Small, competitive and resilient - How small-scale producers contribute to food security

Food insecurity threatens almost one billion people, especially in rural areas in developing countries, where four out of five people go hungry every day. Scientists estimate that the world’s population will grow to 9.1 billion by 2050. Since natural resources are already dangerously degraded, fossil fuels are becoming scarce, and climate change has become an impending reality, this poses a serious challenge. To nourish the growing population and meet the challenges of climate change, it is n...

Civic Driven change:Bringing Politics back in

Politics is central to development discourse, yet remains peripheral.  And, over some twenty years, a civil society narrative has not fulfilled  its potential to ‘bring politics back in’. Reasons can be found in  conceptual confusion, in selectivity in donor thinking and policies  towards civil society and in the growth-driven political economy of  NGO-ism.

KP policy paper on the ‘Dignity Revolutions’ recommended by BNR News Radio as a reading material

At a programme of the Dutch radio channel BNR News Radio on Wednesday 23 November, the latest policy paper of KP Civil Society in West Asia entitled Regional Perspectives on the 'Dignity Revolutions': How Middle Eastern Activists Perceive Popular Protest was recommended as a reading material. This policy paper provides the perspectives of political and social actors who are the foot soldiers of the ‘Dignity Revolutions’. Please click the link of the programme below (in Dutch).  

BlueCoat: US technology surveilling Syrian citizens online

In the context of repression in the Middle East and North Africa,  surveillance technology has played a key role in providing authoritarian  regimes with the tools necessary to track citizens online. Among these  companies, BlueCoat has proved to be the most efficient in helping the Syrian regime control every movement of Syrians on the Internet.

Regional Perspectives on the ‘Dignity Revolutions

This policy paper provides unique perspectives from Middle Eastern  activists who are part of popular protests across the region. The  recommendations are based on their perspectives and addressed to the EU  at large European Commission, the Dutch government and Non-Governmental  Organisations in order for them to best support the democratic  transitions in the region.

Syria's crisis: A 'war of attrition' and a 'marathon', experts say

Read the interesting article of Ahram Online on the conference Emerging Spheres of Civil Engagement in Syria organised by Hivos, Arab Forum for Alternatives and University of Amsterdam on 24-25 October 2011 in Cairo.

The Syrian Uprising and the Power of Stories

On  a daily basis scores of Syrian activists upload their YouTube footage  of protests and the regime’s atrocities, hoping that someone will watch  them, become outraged, and act in ways to support the uprising. Given  the regime’s information blackout, a lot can be learned from these video  snapshots. Yet otherwise the eerie silence from Syria has been deafening. Rarely  are Syrian activists given a voice to express their grievances, wishes,  desires, aspir...

State, society and nature in Ecuador: the case of the Yasuní-ITT initiative

This paper critically analyses the emergence and development of the Yasuní-ITT initiative, which is built on the idea of leaving oil underground in exchange for financial contributions from the international community .Development politics in Ecuador has experienced major changes since the   election of Correa in 2007.

Participation, planning and natural resources in Bolivia: from fiction to practice?

In this paper, we focus on participation in the main planning documents produced in Bolivia in the first decade of the 2000s: the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) and the National Development Plan (PND). We analyze how these planning instruments have been able to capture popular participation through diverse mechanisms and how these practices fit in the current mainstream participation discourse. For more knowledge programme publications on participation in development click here. In t...

“Digital Natives with a Cause?” newsletter, volume VIII

This issue touches upon new dilemma’s of the digital era. Guest editor Nilofar Ansher writes a compelling piece that questions what come’s first: the members of a group of the group itself? She makes her argument through explaining what happens when she deletes all her posts from the Facebook group wall. She asks the questions, when she erases all the traces of her posts, does this matter to the group and to the people that came after her?

Making a difference, online and offline

A new collection examines how technology and issues of connectivity are shaping the lives of ‘digital natives’—and how the Net can influence social change. The Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, and The Hague, Netherlands-based Hivos Knowledge Programme recently launched a four- book collection, Digital AlterNatives with a Cause?, edited by Nishant Shah and Fieke Jansen. Jansen is the knowledge officer for the Digital AlterNatives with a Cause? Programme at Hivos. In the book, resear...

When Civics go Governance

In ‘When Civics go governance’ Ria Brouwers analyses the stormy ascent of African NGOs in the field of good governance. Tracing the tracks of the NGO-boom in Africa, Brouwers brings together key academic writings with ISS led field on NGO interventions in Zambia, Uganda, Kenia and Tanzania conducted under the banner of the Hivos/ISS Civil Society Building Knowledge Programme.

Social movements and NGO interaction

Are we entering a post-NGO era in development? Aid critics very much  suggest so. Hailed as a magic bullet for development two decades ago,  NGOs are increasingly criticized for being ineffective agents of change,  out of touch with broader social currents in society and operating in a  fragmented way. Under pressure to show results, NGOs and their donors  are increasingly attempting to align with social movements in a bid to  scale up their impact. Social moveme...

Participation for What:Social change or social control?

'Participation for What' is about meaningful participation in development. How and when does it work? What are the downsides? And what does it imply for development practice and research? This book brings together a rich collection of essays on participation by Phd -  students from the Institute of Social Studies

Mobilizing Social Justice in South Africa: Perspectives from Practitioners and Researchers

South Africa grapples with serious social and economic  inequalities, including inequality in access to basic services. At a  time of rising social tensions, the country’s institutions are in danger  of losing the legitimacy they gained in the wake of democratic  dispensations of the 1990s. This book presents  the findings of five research projects that address  these key areas in  partnership with practitioners, which were  presented at an internationa...

7 Citizenship in Social Movements: Constructing Alternatives in the Anti-Privatization Forum, South Africa Meghan Cooper

This paper explores how social movements construct citizenship and redefine the very notion of the political realm. Social movements have quickly become powerful actors within South Africa’s civil society.

5 Rights, Politics and Power: The Struggle over the 2006 Abortion Reform and the Women’s Movement in Nicaragua Katherine Kruk

Since 2006 the Nicaraguan abortion law eliminates all forms of therapeutic abortion in the country with a penalty of up to three years in prison. This paper considers the 2006 Nicaraguan abortion law reform by looking at the situation in the country, with special attention to women’s rights, in particular reproductive rights—and, more specifically, abortion rights. The paper shows that the reform is unrepresentative of the attitudes and opinions of much of its civil society members, namely, w...

4 Localised Voices in the Globalised Amazon: Challenges of Civil Society Building in Ecuador Brian Wallis

Civil society building efforts in Ecuador have provided the Achuar and Kichwas of the Amazon with a voice. This is particularly relevant given the global significance of the Amazon, which makes it essential that local voices are empowered to have a say in the future of their local space. Civil society building efforts aim at empowering historically excluded groups, leading to their political inclusion, as well as to an increase in their decision-making power.

1 Seizing and Stretching Participatory Space: Civil Society Participation in Tanzania’s Policy Processes

This paper takes as its starting point the perspective that civil society participation in governance—particularly policy processes such as the Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) and related policy developments—largely takes on a mere consultative rather than a transformative role when initiated and driven by government or donors.

What Support for the Protest Movement?

If the creeping massacre of the Syrian population is to be stopped,  now is the time to send out an unambiguous message, warns Volker  Perthes, expert on the Near East and director of the German Institute  for International and Security Affairs

Knowledge exploration agricultural biodiversity

This meeting is organized to discuss the needs for, and the content of a  knowledge programme on agricultural biodiversity, resilience and  transformation.

Knowledge exploration agricultural biodiversity, resilience and transformation

This meeting is organized to discuss the needs for, and the content of a knowledge programme on agricultural biodiversity, resilience and transformation. The meeting brings together professionals in this field from different regions and disciplines. A mapping report drafted by the Stockholm Resilience Centre in cooperation with Oxfam Novib and Hivos and with input from scientists and development practitioners is the starting point for discussions. This knowledge exploration builds on the refl...

Rethinking Development in an age of Scarcity and Uncertainty

04/10/2011 The session, facilitated by Wendy Hartcourt of SID,  was conducted as an open discussion on the new publishing arrangements with the coming of the digital age among development journals looking at both the opportunities and the current squeeze for resources.The discussion looked at the new possibilities offered by on-line and digital publishing. The discussed focused on how to ensure scholarship and rigour while using the new open forms of communication through social networking and new...