Foreign Aid for Indian NGOs: Problem or Solution?

NGOs and Foreign funding-Unchallenged Breaking India Forces, 2019

In recent decades NGOs have increased their numbers and range of activities to a level where they have become increasingly dependent on a limited number of donors. Consequently competition has increased for funding, as have the expectations of the donors themselves. This runs the risk of donors adding conditions which can threaten the independence of NGOs; for example, an over-dependence on official aid has the potential to dilute “the willingness of NGOs to speak out on issues which are unpopular with governments”. In these situations NGOs are being held accountable by their donors, which can erode rather than enhance their legitimacy, a difficult challenge to overcome. Some commentators have also argued that the changes in NGO funding sources has ultimately altered their functions. The scale and variety of of activities in which NGOs participate has grown rapidly since the 1980s, witnessing particular expansion in the 1990s.This has presented NGOs with a need to balance the pressures of centralisation and decentralisation. Conversely it may also be advantageous to decentralise as this can increase the chances of an NGO responding more flexibly and effectively to localised issues by implementing projects which are modest in scale, easily monitored, produce immediate benefits and where all involved know that corruption will be punished. This paper emphasis on the present challenges and issues of Non Governmental organization in society.

Dialogue, March, 2002

Voluntas, 1991

The last two decades have witnessed a veritable mushrooming of NGOs in India. What, however, is inadequately appreciated is that the conversion of voluntarism into primarily a favoured instrumentality for developmental intervention has changed what was once an organic part of civil society into merely a sector — an appendage of the developmental apparatus of the state. Further, this process of instrumental appropriation has resulted in these agencies of self-activity losing both their autonomy and political-transformative edge. What is required, therefore, is to reorientate voluntarism from a framework of subserving the needs of delivery to one promoting self-governance in the widest sense.

2010

By examining how NGOs operate in southern India in the early 2000s, 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 women is an important part of the empowerment being realized. 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 programmes. The author uses innovative statistical analysis tools to show how a key factor in empowerment of marginalized 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 recognizes 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.

South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies , 2013

This paper examines the role of non-government organisations (NGOs) and the implications for democratisation in India. By analysing one such organisation, this paper argues that NGOs do not always contribute positively to the democratisation process. It shows how Seva Mandir, an NGO working in the tribal areas of Rajasthan, has adopted a purely technocratic and apolitical service delivery approach and promoted a neo-liberal model of development. The unintended consequence of promoting this model has been the growth of a culture of ‘organised dependency’ at the grass-roots level, which has adversely affected the larger objectives of empowerment and democratisation.

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, 2008

This article seeks to understand how the Indian state exercises control over transnational ties between foreign and domestic actors by examining the national legislative practices that determine receipt of foreign funds and the data on foreign funding flows to NGOs (a database of more than 18,000 associations). The article shows how legislative practices of democratic states serve to reduce foreign influence. Issue characteristics are also shown to determine state response to externalization, blocking transnational ties in ''high politics'' areas such as minority claims. Finally, within state imposed restrictions, religious rather than secular organizations remain dominant transnational actors in India. The study contributes evidence to suggest that contrary to the arguments of world polity theory and many transnational social movement scholars, states continue to remain powerful actors limiting transnationalization.

World Development, 1999

Ð What is the best way for nongovernment organisations (NGOs) to make a lasting impact on poverty? This paper summarizes the ®ndings of recent research into the impact, sustainability and cost-eectiveness of two NGOs in India and two projects implemented by Save the Children Fund-UK in Bangladesh. The factors determining performance are explored through the interaction of organizational decisions with the external context. Although these interactions are complex and dynamic, some clear conclusions emerge. Making a dierence to livelihoods and capacities among poor people depends on NGO successes in fostering autonomous grassroots institutions and linking them with markets and political structures at higher levels. These conclusions question the current predilection among donor agencies to fund large-scale NGO service delivery. Ó

Environment and Urbanization, 1999

This paper presents the findings of research on the activities, target groups, funding base and linkages of a sample of 67 grassroots NGOs working with the urban poor and on the extent to which their work is subject to internal or external evaluation. The paper demonstrates the diversity of NGO characteristics within one particular Indian city, Bombay (1). The paper highlights certain concerns for the future role of the non-governmental sector, especially in the context of the changing role of the state. As NGOs move in to fill the gap left by the public sector, encouraging rapid growth of expectations, complicating objectives and necessitating trade-offs between the competing demands made on them by other actors, they may be ill-equipped to respond effectively to an expanding role in the urban centre.

Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) were introduced in 1945 with the creation of Inter-governmental organisations (Willets, 2011, p.6). It is a notoriously broad term and is applied to a variety of different organisational forms (Vakil, 1997), therefore hard to define. However they are typically viewed as non-profit, voluntary and civic society based (Lewis & Kanji, 2009, p.9). This essay shall seek to highlight the main arguments which support Development NGOs (DNGO) being agents of foreign Aid: Providing for all beneficiaries through constant funding, promotion of development and monetary aid and lack of affiliation making them non bias. As well as the argument that foreign aid is a secondary purpose behind cooperation and the lack of DNGOs in capacity building, which all represent how they are not ‘agents of foreign aid’. This essay shall also attempt to address the reasons why DNGOs are vehicles of cooperation: the influence of alliance, involvement in the early stages of aid allocation, embracing of the Global South and the involvement of the government throughout planning. However, also discussing the impact of globalisation, ignorance to the core issue and the lack of substantial influence on states. Concluding that DNGOs are progressing from primarily providing foreign aid, to the understanding that cooperation is fundamental to global assistance and improving the global sphere.