of the experience of Indian NGOs with foreign aid since Independence. Simultaneously, it also analyses, in a broad historical perspective, some of the issues which are the subject of contemporary debate regarding the voluntary sector and aid, such as who decides ‘what'is development and ‘how'it should be brought about; whether foreign donors have hidden agendas, and if their aid amounts to cultural imperialism; and whether aid has made NGOs more self-reliant.The book also looks at the tripartite relationship between NGOs, donors, and governments, examining, for instance, whether the government is justified in imposing restrictions on receipt of funds by NGOs on the grounds that terrorist activities and religiously motivated communal strife are often financed with funds from abroad, with NGOs being used as fronts for both.

This book discusses approaches used by NGOs in formulating and implementing mental health care in the community in the context of high treatment gap, insufficient public expenditure on health, human resource shortages, heterogeneity of communities as well as cultural beliefs in India. It uses a qualitative case study approach to document and analyse the work of some major NGO-run community mental health programmes in India, all of which cater to vulnerable populations and are in different and diverse regional settings. It casts the spotlight on envisioning community mental health in policy and law, implementation by the government, how it is practised by select NGOs and the challenges involved in programme implementation. In doing so, it hopes to understand the trigger factors that have led to NGOs embarking on community mental health programmes: how needs of the community are understood, the funding mechanisms, how the human resource gap was addressed, type of networks formedin the community, therapeutic and social interventions, accountability mechanisms, achievements and limitations of the programmes. This book is for students and researchers in the fields of social work and psychology, and NGOs, government and funding agencies, and for those interested in understanding and working with community mental health programmes.

Through an ethnographic study of the ‘Barefoot College', an internationally renowned non- governmental development organisation (NGO) situated in Rajasthan, India, this book investigates the methods and practices by which a development organisation materialises and manages a construction of success. Paying particular attention to the material processes by which success is achieved and the different meanings and discourses that they act to perform, this book offers a timely and novel approach to how the world of development NGOs and development ideologies work. The author argues that the College, as a prolific producer of various forms of development media, achieves its success through materially mediated heterotopic spectacles: enacted and imperfect utopias that constitute the desires, imaginings and Otherness of its society. The chapters that follow consider the different scenarios through which success was realised at the College.

Developing a distinctive theoretical framework on civil society, this book examines how Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) contribute towards democratization in India and what conditions facilitate or inhibit their contribution. It assesses three different kinds of politics within civil society – liberal pluralist, neo-Marxist, and communitarian – which have had different implications in relation to democratization.By making use of in-depth empirical analysis and comparative case studies of three developmental NGOs that work among the tribal communities in the socio-historical context of south Rajasthan, the book shows that civil society is not necessarily a democratizing force, but that it can have contradictory consequences in relation to democratization. It discusses how the democratic effect of civil society is not a result of the'stock of social capital'in the community but is contingent upon the kinds of ideologies and interests that are present or ascendant not just within the institutions of civil society but also within the state. The book delivers new insights on NGOs, democratization, civil society, the state, political society, tribal politics, politics of Hindu Nationalism, international development aid and grassroots social movements in India. It enables readers to understand better the multifaceted nature of civil society, its relationship with the state, and its implications for development and democratization.

New updated version now available!This book is the outcome of a study conducted in the eastern city of Kolkata in India in the mid-2000s. It is an ethnographic study that looks closely at women from the upper and middle classes who work with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that help empower women from all classes of society. Unlike many studies that focus on grassroots women who are the beneficiaries of NGO and developmental projects, this book looks at those women who, as volunteers and activists, help carry out these projects to the best of their abilities. These women are often overlooked from mainstream studies on women in developing nations. But their role is invaluable and crucial in defining the agendas and strategies used to enhance feminist consciousness and developing organizational structures.This book is significant because it offers awareness and alternative views to the challenges (and motivations) faced by middle and upper-class women volunteers and activists in building a career in the non-profit sector of NGOs in Kolkata. Through the testimonies of these women, it examines alternative processes of agency and change in order to define these challenges and motivations. Also revealed by the analysis, is useful information about the oppression and subordination of these women in contemporary gender-stratified civil society in India. But more importantly, this book examines the various ways urban, educated Indian women construct a feminist praxis in terms of their everyday lived experiences as volunteers and activists. In terms of their lived experiences, the women in this study reflect on the social challenges they encounter and motivations they experience as volunteers and activists, while also discussing their understanding of feminism and views on the image of a “feminist” in the postcolonial context. The results demonstrate the power of feminist standpoint theorizing and how it raises consciousness, empowers women and stimulates resistance to patriarchal oppression and injustices. Finally, this book produces new knowledge and research on the conception of feminism among women volunteers and activists in a non-western setting and how they construct the image of a feminist.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are widely heralded as an opportunity for the poor to have greater access to information that can help them escape poverty, as well as an important tool for development agencies. But as Tanya Jakimow shows, the consequences of the'information age'often deviate greatly from our image of an interconnected, modern world. Peddlers of Information offers a critical look at how local NGOs in rural India are using ICTs, particularly the internet—and the implications that this has for development work and ideas about poverty.

A PDF version of this book is available for free in open access via www.tandfebooks.com as well as the OAPEN Library platform, www.oapen.org. It has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 3.0 license and is part of the OAPEN-UK research project. By examining how NGOs operate in Southern India in the early 2000's, this book discusses the challenges faced by small, local NGOs in the uncertain times of changing aid dynamics. The key findings focus on what empowerment means for Indian women, and how NGO accountability to these groups is an important part of the empowerment being realised. The notion of community empowerment, in which the ‘solidarity'of a group can be a path to individual empowerment, is discussed, as well as analysing how empowerment can be a useful concept in development. Based on case studies of 15 NGOs as well as in-depth interviews with 80 women's self-help groups, the book highlights the key features of effective empowerment programs. The author uses innovative statistical analysis tools to show how a key factor in empowerment of marginalised women is the accountability relationship between themselves and the supporting NGO. The book goes on to discuss the ways that NGOs can work with communities in the future, and recognises the limitations of a donor-centric accountability framework. It provides a useful contribution to studies on South Asia as well as Gender and Development Studies.

Adopting an inter-disciplinary approach, this book provides an in-depth understanding of why Indian NGOs run by women for women, tend to be successful. Based on first-hand observations spanning five years and interviews with 20 founders of NGOs, this book explores the factors that motivate and facilitate women entrepreneurship in the development sector. It examines the organizational structures that have evolved based on feminist ideology and the services provided (e.g. self-help groups and micro-finance). The authors also discuss the social impact of these NGOs in promoting both development and women's empowerment. They show how small NGOs are particularly effective in garnering support from the grass-roots and in tapping the knowledge base of local communities. Overall, the authors find that women entrepreneurs act as facilitators with a unique leadership style and that they encourage community-based movements grounded in local issues. As a result, these NGOs are successfully changing the landscape of rural poverty in India while ushering in sustainable development.

The image of “Third World Woman” victimhood is one that runs through discourses in Western feminism, the fields of gender and development and also the activities of NGOs. Tamsin Bradley deconstructs this through her exploration of the relationships between NGOs and the people they target, using a unique multi-disciplinary perspective that examines the interfaces between anthropology, development and religion. She argues that dominant approaches in development practice see women as a singular and weak “other”, a focus for pity and compassion, which obscures the complexities of diverse communities and the ability to respond to real needs. Bradley's extensive fieldwork, on grassroots NGOs in rural Indian Rajasthan, and their Western donor organisations, and combines it with her compelling critique of development theory and practice, which she finds often caught in a macro system unable to connect with social realities. This leads her to a new and unique methodology, one rooted in a more honest, responsive and inclusive approach to encourage development workers to listen to the needs of those they seek to help.

Local organizations have become key mechanisms in effective, fair, and sustainable resource management and development in India. This book adds empirical evidence to the debate on whether or not these functions are performed as expected. Based on research in three sectors in three states in India, the authors'findings indicate that the design of and support for local organizations are often little more than rudimentary, resulting in less than adequate performance and raising serious sustainability concerns. Two debates dominate discourse on the roles of organizations. The first is a practical.

Two persistent problems that affect a significant portion of Indian women are poverty and violation of their human rights. In recent years, micro-credit has come to be viewed as a vital tool to ameliorate both conditions. However, there are few studies in the Indian context which test the validity of the assumption that there is a linear link between micro-credit, poverty reduction and women`s empowerment. This important and thought provoking volume brings together revealing case studies of micro-credit interventions made by six non-governmental and quasi-governmental bodies in five states of peninsular India, several of which have been supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The six case studies are diverse in terms of their socio-economic and geo-political contexts: the nature and ideological orientation of the intermediary organizations; the groups targeted by the projects (exclusively women or men and women); and the life-spans of the projects. Despite their differences, all the studies offer useful lessons on the institutional structures and processes that do or do not facilitate women`s empowerment and poverty reduction, while exploring the potential and limitations of micro-credit to achieve these twin goals.

`A worthwhile collection of experiences from several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) across India in the field of mental health.... A useful sourcebook in gaining insight of the various non-formal efforts in mental health care delivery in India′ - Psychological Medicine In the third world, research evidence shows that mental disorders are amongst the commonest and most disabling health problems in the community. The enormous scale of the burden of mental illness becomes worse because of poor access and availability of appropriate health care for most of the sufferers. The non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have played an important role in filling gaps and innovating new models of health care in under-served populations, but their work has rarely been documented. This book is the first comprehensive documentation of the NGO movement that deals with mental health problems in India. It has brought together 17 different NGOs from all regions of the country. They deal with a wide range of mental health and allied issues, from severe mental disorders to substance abuse to trauma and violence to suicide prevention and dementia in the elderly. Successes and limitations of each NGO as a service provider have been critically examined. This book also demonstrates the innovative methods adopted by the NGOs to meet the needs and challenges of mental health. In the last chapter, the editors have drawn lessons from the experience of the NGOs and have linked them to the thematic issues pertaining to the NGO role in mental health services in the country.

Focusing on NGOs that work in the areas of rural development, women, and children, the authors'goal is to shed light on the contributions of the sector in the spheres of social welfare, empowerment, service, and rural development. In addition, the problems and difficulties experienced by NGOs are analyzed and explained. This important new book traces the rise of NGOs in India and their transformation over the years, revealing the importance of NGOs in India's development after Independence.Beginning with a detailed history of voluntarism in India and examination of NGOs around the world, the authors provide the framework for examining NGOs in India as a force contributing to development. They then focus on partnerships and cooperation between NGOs and the government, advocacy and policy implications of NGO activity, accountability within organizations, approaches to problems and delivery of services, NGO life cycles, and the need for a code of ethics within NGOs. Case studies on NGOs designed to assist women, children, and rural development are presented and discussed in the context of development in general and improving the quality of life for all Indian citizens. This careful and comprehensive examination is a unique addition to a growing field of literature on India.