From Poverty to Power

It’s International Men’s Day tomorrow – here’s why it’s a bad idea

Duncan Green - November 18, 2016

Tomorrow is International Men’s Day, but Gary Barker isn’t celebrating I’m sure it was well-intentioned when International Men’s Day began over a decade ago. The day, in part, aims to draw attention to men’s and boy’s health; this year’s theme is “Stop Male Suicide”. This is a worthy goal: men die earlier and are more likely to face chronic illness and less likely to care …

Some highlights from the first 30 book launches for How Change Happens

Duncan Green - November 17, 2016

I’m about six weeks into launching How Change Happens, and am having a great (if knackering) time. Highlights so far include a Kurdish/Dutch guitar combo warming up the crowd in Nijmegen, conversations with an Islamic finance entrepreneur trying to do financial inclusion in South Wales, a great group of women managing a community-run service station on the M5 motorway and a network of ‘social leaders’ …

Fragility v Conflict – can you help with a new 2×2 please?

Duncan Green - November 16, 2016

Struggling towards the finishing line on my paper on empowerment and accountability (E&A) in fragile and conflict- affected settings (FCAS) – thanks to everyone who commented on the first draft, by the way). It’s nearly there but I need your help with one particular section. I want to argue that lumping ‘fragile’ and ‘conflict’ together in one category is very unhelpful. In reality, many violent …

Overcoming Premature Evaluation

Duncan Green - November 15, 2016

Chris Roche (the koala – I’m the kangaroo, right) is a friend and a brilliant development thinker, even if he has an alarming tendency to be able to reference development jargon like a machine gun. If you can get past the first para, this is well worth your time. There is a growing interest in safe-fail experimentation, failing fast and rapid real time feedback loops. This …

General

Links I Liked

Duncan Green - November 14, 2016

A polarized nation: Donald Trump won every subgroup of white voters except female college grads. He lost every single subgroup of non-white voters. [h/t Caroline O] Saturday Night Live has had a brilliant election campaign, and finished it off in style with this moving tribute from Kate McKinnon (as Hillary Clinton), brilliantly combining a tribute to Leonard Cohen and Hillary Clinton. For great artists and …

Only (re)Connect. The US elections, How Change Happens and where do we go from here?

Duncan Green - November 11, 2016

This is just me indulging in a little personal therapy as I come to terms with this week’s political earthquake. If you want the official Oxfam response, we’re working on it, but you’ll have to wait (should be out before the 2020 elections). So this is just me. Is that clear? Good. Trexit? Brump? 2016 is proving to be one hell of an annus horribilis …

Campaigning for Change: Lessons of History. Top new book, free to download

Duncan Green - November 10, 2016

I’ve blogged a couple of times on a fascinating project run by Friends of the Earth and the History and Policy network to bring historians of past campaigns and modern day campaigners together to discuss the lessons of history. The resulting 174 page book is now out and I highly recommend it. The discussion was part of FoE’s Big Ideas Change the World project (why …

How can the international community help put women at the heart of bringing peace to South Sudan?

Duncan Green - November 9, 2016

Oxfam’s Shaheen Chughtai reports back from a recent conversation at the UN Once in a while, the shroud of coded, diplomatic language that envelops discussions at the United Nations Security Council is ripped away by reality. On 25th October, it was the words of a women’s rights activist from conflict-ridden South Sudan, Rita Lopidia, which gripped the chamber. “I meet many South Sudanese women, and …

Climate Change: Meeting sea level rise by raising the land

Duncan Green - November 8, 2016

As the COP 22 meeting on climate change gets under way in Marrakech, Joseph Hanlon, Manoj Roy and David Hulme introduce their new book on climate change and Bangladesh Community groups in coastal Bangladesh have shown that the land can be raised to match sea level rise. Their success has been hard fought, initially contested by aid agencies, engineers and the police. But they …

General

Links I Liked

Duncan Green - November 7, 2016

Waiting for stuff is such a pain isn’t it? From the Boston Globe Irresistible listicle, especially the nuclear powered vacuum cleaners: 10 predictions for the future that got it wildly wrong Smoking kills more people in low- and middle-income countries than TB, malaria and AIDS combined. Taxing tobacco is the obvious and best solution, so why doesn’t it happen? COP22 will be the nerdy friend …