Disrupt & Innovate

This page is part of a series of COVID-19 resource pages that we are creating to help civil society actors.

Click here to view all available pages.

Click here for our latest events news.

On this page, you will find links to readings, podcasts and videos related to the latest COVID-19 news and analysis. If you have a recommendation or a suggestion, let us know. Many thanks to our volunteer researcher Ineke Stemmet.

The sections are:

Staying up-to-date: Links to sites that will keep you abreast of important developments related to our sector and the latest news.

Strategic: We look at the impact and responses to COVID-19 in a general and intersectional way (i.e. impacts on human rights, climate change, etc).

Policy: Civil society’s policies that respond to challenges posed by COVID-19.

Operational: A list of what your organisation can do now to navigate these unprecedented times.

1. Staying up-to-Date

• COVID-19 Civic Freedom Tracker (ICNL/ECNL)
  This tracker monitors government responses to the pandemic that affect civic freedoms and human rights, focusing on emergency laws.
• Cultural factors are behind disinformation pandemic: why this matters (The Conversation)
  In Africa, people who report higher levels of exposure to disinformation also report lower levels of media trust. The most common reasons for people to share misinformation was to raise awareness out of a (misplaced) sense of civic duty, and make others aware of misinformation. Media users in sub-Saharan countries also said they shared misinformation “for fun”.
• Effective Activism in a Time of Coronavirus: what are we learning six months in? (From Poverty to Power + Save the Children)
  Activism is unlikely to be what speeds our exit from the crisis, but it is the single biggest determinant of whether that exit is equitable. This moment demands our best ever work and we won’t do it without plans to deal with the biggest strategic challenges in front of us – Save the Children’s Kirsty McNeil lists four to start with.
• EU launches another tool on pandemic’s threat to human rights (Devex)
  The EC is launching a new platform to monitor the consequences for democracy and human rights, prepared by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance — or International IDEA. It is intended as a one-stop shop to allow policymakers, journalists, civil society groups, and the public to track the impact of the pandemic.
• How have Africa’s regions fared in tackling COVID-19? (Institute of Security Studies)
  Regional responses to the pandemic are essential, and although regions acted quickly, results have been mixed.
• Locally Rooted: The place of community organising in times of crisis (Community Organisers UK)
  It is widely acknowledged that neighbours have played an essential role in supporting their local communities through the COVID-19 crisis. Often this support has bubbled up spontaneously from below. UK-focused blog and report.
• The COVID Inequality Ratchet: how the pandemic has hit the lives of young, women, minority and poor workers the hardest (From Poverty to Power)
  Oxfam blog on what we know about the unequal impact of COVID-19 on workers and pre-existing inequalities in labour markets, looking at data for high and lower/middle-income countries.
• The Wicked Conversation (Good Governance Africa)
  A blog series of current pan-African perspectives on the pandemic as a ‘wicked problem’, to explore ‘wicked solutions’ on: leadership, rule of law, work and jobs, public health measures, social support measures, and planning the future.

2. Strategic

Biodiversity and Climate Change

• Preventing the next pandemic: Zoonotic diseases and how to break the chain of transmission (United Nations Environment Programme)
  This scientific assessment with key messages for policy-makers examines the human-mediated factors which drive the risks of zoonotic disease outbreaks and ways in which these can be mitigated.

Civic Space and Human Rights

• Locally rooted: The place of community organising in times of crisis (Community Organisers)
  A report intended to show how people can organise together and build supportive, effectively serviced and more equitable communities.
• Pride is a timely reminder that LGBTI people must not be left out of COVID-19 response (Amnesty International )
  Last month’s Pride celebrations were a chance to celebrate and promote the rights of LGBTI people at a time when their rights are under increased threat. Amnesty International warned that existing inequalities have been entrenched by months of lockdown measures, exposing LGBTI people to terrifying levels of discrimination, stigma, hostility and violence.
  
• How to operationalise human rights for COVID-19 measures (BMJ Global Health)
  The human rights framework is complex and not readily accessible to anyone not specialised in human rights law. However, it is paramount that human rights are respected in the current situation. This article provides a basic how-to guide for the assessment and operationalisation of human rights for COVID-19 measures.
• Lockdowns vs. religious freedom: COVID-19 is a trust-building exercise (Open Global Rights)
  Governments must partner with faith leaders to battle COVID-19, creating an opportunity to build necessary trust and cooperation with wider parts of the population.
• Power in the Pandemic Breaking Borders, Refugees Imagining a Post-COVID World (Oxfam)
  This podcast cuts across borders and hands the mic to two refugee activists who discuss the impact COVID-19 has had on the communities they work with.

Data and Digital

• A Digital Lifeline in a Public Health Crisis (Stanford Social Innovation Review)
  Five lessons from BRAC in Bangladesh using a digital cash transfer programme to help poor families struggling with COVID-19.

Futures

• ‘Imagining a Post-COVID World – Strategic Futures’ (Six scenarios as 30-second videos) (Auxano Strategies, Nordic Foresight and the Global Arena Research Institute)
  Explore COVID-19 pandemic’s implications on the trans-Atlantic community, US-China relations, IPCC emission reduction targets, the gig economy and more. Six video-illustrated scenarios: (1) The Panic Normalised, (2) Taming Our Worst Impulses, (3) Too Little, Too Late, (4) No Return to Normal, (5) An Atomised World, (6) A Disaster Forgotten.
• After the Pandemic: Which Future?  (Great Transition Initiative)
  How will today’s crisis alter the shape of tomorrow’s world? Which scenario—Conventional Worlds, Barbarization, Great Transition—has become more likely? How can we seize the moment to propel transformation?
• Are you reframing your future or is the future reframing you?: Megatrends 2020 and beyond (EY)
  The COVID­-19 pandemic accelerated global megatrends, pushing the world onto a new S-curve of growth. This global reset created an opening for change that seemed unthinkable a few months ago, including the opportunity to shape the post-pandemic world for the better. EY Megatrends provide leaders with a framework for navigating this unprecedented change and charting future growth.
• COVID-19 crisis: possible scenarios for the next 18 months (Futuribles International)
  Thanks to its knowledge of rigorous forward-thinking methodologies, Futuribles International Association has set out 11 scenarios to forecast the possible evolutions of the crisis over the next 18 months (the targeted horizon being the end of 2021).

Gender Equality

• Women Face Rising Risk of Violence During Covid-19 Leave No Woman Behind in Governments’ Response (Human Rights Watch )
  Governments need to do more to monitor and intervene to prevent violence against women during COVID-19 lockdowns, Human Rights Watch said today in a report to the United Nations special rapporteur on violence against women. The problem may be especially acute for women who face both discrimination and marginalisation.

Multilateralism and international cooperation

• African solidarity to address the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the continent (African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes )
  The African Union (AU), together with the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, launched a public-private initiative known as the AU COVID-19 Response Fund. The intention of this initiative is to mobilise at least US$150 million for immediate needs to prevent the transmission of COVID-19, and up to US$400 million to support a sustainable medical response to the COVID-19 pandemic that is currently spreading across the continent.
• The Multilateral Order Post-COVID: Expert Voices (The Institute of International and European Affairs)
  The multilateral order since the Second World War was already showing strains before the world was afflicted with the pandemic. In this IIEA Expert Voices publication, ten foreign policy experts share short perspectives on the question of how COVID-19 pandemic will impact different aspects of the rules-based multilateral order.

Pandemic Specific Consequences and Responses (economic, health & social impacts)

• Beyond Lockdown⁠—Sustainable COVID Control for Low-Income Countries (Centre for Global Development)
  Countries need to be supported to deploy layered context-specific mitigation strategies after lockdown
• Can we avoid a lost decade of development? (Brookings Institution )
  Children have not borne the brunt of the immediate health threats posed by the coronavirus pandemic. But as the pandemic mutates into a global economic crisis, millions of children could be left carrying disadvantages that will limit opportunities for the rest of their lives. This article asks whether we can avoid the 2020s from becoming a lost decade for development.
• Economy Must Not Get Stuck Between Lockdown and Recovery (Chatham House )
  Despite recent outbreaks in several countries which had appeared to be close to excluding the virus, focusing on suppression and elimination is the best economic as well as a health strategy.
• How have Africa’s regions fared in tackling COVID-19? (Institute for Security Studies)
  African countries are increasingly trying to coordinate COVID-19 responses with those of their neighbours. This is done largely through regional economic communities and is a potentially important response to the pandemic. Yet their efforts have had mixed results.
• OECD’s Economic Outlook 2020: Facing The Jobs Crisis (OECD)
  COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on jobs has been 10 times bigger than that of the global financial crisis. Countries now need to do everything they can to stop this jobs crisis from turning into a social crisis. Reconstructing a better and more resilient labour market is an essential investment in the future and in future generations.
  

3. Policy

• Care in the Time of Coronavirus: Why care work needs to be at the centre of a post-COVID-19 feminist future (Oxfam GB)
  While COVID-19 and the related containment efforts have caused increases in women’s – and men’s – unpaid care workloads, women are still doing the bulk of this work. Care work is essential to the healthy functioning of our societies and economies and must be better supported through policy and social norms change.

4. Operational

• Reforms key to NGOs weathering Coronavirus financial crisis (Casey Kelso/Medium)
  The true internal change will be tested soon as NGOs face potential massive layoffs. Well-managed NGOs are more likely to survive, while those distrusted by staff and donors alike risk going under.

• COVID-19
• COVID-19 Resources

Robert Vysoudil

Communications Student Assistant

International Civil Society Centre

This page is part of a series of COVID-19 resource pages that we are creating to help civil society actors.

Click here to view all available pages.

Click here for our latest events news.

On this page, you will find links to readings, podcasts and videos related to the latest COVID-19 news and analysis. If you have a recommendation or a suggestion, let us know.

The sections are:

Staying up-to-date: Links to sites that will keep you abreast of important developments related to our sector and the latest news.

Strategic: We look at the impact and responses to COVID-19 in a general and intersectional way (i.e. impacts on human rights, climate change, etc).

Policy: Civil society’s policies that respond to challenges posed by COVID-19.

Operational: A list of what your organisation can do now to navigate these unprecedented times.

    1. Staying up-to-Date

• A Better World Ahead Means Shaping Emerging Narratives Now (SSIR)
  The groups that set the narratives about what happened during the COVID-19 crisis, what to do now, and what’s next will have outsized influence on who we hold responsible, who gets help, and what we do moving forward.
• Adaptive Context Analysis during Covid-19 – Listening to Local Voices During a Pandemic (Global Policy – World Vision blog)
  With the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic two key tenets for humanitarian aid that often go together, context analysis and travel, are now in tension. World Vision’s Johan Eldebo shows how they’ve sought to overcome it by balancing the necessity for remote management with the ongoing need for the locally informed analysis.
• Challenging the “‘White Gaze’ of Development” during COVID-19 (Podcast) (Oxford Society for International Development)
  Liberian academic, activist and author Robtel Neajai Pailey, uses race as a lens of analysis to interrogate assumptions that Western whiteness and modernity are the primary signifiers of progress and expertise. In exploring the pitfalls of adopting a “colour blind” outlook on development, it considers how scholars, policymakers and practitioners can challenge the ‘white gaze’ by imagining “a better world beyond flattened curves”.
• COVID-19: Human development on course to decline this year for the first time since 1990 (UNDP)
  The United Nations Development Program predicts a decline in global human development – education, health, and living standards – for the first time in 30 years.
• Embracing Innovation in Government Global Trends 2020: Innovative COVID-19 Solutions (OECD Observatory of Public Sector Innovation)
  OPSI has identified five key themes driving public sector innovation efforts during the crisis: 1. Rapid acceleration of digital innovation and transformation, 2. Seeking bottom-up solutions and insights, 3. Social solidarity and caring, 4. Reducing the spread through virus tracking and adaptive action, and 5. Forging a path to recovery.
• How are Civil Society Organizations adapting in the pandemic? (From Poverty to Power FP2P)
  Diverse stories on the roles of civil society and civic agency during the pandemic. While many actions focus on the basic and immediate needs that an emergency response requires, many others hint at gradual shifts and emerging areas of the agency.
• How the Coronavirus Tests European Democracy (Carnegie Endowment Europe)
  The Coronavirus pandemic is prompting contrasting trends in European democracy. While the crisis is aggravating many stresses that afflict democracy in Europe, it is also propelling democratic efforts in a number of areas. Several articles including: Coronavirus and European Civil Society, Technocracy and Populism After the Coronavirus, Digital Divides and the Coronavirus.
• Humanitarian Financing Is Failing the COVID-19 Frontlines  (Center for Global Development)
  Longstanding weaknesses in the humanitarian business model are undermining the COVID-19 response in fragile and conflict-affected states. Extensive delays, poor mechanisms for tracking disbursement of funds from intermediaries to implementers, and persistent obstacles to financing local actors are preventing funds from reaching organizations on the frontlines of the COVID-19 fight.
• In many countries, the coronavirus pandemic is accelerating, not slowing (The Conversation)
  Around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic is accelerating. While some countries such as Australia and New Zealand have managed to flatten the curve, in many other parts of the world the number of cases has continued to reach new highs.
• Latin America sees the largest decline in peacefulness as COVID-19 poses a further threat (Devex)
  South America is the region of the world where peace deteriorated most last year, followed by Central America and the Caribbean, according to the “Global Peace Index 2020” report, with peacefulness expected to drop globally as a result of COVID-19.
• New UNESCO report shows COVID-19 leaving vulnerable children behind (Devex)
  The “2020 Global Education Monitoring Report” from UNESCO shows progress is slowing on the global out-of-school rate for primary and secondary school-age children, and COVID-19 will only make it worse.
• Sector boundaries are blurring, says CARE secretary-general (Devex)
  COVID-19 has “deeply transformed” the humanitarian and development sectors, potentially blurring the boundaries for good, according to the new secretary-general of CARE International.
• Sierra Leone faces coronavirus as rainy season hits – local disaster planning will be key (The Conversation)
  Overlapping disasters of COVID-19 and flooding could be a serious threat for Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown.
• The Global Economic Outlook During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Changed World (World Bank)
  The pandemic is expected to plunge most countries into recession in 2020, with per capita income contracting in the largest fraction of countries globally since 1870.
• The view from space: See how dramatically COVID-19 changed the world (Fast Company)
  A new dashboard from three space agencies shows the startling impact of the coronavirus pandemic on everything from air quality to asparagus farming.
• What kind of research should inform COVID responses? (From Poverty to Power FP2P)
  If we agree that evidence-informed policy and practice are good things, we need to think about what kind of research gets commissioned. We are fast reaching the end of the road for COVID expert opinion based on what was happening in last data rounds before COVID, and need to shift gears to investing in new data.
• When the West Falls Into Crisis (Webinar) (The New Humanitarian)
  An important conversation on rethinking humanitarianism in the midst of #BlackLivesMatter and COVID-19. The globalisation of vulnerability – made clear by the Coronavirus pandemic and a global anti-racism movement – is putting into question traditional conceptions of humanitarian aid, too. Will this historic moment force a rethink of international solidarity? Is the international nature of aid inherently problematic? TNH Director Heba Aly posed these questions to panellists from across the aid sector.
• World Bank has ‘stretched’ its capacity in coronavirus response, Malpass says (Devex)
  The World Bank has reached the limit of support it can provide to low- and middle-income countries recovering from the pandemic, even while acknowledging those nations require more resources than are currently available, the institution’s president says.

    2. Strategic

Biodiversity and Climate Change

• Climate change makes COVID-19 politics look easy (Lowy Institute)
  The coronavirus pandemic has led to all kinds of novel political calculations. Climate change needs even better ones.
• Opportunity in Crisis: Making Green Energy the New Normal (Asia Foundation)
  Some of the most indelible images of the pandemic have been the brilliant skies that emerged from the smog as the world stayed home and fossil-fuel use plunged. With renewables now cheaper than coal, we must summon the political will to build a green new normal.

Cities and Urbanisation

• Six experts on how we’ll live, work and play in cities after COVID-19 (Fast Company)
  Architects and urban planners from Gensler, Harvard, and Bloomberg Associates explain the changes coming to our shared spaces.

Data and Digital

• Artificial Intelligence and the Fight Against COVID-19 (Nesta)
  AI could play a powerful role in tackling the pandemic, from helping to discover new drugs and vaccines to testing and predicting the spread of infection. But new Nesta analysis of the quality of AI research has found some significant limitations in how it is currently being applied.

Futures

• A post-pandemic world is unlikely to focus on meeting need over human greed (The Conversation)
  Political and economic power-holders will strive for a return to pre-pandemic ‘normality’.
• Exploring the impact of COVID-19 in Africa: A scenario analysis to 2030 (Institute of Security Studies)
  This new study assesses the likely impact of COVID-19 on Africa over the next decade. Comparing three scenarios on growth and mortality with the continent’s pre-pandemic development projections, it examines impacts on average incomes, poverty levels and SDG targets, and how to reduce vulnerability and strengthen resilience.
• Martin Wolf – The World After the Pandemic (Podcast) (How To Academy)
  The world after 2020 will be very different from the world we left. But how? Will the pandemic lead to the greatest upheaval in the social contract since the second world war, the end of globalisation, the beginning of the Asian century? Will it lead to tax rises, inflation, further austerity? Hear from the world’s preeminent financial journalist.
• Navigating the transition to sustainability amidst new forces, positive and negative (Forum for the Future)
  Caroline Ashley, Global Director of System Change Programmes at Forum for the Future, examines the emergent positive and negative forces actively shaping the post-COVID-19 reality and reasserts the need for a just transition.
• Optimistic or pessimistic about Covid-19? No need to choose (From Poverty to Power FP2P)
  Jordi Vaquer, Director for Global Foresight and Analysis at the Open Society Foundations, argues this is a time when defenders of open society can neither afford to sit comfortably upon the vindication of their analysis by events, nor to simply spring into action following their mood, their gut and their time-tested handbook. It is the moment to be bold, imaginative and thorough in our thinking about the future.
• Rethink: The edge of change (Podcast) (BBC World Service)
  How the coronavirus pandemic has created new opportunities to change our world.
• The Long Shadow Of The Future (Noema)
  The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed how valuable it is for governments to have operational expertise, plan for the long-term and socialise certain risks.

Multilateralism and international cooperation

• Humanitarian Financing Is Failing the COVID-19 Frontlines (Centre for Global Development)
  Longstanding weaknesses in the humanitarian business model are undermining the COVID-19 response in fragile and conflict affected states.Now should be an opportunity for international NGOs to rethink their role in humanitarian delivery entering into subcontracting relationship for operational delivery.

Pandemic Specific Consequences and Responses (economic, health & social impacts)

• Let the learning begin — a WHO open-access platform could transform COVID-19 response (Devex)
  Information is only as good as our ability to find, understand, and use it. Hence, WHO should convene an independent panel to verify information and decide what to include into a global information portal for health authorities, journalists, academic experts, and civil society.

     3. Policy

• And now some questions for China’s TikTok (EU Observer)
  The EU named China as responsible for targeted influence operations and disinformation campaigns around COVID-19. Given the questions about the extent to which TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, propagates censorship, TikTok’s membership in the EU Code of Practice risks prematurely legitimising the platform as a responsible information space actor.
• Can the AU protect citizens against COVID-19 abuses? (Institute for Security Studies)
  The African Peer Review Mechanism’s pandemic governance guidelines are useful, but do they go far enough?
• COVID-19 & the Risks to Children in Urban Contexts (Policy Brief) (World Vision)
  Residents of urban slums, informal settlements and low-income neighbourhoods endure living conditions that make it challenging to protect against COVID-19. This policy brief looks at how World Vision is responding to anticipate and experience the impacts in urban areas and assess the needs of the most vulnerable. It provides recommendations for what governments, the UN and other NGOs can do to lessen their suffering.
• Left out & Unaccounted for: How COVID-19 is exposing inequalities in cities (World Vision)
  At World Vision, we are responding to COVID-19 in over 253 cities across all regions in both stable and fragile contexts. COVID-19 is currently a trending global challenge, but for urban hotspots, it is one of many. Now more than ever, the international community must amplify its voice in calling for accelerated actions to alleviate poverty and inequality in urban areas, making cities “inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” (SDG 11).
• Survey: Advocacy in the Time of COVID-19 (Africa) (Advocacy Accelerator )
  The Advocacy Accelerator is keen to take the pulse of how change-makers within the advocacy ecosystem in Africa are being impacted by and responding to the current global pandemic COVID-19. The results of this survey will be shared with all who participate (organised by country) in order to inform your advocacy programme planning.

     4. Operational

• The Safe People + Data Initiative (Dobility)
  This new initiative provides methodologies and resources for safer data collection, in response to COVID-19 and the growing need for safety-focused innovation. It offers tools and insights to support safer methods of in-person data collection and alternative methods of reducing in-person interactions and collecting data remotely.
  
• Dynamic Accountability and COVID-19 (Global Standard for CSO Accountability)
  Due to the COVID-19 crisis, many countries have imposed restrictive measures to ensure that the spread of the disease can be contained. In this new reality, Dynamic Accountability is taking a different shape. This post suggests some key takeaways and tips for organisations who wish to practice dynamic accountability during this difficult time.
• What does Accountability Look Like During Times of Disruption? (Restless Development)
  The disruption caused by COVID19 is a chance to forge new ways of working, that put accountability practices and decentralised organisation at their heart, says Katie Fuhs.

• COVID-19
• COVID-19 Resources

Robert Vysoudil

Communications Student Assistant

International Civil Society Centre

Recent developments have rightly brought back old calls for structural change in the aid sector, and for taking anti-racist action individually and as organisations. CARE International’s Andres Gomez de la Torre Barrera makes a compelling personal case that we can either remain tone deaf (again) to these calls or take the opportunity to listen, reflect and act with a renewed sense of urgency.

The pandemic is exposing deep inequalities in our world, and our sector is not immune

It’s difficult to sum up how I’ve felt in the last few weeks. I’ve gone from frustration to excitement, sadness to hope and, at points, rage. It’s been heart-breaking to witness people in my home country, Peru, dying due to COVID-19. But even more than the virus itself, the real killers are years of oppression, inequality, corruption and gender-based violence, underpinned by structural racism, indifference and patriarchy. All around the world, the pandemic is exposing the deep inequalities in our world in the most brutal way.

Protests and reactions around the world are also refocusing attention to how racism is structural and embedded into all aspects of our society. It’s inevitable the aid sector is also deeply marked by it, despite the ideals it embraces of humanity, equality and empathy. Nearly everyone has a story, as highlighted in this recent Bond blog, “from overt experiences of racial discrimination, to everyday micro-aggressions and unsafe workplace cultures”. Passionate and thought-provoking statements from within seem to be finally shaking our sector, particularly (but not exclusively) from Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC), despite these same voices (and others before them) having already tried for so hard and for so long to prompt change.

A new opportunity to challenge ourselves and make our sector more equal and inclusive

We have an opportunity, with a renewed sense of urgency, to go as deep as we can and face the real underlying issue: we need to decolonise the aid sector. The level of change needed is so significant, that we can’t waste time in accelerating actions to tackle racism and colonialism in aid. It’s a call for all of us, because no one is immune – individually or as an organisation, by action or inaction – to structural racism. We need to see this as an opportunity to reflect on how racism – subtle or open – shows up inside our organisations, shaping the way we conceptualize our work, our behaviors and ways of working.

Anti-racism means learning and listening as individuals

White supremacy culture, with roots in colonialism, designed and constructed the aid system we work in and – by action or omission – we have supported this dominant power and narrative. As Stephanie Kimou, Founder of PopWorks Africa, said during last week’s #AntiRacistInAid webinar, “You don’t need to be racist or a white supremacist to support white supremacy culture.” If we feel called out, fragile, guilty or uncomfortable with this discussion, there are plenty of resources and voices that we can use to educate ourselves. They can help us start reflecting on our own privileges and how we have engaged with racism and the systems that embed them in our own lives.

Listening to inspirational and fearless leaders will challenge the way we see the world and the aid sector, while helping us to reflect on our own assumptions and privileges. I’ve been particularly drawn to Stephanie Kimou and Degan Ali, Executive Director of ADESO, in the two superb and inspirational webinars that took place last week, #AntiRacistInAid and #RethinkingHumanitarianism.

Essential reading is this fantastic piece by Vu Le on Have nonprofit and philanthropy become the “white moderate” that Dr. King warned us about? and Jennifer Lentfer’s ‘Professional do-gooders, here’s 14 ways to be in action against anti-Black racism’. And if you enjoy audio, listen to Challenging the “‘White Gaze’ of Development” during COVID-19 with Liberian academic, activist and author Robtel Neajai Pailey.

Anti-racism means taking active stands, engaging in difficult conversations as leaders

If we’re in a position of leadership within an ICSO, it is key to listen, learn fast, and reflect on the role and responsibility we hold, and bring attention to the need for change. Tweeting supportive messages or publishing solidarity statements mean very little if not accompanied by reflection and concrete commitments, including taking an active anti-racist stand in our own organisations. As Degan Ali says, we need a “radical reckoning” else #BlackLivesMatter might become a trend in our sector, if structural issues are not addressed.

People in leadership positions in our sector – predominantly white men – should not run away from difficult conversations because of their political nature. The international aid system is political, as everything in it is about power relations and hierarchies. As compellingly argued by Vu Le, if sector leaders do not publicly call out white supremacy or nationalism when protesters are risking their lives in a pandemic, or ‘think it’s too political or uncomfortable to say that Black lives matter and act/fund accordingly, then…you are part of the problem.”

Leaders should promote spaces for staff to discuss racism, inclusion, gender inequality and privilege, without forcing our presence in what might need to be safe spaces. We need to support these as important and necessary ongoing investments in our staff well-being and organisational development. Our own Leadership Teams must learn and reflect about these issues, listen to the lived experience of others, and be prepared for uncomfortable conversations, at least at the beginning. If these are not making you feel uncomfortable, then you’re probably not having the right conversation.

Anti-racism means reflecting the diversity of our communities in our own people

Our leadership and teams should better reflect the diversity of our own communities. Significant changes are needed in the way we approach our own people and what we value the most – recruitment and promotion, equal pay for equal jobs, expat salaries and benefits, investment in training and support – and the promotion of an organisational culture that truly embraces gender equality and inclusion. Women, and particularly Black, Indigenous and Women of Colour must be fully represented in the most senior leadership, executive and board roles in our organisations.

Finally, and irrespective of the position we hold in our organisations, we should all reflect on our privilege and, from this point, engage in discussions with a different perspective. We should be able to recognise if (or how) we are beneficiaries of a system that discriminates BIPOC, and engage with more empathy, acting and seeking fairer practices and, why not, taking a step aside.

Anti-racism means being serious about localisation in our operating models and behaviours

All the #AntiRacistInAid panellists agreed, “we can’t be truly anti-racist in this sector if we are not serious about true localisation”, although tokenistic localisation itself is coming under question as another construct of the same system we’re trying to change. We must start by asking what is needed and who is best placed to meet that need, rather than articulating what we – as ICSOs- can offer or bring (“our expertise”). We need to properly engage with demands from national actors for a paradigm shift whereby we support and not compete with them. And we need to stop trying to justify why this is not possible yet, and instead make it happen. “As national as possible and as international as needed” is regaining momentum as a clear vision, and “leading from behind” or “speaking on behalf of the voiceless” finally starting to lose ground.

This also means taking actions to ensure we are: investing more in locally-led actions, engaging in more equitable partnerships – which recognise power imbalances but genuinely embrace the added value of each partner brings, being fully transparent on how much of the money we raise actually reaches local communities, questioning who makes the decisions on the use of the funding, and having effective exit strategies which avoid perpetuating our presence and/or harmful dependency. Everything we do must aim at complementing existing local capacities – which were there way before we arrived and will be way after we depart.

Anti-racism means rethinking our knowledge, communications and language

The aid sector has basically been built on the transfer of knowledge and resources from “givers” to “recipients”, reinforced by all actors in the system. From donors reinforcing paternalistic needs for “capacity building’ to those at the ‘receiving end’ embracing the model – for multiple reasons – white supremacy practices are not exclusively by White people or those from “the global north”. Most examples of driving progress, innovation or “out of the box thinking” seem to be “exported” by the same suspects. Communications focus should be on rethinking who is telling the stories and getting the credit for the work done, and constantly reflecting if we are behaving like “white saviours”. Simply asking for permission for photos “we take” and use in “our channels” or trying to portray communities in a dignified way is not good enough.

Last but definitively not least, language is both power and political too. Let’s start just by getting rid of all these terms I still hear: “beneficiaries”, “capacity building”, “first” and “third world”, “going on a mission” or “travelling to the field”. My colleague Tessy Cherono Maritim really gets us thinking on this: “Going to ‘the field’ is the same as saying ‘third world’ and fuels this racist and white saviour fantasy of ‘exploring in the wild’ or going somewhere dangerous to rescue people with no autonomy or initiative. We never refer to European or North American offices as ‘the field’. The term perpetuates this idea of a powerful centre and places outside this as the ‘other’. If we believe in the notion of a networked, multi-polar world, where ideas, capacities, money, power, exist in contexts outside the West/North, we should stop reference to this term. Changing language is a simple way to communicate our commitment to anti-racism.” The responsibility for changing white supremacy language is on those who constructed it.

Anti-racism means us joining together to shake the system we’re part of.

While this is obvious, sometimes it seems like we don’t want to see it: ICSOs are just one set of actors within a much broader and complex aid architecture. But we have both a right and responsibility to shake the system from within, “unlearning” from being in it for so long, and getting our act to work together in solidarity to bring about this much-needed change.

The views and opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of CARE International.

Resources

1. The organisers of #AntiRacistInAid made available some free resources they are happy for us to share. Take a look.

• Taking this implicit bias test may be helpful in unpacking your own unconscious biases.
• This reading list on anti-racism specifically for aid workers, put together by the Fifty Shades of Aid community.
• A compilation of resources on anti-racism in general.

2. A good collection of articles, reflections and suggestions by Nadine El-Nabli and Anna Myer. It includes useful resources and suggested practical commitments on several areas. (link).

• Black Lives Matter

Andres Gomez De La Torre

Head of Organisational Development

Care International

Andres Gomez de la Torre Barrera is the Director of Confederation Development & Governance (Interim) at CARE International. Originally from Peru, Andres works at the CARE International Secretariat on issues such as confederation development and diversification, operating models, governance, policy and strategy. Previously, he worked for a range of organisations, including global alliances (Family for EveryChild), international INGOs (CAFOD and WomanKind) and national CSOs, government and private sector firms.