ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we return to a fundamental theme in the debate on lasting change, on targeting primary causes of problems and the discontinuity of programmes: ownership and dependency. In Chapter 8 on PEAS, we reviewed the dependency-inducing practices of providing as a discrete expert routine. We observed the coercive objectivity of its reasoning, its propensity to decide on issues and on interventions from the top down and from outside in, or its tendency toward charity. ‘This assumed objectivity is founded on implicit principles of division, hierarchy and exclusion – principles through which scientific research can turn into an excellent agent of control’ 1 and, therefore, dependency. Neither does giving induce ownership. Ownership comes from an ownership of process, of problem and of solution. I have constantly seen and heard well-intended experts, NGOs and others decide on a problem, legitimate maybe but not perceived as a problem by community, and, if so, certainly not a priority. People will go along with what outsiders say or have decided because, in the process, they may just get something worthwhile for themselves, which in their lives of least expectation is better than nothing. Worse still, the poor will then get handed the responsibilities to implement priorities decided by others – what Banargee and Duflo call ‘mandated empowerment’. 2 That is, the inevitability of having to do it themselves, albeit with a bit of help, on the assumption that by doing so, they will in time come to own it.
