ABSTRACT
Capacity building tends to address specialized management issues—;;financial management, organization development, grantsmanship, and service integration, for instance—;;usually depending upon the purview and interests of the capacity builders. This chapter reviews some common conceptions of capacity. It proposes an analytical framework for policy makers, researchers, and practitioners who must design, evaluate, and run programs. By definitions, capacity measures the survival ability of organizations. R. T. Lenz defines strategic capability as "the capability of an enterprise to successfully undertake action that is intended to affect its long-term growth and development". Some views of capacity focus on such qualities of administration as politics, informal processes, and participation in contrast with others which stress rationality or the "perfection" of administration. Most capacity-building efforts suffer from a lack of conceptual precision. There are numerous administrative routines, programs, or procedures necessary to implement the activities comprising "capacity".
