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The Six Core Words
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The ability,
power
or strength
of a community or an organization.
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(Deutsch:
Macht,
empowerment,
die
stärkung, leistungsfähigkeit,
English:
capacity,
power,
strength,
Español:
capacidad,
potenciación,
Filipino/Tagalog: kakayahan,
pagpapalakas,
Français:
capacité,
empowerment,
Italiano:
empowerment,
Kiswahili:
uwezo,
Português:
capacidade,
fortalecendo,
Romãnã: capacitate,
Pyccкий:
paзвития,
Somali: awooda)
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| The difference between
capacity development and capacity building lies with the conception of
where the force of growth originates. |
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The term "capacity building" implies
that some agency outside the community or organisation supplies the energy
to increase its capacity. |
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| It is informed by the
concept of "social
engineering." |
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The term "capacity development,"
in contrast, implies that the energy for growth is internal to the community
or organisation. |
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(Deutsch:
leistungsaufbau;
leistungsentwicklung,
English:
capacity
development, Español:
desarrollo
de la capacidad, Filipino/Tagalog; paglilinang
ng kakayahan, Français: renforcement
des capacités, développement
des capacités, bâtiment
de capacité, développement
de capacité, fortifier
de la communauté, हिन्दी (Hindi): षमता विकास,
अधिकारिकरण,
Kiswahili:
kujengea
uwezo,
Português: desenvolvimento
de capacidade, Romãnã: dezvoltarea
capacitatii, Somali: awoodsiinta)
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| The
empowerment of a community (or organization) is an increase in its strength,
improvement in its
capacity
(ability) to accomplish its goals. |
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Like capacity
development, it is a process of becoming stronger. See "Measuring
Empowerment" for a list of the sixteen elements of power or capacity,
and a participatory method of measuring its increase. |
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| The
empowerment methodology, in contrast to the charity
approach, aims at strengthening the community rather than encouraging it
to remain dependant
upon outside resources. |
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The empowerment
methodology, therefore, does not make everything easy for the community,
because it sees that struggle and resistance, as in physical exercise,
produce more strength. See Community
Empowerment. |
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See
Jihad
for an interesting metaphor.
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| The training material
here is aimed at attacking poverty at the community level, where mobilisation
and management training are aimed at empowering low income communities.
The theory behind the skills and techniques here is sociological. |
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The successful community worker,
an applied sociologist, can not do the best job, however, unless she or
he is familiar with some of the basic principles that lie behind the offering
of skills or describing the programmes to be set up. |
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It is built up of several
important principles:
1. The balance of power (opinion
makers and leaders, not merely the demographic majority) must desire the
community to become more self reliant and willing to make efforts and sacrifices
to become so. (Leaders and opinion makers may be formal and/or informal,
officially recognised and/or unrecognized). Without this, the mobiliser
would be wasting time and better employed in another community or organization;
.
2. An experienced and/or trained agent must
be available to intervene to stimulate and guide the community to organize
and take action to become more self reliant. The mobiliser may be one with
natural talents and skills, while the training in this web site is aimed
at developing and sharpening those skills and talents;
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3. While assistance can be offered, it should
not be charity assistance which promotes dependency and weakness, but partnership,
assistance and training that promotes self reliance and increased capacity;
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4. Recipient organisations or communities
should not be controlled or forced into change, but professionals trained
as activists of mobilisers should intervene with stimulation, information
and guidance. Social engineering must be avoided. Persuasion and facilitation
are needed;
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5. Organisms become stronger by exercising,
struggling, and facing adversity. Empowerment methodology incorporates
this principle for social organisations. Sports coaches use the slogan,
"No pain; no gain." We do not promote pain, but do promote struggle and
effort;
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6. Hands on participation, especially in
decision making, by the recipients, is essential for their increase in
capacity. Decisions can not be made for or on behalf of the community;
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7. A substantial proportion (it varies)
of the resources needed for a community project (ie the action) must be
provided by the community members themselves;
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8. We need to aim at the participants from
the beginning taking full control, exercising full decision making, and
accepting full responsibility for the actions which will lead to their
increased strength.
This is the core set of principles of the
empowerment methodology. |
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| (Deutsch:
stärkungsmethode,
English: empowerment methodology, Español: ~, Français: ~, Português:
~) |
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| (Deutsch:
Empowerment,
Macht,
die
stärkung, Stärken,
English:
capacity
development, empowerment, power,
strengthening,
Español:
capacidad,
potenciación,
Filipino/Tagalog: pagpapalakas,
Français:
capacité,
empowerment,
हिन्दी (Hindi): षमता विकास अधिकारिकरण,
Italiano:
empowerment,
Kiswahili:
kujengea
uwezo, Português: capacidade,
desenvolvimento
de capacidade, fortalecendo,
Romãnã:
dezvoltarea
capacitatii,
intarire,
Pyccкий: Рaзвития,
Somali:
xoojinta) |
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| The
word "sustainability" is important in development assistance. (The word
is not found in most dictionaries). It refers to the "ability" of something
to be "sustained" (carried on) after outside support is withdrawn. For
the community that builds a water supply, the repairing, cleaning and using
the pump after it is constructed, is the desire. |
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For an external
donor, it is the continuation of the project or its outputs after the donor
withdraws. For you, the mobilizer, it is the continuation of the community
strengthening social process after you move on. For environmentalists and
ecologists, Sustainability requires that an activity can be sustained (eg
biologically) by the physical environment, that non-renewable resources
are not used up. |
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| (العربيّة
(Arabic): الاستمرارية,
Deutsch:
Nachhaltigkeit,
die
nachhaltigkeit,
Español:
sostenimiento,
Filipino/Tagalog: maipapatuloy,
Français:
durabilité,
हिन्दी (Hindi): निरंतरता,
Italiano:
sostenibilita,
Romãnã: dezvoltare
durabila, Português:
sustentabilidade,
اردو Urdu: سسٹينيبِلٹ) |
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| The
word, "democracy," comes from ancient Greek and Latin languages, where
"demo" means the people (as in demography) and "cracy" means power (as
in bureaucracy or aristocracy). |
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The word democracy,
then, means power to the people. Ironically, ancient Greece was not very
democratic in that the economy was based upon the labour of slaves. |
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| There
are different kinds of democracy: eg representational democracy where the
people elect representatives (eg Members of Parliament) to make decisions
for them, and participatory democracy where the people are involved in
making decisions. |
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As a mobilizer,
you are urged to promote democracy, ie in the community project, but you
are not obligated to imitate the British parliamentary system. Look
for what is socially appropriate. |
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A process of social
change towards increased political decision making power for all people.
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| A
"partnership" is a relationship in which there is some equality between
the parties in the agreement. In the key word, "independent," above, it
was noted that we are all, to some extent, interdependent. While your work
leads to a community breaking out of dependency, it cannot become totally
independent. |
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The realistic
aim, then, is for communities to get into partnerships with municipal or
district authorities, and work towards more equal relationships. |
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| "Participation"
is used in several contexts on this web site. "Community
Participation" means that all members of a community participate in
decision making that affects the community (not merely consultation or
contribution). See Civic
Engagement. |
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"Participatory
Training" means that the trainees learn by doing,
ie participating as an effective method for learning skills. Participants
do not learn as effectively when they are listening to a lecture or to
a presentation. "Participatory
Management" means that management is not left only to the managers,
but is everybody's business. "Participatory Appraisal" (PRA)
means that the affected community or organization is stimulated to participate
in assessing the situation and determining priority needs. |
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| Transparency
is a very important element of strengthening a community (see elements
of empowerment).
The word "transparent" here means the ability to see through something. |
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When civil
servants try to do things (ie make decisions, allocate resources) in secrecy,
hiding their activities from the people, they are not being transparent.
They are giving the people the "mushroom
treatment." |
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| This
promotes mistrust, apathy, and marginalization (important factors of
poverty
and community weakness). Your job as a mobilizer is to promote transparency.
You do it by explaining what it is, and that the people have a right and
a responsibility to know what is going on (awareness raising). |
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You also do
it by ensuring that it is a key element of the community organizations
that you form or re-organize. Laws, such as the "Freedom of Information
Act," or similar laws which ensure that details of government spending
must be of public record, available to the people, are intended to promote
governmental transparency, although some officials will attempt to subvert
the spirit of such laws. |
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| If
you hide a problem, cover it up or deny that it is there; you surely hinder
its solution. |
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If, instead,
you uncover it, admit it, and honestly examine it, you are well on the
way to solving the problem. Transparency strengthens. |
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