Resources

This paper reflects on the questions of how and under what conditions can the democratic potential of Deliberative and Inclusionary Processes (DIPs) be enlarged to include more people and more places. The author concludes that enabling government policies, organizational change and professional reorientation are all necessary preconditions for the widespread use for DIPs in all aspects of life. However, through an analysis of where and how power is exercised, the author suggests that rather than merely attempt to institutionalize and expand DIPs in the realm of politics, the key issue should be widening economic democracy. This would result in mutually reinforcing and radical structural reforms; some such reforms are proposed by the author and include the notion of a unconditional citizen income for all, a more equal balance between waged and non-waged labour and combining subsistence and market economies.

This IDS working paper examines the role of knowledge in the process of making and implementing poverty reduction policy. It focuses on the production of poverty knowledge through measurement and assessment, providing an overview of contemporary poverty assessment approaches, and the issues and dilemmas involved in applying them in the context of poverty reduction policy processes. The first section examines the policy process in order to understand the relationship between poverty knowledge and policy change. It looks at how legitimate knowledge is traditionally framed in the policy process as the domain of technical experts who reduce complex phenomena to measurable variables, and how this frame changes if policy is understood as a more chaotic process with multiple actors involved. Section Two discusses the broad questions of what poverty actually is and how it can be measured, focusing on the fact that a consensus appears to have emerged which then obscures the many debates centred around poverty measurement. Three policy events are examined in order to show how different objectives shape the methodological choices policy actors make. The third section focuses on a range of methodologies available for poverty assessments, with a focus on household surveys and participatory poverty assessments (PPAs). Lastly, the World Bank and Oxfam are examined in order to understand how two international development actors with different objectives made use of acquired poverty knowledge in constructing policy messages. The argument is proposed that the agency and objectives of the policy actors themselves are most important in shaping policy narratives.

This discussion paper sets out to generate ideas on new approaches to evaluating citizen education in practice. It considers three broad perspectives - renewed interest in the promotion of citizenship in the North and South; the history of citizen education; consideration of how people learn - and then identifies lessons and challenges. The paper then focuses on several factors involved in the internalisation and development of citizenship, and finally reviews new work on learning from other academic fields in order to assess how citizen education can enhance active citizenship. In the final section, there are questions and challenges for future work.

This issue of in brief traces synergies and tensions between gender and participation in development practice. The lead article cites the importance of mainstreaming gender-aware and participatory approaches for equity; there are two case studies concerned with entrenched resistance to equity within organisations; a final article considers the incorporation of gender into poverty reduction strategies advocated by the World Bank.

This article compares findings deduced from participatory appraisal techniques with those obtained by more conventional assessments, notably household surveys and specifically those drawn from a local, recently revised census. Its particular focus is on measuring wellbeing in an area in Mali, with particular reference to household food security and child under-nutrition. It investigates how the different methods of assessment can reveal discrepancies relative to the method of data collection used which impact in a contradictory way on deductions.

The paper is a case study of the way that World Neighbors used PRA in a process of community development in one sublocation in Kenya. The paper gives some background as to the practices of World Neighbors, the conditions in the community, and the role of government in the area. It then explains how PRA was used with a representative body at the sublocation level for analysis and planning. The PRA discussions led to development activities that had impacts on the physical well-being of community members, as well as less tangible social effects. The social effects included new modes of operating for the village leadership, changed relationships between community members, and supportive attitudes of local government officials for community led development strategies. The case study raises a number of general strategic choices facing non-governmental organisations using PRA and presents the strengths and weaknesses of the strategies chosen by World Neighbors.

From tentative beginnings in the late 1980s, Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) has spread through Kenya 'like a bushfire'. In response to growing demand for 'doing participation', PRA has been popularised and marketised to such an extent that, as one Kenyan practitioner put it, 'everyone is doing something and calling it PRA'. PRA has become a routine requirement for development organisations, many of which have done little to change their ways of operating to accommodate a more participatory approach. The paper explores some of the different visions and versions of PRA as it has taken shape in the Kenyan context, highlighting differences that are rooted in the different pathways that have brought practitioners to use PRA, and in the enduring development institutions that have shaped practice. It suggests that the sheer variety of meanings and practices associated with PRA pose a serious challenge for efforts to enhance the quality of participatory practice. It poses the question of whether it is possible to arrive at a single vision of PRA and how quality standards could be agreed upon and enforced. It goes on to argue that deliberation on these issues is in itself valuable, even if no clear agreement is reached.