A key component of working towards locally led development is to enable responsible partnership transition processes. This is especially crucial in the aid sector where donor priorities regularly shift, and contexts are ever-changing, which has led to a greater need to sustain impact and ensure local actors’ sustainability. However, a significant gap that has emerged to support international actors to effectively leave contexts, end programs, or transform organizational structures is the lack of knowledge around best practices and practical examples of responsible partnership transitions.

Stopping as Success (SAS) recognized this need and from 2017-2020, conducted research to build evidence and create tools and resources to support responsible partnership transitions. Under the current phase of the project, SAS+ seeks to apply these learnings and accompany organizations currently going through partnership transitions. In order to continue learning how partnership transitions happen in different contexts and what factors support or hinder such processes, SAS+ held a 2-day online consultation to examine recent shifts in the aid sector related to partnership transitions. As phenomena such as the COVID-19 pandemic and efforts such as the #ShiftThePower movement and decolonizing aid conversations have forced international actors to reimagine their relationships with local actors and vice versa, this consultation sought to understand how partnership transitions are impacted and influenced by these dynamics.

This document was made possible by the generous support of the American People through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents of this case study are the sole responsibility of Peace Direct, CDA Collaborative Learning and Search for Common Ground, and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.