Claim OwnershipThe Power Shift: Decolonising Development
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© 2024 The Power Shift: Decolonising Development
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The Power Shift: Decolonising Development podcast brings together activists, practitioners and thinkers to join a wide-ranging conversation on decolonisation, where they share ideas and identify tools for practical action. If you’d like to know more about decolonising development – and what it means in practice, or you would love to change the way you do your work in the development sector, then this is the right place.
36 Episodes
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In this week’s episode, we talk to Jessica Oddy, founder and director of Design for Social Impact Lab (DFSI) about applying an equity-centred intersectional lens to social impact projects. We talk about the importance of co-design centred around care and solidarity throughout the entire project cycle.Jess talks about having a systems thinking approach which engages with a community’s history and context in order to develop a project. A systems thinking approach facilitates mutual learning, wh...
In this week’s episode, we talk to Faye Ekong about management approaches to leadership which are rooted in African experience. Faye tells us about the absence of African approaches represented in mainstream management and leadership.Faye Ekong introduces us to African Humanism, which embodies dignity, social harmony, coexistence and community. We talk about the importance of understanding historical, social, and cultural contexts within organisational policy, instead of importing a prescript...
In this week’s episode, we talk to Jonathan Glennie, co-founder of Global Nation, about the insufficiency of global aid as a response to current global affairs.Jonathan introduces the idea of ‘global public investment’ in order to address aid reliance through a new form of accountability. We also talk about circular cooperation as a system in which all entities involved respond to the possibility of learning from each other.Jonathan speaks about the importance of dignity, listening, and owner...
In this week’s episode, we speak to Yacine Ait Larbi about the critique he and Sarah Edgcumbe present in a two-part blog on paid-for development research. They outline the competing expectations of consulting companies who often value quick and relevant research outputs over research that is in-depth, reliable, well-grounded and ethical, due - in part - to time and resource pressures. We speak about development research being interest-driven rather than values-driven, and the consequence...
In this week’s episode, Ajoy Datta talks to us about organisational change, leadership development, and policy, advocacy and influencing. Ajoy tells us about promoting change within an organisation with a focus on difference and diversity. He focuses on an “unconventional” approach which highlights the complexity in working relationships and makes space for emotions. Working alongside people to unlock their knowledge and transform their conversations is part of the action learning approa...
In this week’s episode, we speak to Nancy Kankam Kusi from West Africa Civil Society Institute (WACSI) about their focus on advocacy, influencing, and facilitating an enabling environment for civil society organisations across West Africa and beyond.Nancy talks to us about the importance of knowledge sharing on issues of decolonisation and localisation, and how WACSI facilitates spaces for fruitful discussions across the sector. The Decolonising Advisory Community at WACSI provides support to...
In this week’s episode, Alba Murcia and Kate Bird (The Development Hub) explore the findings from their research paper on feminist organising and decolonial initiatives. We talk about the work that feminist organising has developed in terms of understanding power and positionality, adopting an intersectional approach, and embracing diverse knowledges and value systems.The paper features thematic case studies which focus on bodily autonomy, land rights, and territorial integrity across t...
In this week’s episode, Nompilo Ndlovu and Kate Bird, co-conveners of The Development Hub’s Skill Share Programme, reflect on their journeys so far within The Development Hub. We discuss the lessons learned from the 5-day immersion programme, and highlight the depth of discussions and diversity of shared experiences throughout the sessions. We also reflect on the reasons behind the majority of participants being women from the minority world, and how to address this disparity for future ...
In this week’s episode, we talk to Kate Newman, INTRAC CEO, about the organisation’s shift in order to respond to the changes happening in the international development sector. She talks of realising that rather than exclusively responding to each organisation’s needs, they realised they could be more impactful by taking on an ecosystem approach.INTRAC’s goal is to build a network of ethical values-driven consultants, where local context and lived experience is prioritised. This strengt...
In this week’s episode, we talk to Allan Moolman, a South Africa-based staff member of a leading INGO, who tells us about his organisation's development of a decolonial partnership strategy. We focus on the power relations present in language, resource allocation, and local decision-making.The decolonial partnership strategy questions the internal power structures present within its organisational structure and procedures, as well as externally looks at relationships with the partners who loc...
In this week’s episode, Asif Saleh speaks about BRAC as an INGO based in Bangladesh, which delves into understanding the underlying structural causes of poverty. Their work has focused on addressing the most pressing issues in a way that generates long-term stability.Asif talks about circular learning and flows of knowledge which disrupt Global South/Global North dynamics. BRAC emphasises the scalability of models so that they can be applied to a variety of contexts focused on keeping costs l...
In this week’s episode, Edgar Villanueva tells us about his book Decolonising Wealth, which was written in an effort to disrupt the flow of capital and to liberate resources for marginalised communities. Edgar tells us about how indigenous worldviews can contribute to community healing and to repairing the harms caused by the philanthropic sector. We also talk about a framework called Repair to Philanthropy, where money reparations work to re-dress the harms inflicted on communities.Edgar lin...
In this week’s episode, Fredrick Ouko and Mary Ann Clements discuss ADD International’s organisational structure, especially their roles as co-CEOs and how representation matters. They tell us about modelling the team leadership in line with the lived experiences they want to represent and advocate for.Through participatory grantmaking, they challenge the “colonisation of resources”, through which international funding goes mainly towards INGOs, rather than organisations of people with disabi...
In this week’s episode, Sarah Rose introduces us to USAID’s approach to localisation as one of the biggest funding partners amongst bilateral donors. Sarah emphasises the importance of gathering the entire global development community in order to rethink roles and reform practices for localisation to be effective.Sarah talks us through USAID’s journey towards localisation, their time-bound measurable goals, and how to integrate localisation into every aspect of USAID’s work portfolio. USAID i...
In this week’s episode, Heather Grady from Rockefeller Philanthropic Advisors (RPA) and Tanya Beer, an independent consultant, present the Shifting Systems Initiative Evaluation. The evaluation explores what systems change means to the philanthropic and funding sector, and evaluates the contribution of the Shifting Systems Initiative to the sector.Our discussion examines systems change practically, and explores alternative entry points such as ‘doing the inner work’, working together, impleme...
In this week’s episode, Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi from African Centre for Economic Transformation (ACET) de-centres the focus on racism and colonialism, and instead brings attention to the range of power dynamics present in the development and humanitarian ecosystems, including gender, class, and the historical origins of certain organisations.Mavis discusses the institutional sustainability of Global South-based organisations where they are often not considered the first choice by either Global Nor...
In this week’s episode, Maya Hasan, founder of the Fearless Project, talks us through her Shifting Power Accelerator program. Maya approaches decolonisation from her personal experience as a ‘third culture’ individual straddling multiple identities and growing up and working across the Global South and Global North, which have facilitated her integration of an intersectional approach into her work.She introduces her training program, which takes on a participatory applied learning approach wh...
In this week’s episode, Dylan Mathews talks us through Peace Direct’s journey as a Global North-based peacebuilding organisation. He reflects on the pivotal moment in which Peace Direct spoke to local partners and began to actively question how structural racism is embedded into the sector.Dylan contends that there is a need for both organisations and individuals in the Global North to acknowledge that they may have benefitted from the development sector and that they have “done harm in the p...
Lena Bheeroo (Bond) introduces us to Bond’s Anti-racism and Decolonising Framework and the wider work she’s done in tackling racism across organisations in the development sector. Lena highlights the importance of bringing in people working at all organisational levels as part of a collective effort.Lena outlines how Bond’s framework maps out the process of addressing racism from a personal and professional perspective, and aims to demonstrate the interdependence of organisational structure, ...
In this week’s episode, Priyanthi Fernando (IWRAW Asia Pacific) tells us about her ‘disruptive’ approach to the development sector by continuously asserting Global South perspectives to the work being carried out.We discuss the embedded double standards when activists and practitioners from the Global South get invited to attend events organised by elites from the Global North - but how practitioners from the Global North very rarely attend events organised and hosted in the Global South.She ...
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