If you missed the live event, enjoy the recording!

This conversation drew on Stopping As Success’ case studies, and their recent book, as examples of how development can be done differently. Panelists explored topics including financial sustainability of local organizations, rooted in local identity, and built on global solidarity between INGOs and local organizations, while also discussing the impact of COVID-19 on local leadership and responsible transitions more broadly.

Panelists and the SAS consortium organizations, CDA, Search for Common Ground, and Peace Direct, came together in this reflective conversation filled with lessons for the development sector.

Speakers

Pauline Wambeti believes in “not waiting for other people to make the changes for us, but to make the changes ourselves.” Having invested over 15 years in community development in Kenya, Pauline is currently the Managing Director for Nuru Kenya. Prior to joining Nuru, Pauline worked for the United Nations Environment’s Regional office for Africa-Nairobi. She has been a Programme Officer for the National Organization for Peer Educators; a Business Development Officer for K-Rep Bank Ltd and, a Program Facilitator for Doctors of the World. Pauline has studied Social Work and Community Development in addition to post graduate studies in Development Studies and Project Management. She is a 2018 East Africa Acumen Fellow.

Tala Bautista is a member of the Sumacher First Nation in Kalinga, Philippines. She got involved in the peacebuilding field in 2008 and currently works with Peacebuilders Community Inc., (PBCI) and Coffee for Peace (CFP) since 2011. She serves as the Chief Operations Officer of PBCI and Senior Vice President of CFP. She is also currently serving as an adjunct faculty for the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding.

Her work with PBCI and CFP is focused on community organizing and advocacy to local leaders to adopt the Peace and Reconciliation (PAR) framework in their organizations. She helps develop the local communities’ own vision for peace, crafting contextually-based, culturally-sensitive strategies to address peace issues in their place. Her approach in peacebuilding work is intensive listening and intentional relationship-building with the people most impacted by injustices. She believes that peacebuilding should be firmly grounded on people’s lived experiences, taking care to be sensitive to power differences and relations.

Kshiti Gala is a Senior Strategist at Plum Insights, a research consultancy based in Mumbai, India. She leads the development practice and works closely with Indian CSOs, governments and INGOs. She is a research consultant with an interdisciplinary approach and expertise in Development Economics. Over the last 8 years, she has worked with international organisations such as Women’s World Banking, Oxfam, Triggerise, UNDP, Aga Khan Foundation and Girl Effect in areas of financial inclusion, small enterprise development, dryland agriculture, biodiversity conservation and sexual and reproductive health.

She is Visiting Faculty for Business Ethics, Research Methodology, Macro Economics and Development Economics at the Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), Mumbai. She has been a Research Associate at Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR) – the Reserve Bank of India’s advanced research institute. Her critical evaluation of India’s ‘Make in India’ policy is being published by Cambridge University Press.

She has been an Independent Research Consultant for the ‘Stopping As Success’ Project. She co-authored the transition case studies of INGOs like ActionAid and Plan International in India and conducted the multi-stakeholder fieldwork. She is passionate about locally led development and has worked with ingenious communities on poverty alleviation programs in remote, rural parts of Madhya Pradesh. She is a Young India Fellows – a multidisciplinary postgraduate program in Liberal Arts at Ashoka University and has read the MSc in Development Economics at SOAS, University of London as the UK Government’s Chevening Scholar.

David Yamron is a Senior Consultant on the Statistics, Evidence, and Accountability team at Oxford Policy Management. Prior to joining OPM, David was the MENA Design, Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist for Search for Common Ground, where he led a team tasked with providing technical and strategic assistance to the MENA senior management team and six country offices. He also led Search’s technical contributions to the Stopping as Success consortium, writing and editing an array of case studies, tools, and resources. His previous professional experience includes project-based technical assistance to USAID missions around adaptive management, as well as past stints as an English teacher and a tech company project manager. He holds an MSc in Development Management from the London School of Economics and a BA in History from Carleton College.

Moderator

Grace Boone is Program Manager at CDA. She is driven by the desire to shift the international development system to be more accountable to communities most affected by aid and she works alongside people most affected by conflict to inform conflict-sensitive policy and practice. From 2018-2020, Grace managed the Stopping As Success (SAS) collaborative learning project which advocates for locally led development by using evidence from 13 countries to inform responsible INGO transitions. She co-edited SAS’ latest book What Transformation Takes: Evidence of Responsible INGO Transitions to Locally Led Development from Around the World. Additionally, Grace serves as editor for CDA’s From Where I Stand: Unpacking ‘local’ in aid learning forum, co-facilitates the Locally Led Peacebuilding Working Group alongside Alliance for Peacebuilding and Peace Direct, and leads CDA’s internal Anti-Racism and Social Inclusion Task Force.