Civil Society and Development: How DFID Works in Partnership with Civil Society to Deliver the Millennium Development Goals

This paper from the Department for International Development (DFID), United Kingdom (UK), sets out DFID’s approach to working in partnership with civil society and aims to: 1) look at the role of civil society in development and identify the key areas where DFID is working with and through civil society to reduce poverty; and 2) set out the range of mechanisms DFID has for working with and supporting civil society in these areas. DFID intends the paper to be of assistance to current and future partners, as well as the wide range of DFID staff who work with civil society, and to provide a basis for future policy development.

DFID works with civil society - defined here as the groups and organisations that occupy a position between the household, the state, and the private sector - because of its role in reducing poverty through:

• Building voice and accountability: civil society helps build effective and accountable states and supports voices for change.
  
• Providing services and humanitarian assistance: civil society can play an important role, particularly in fragile states, by delivering services to economically poor people and developing new innovative approaches to reducing poverty. It also has an important role to play in responding to humanitarian crises.
  
• Promoting awareness and understanding of development: a strong UK development community is important for building public support for development, contributing to policy debates, and holding the international community to account.

DFID works by building voice and accountability to empower civil society in the following:

• Policy formulation: empowering and representing the economically poor in policy formulation at a local and national level.
  
• Monitoring services and budgets: improving state services through monitoring, demanding transparency and accountability, and ensuring inclusive access to services.
  
• Conflict resolution: providing a voice for communities in resolving conflict.
• Global advocacy: playing a role in global advocacy, such as campaigns on landmines and coalitions on trade issues.

DFID’s “Drivers of Change” studies are designed to provide an insight into the positive and negative influences of civil society organisations and their relationships with government. DFID also provides humanitarian aid and services in situations in which civil society can help ensure even distribution of aid and services, particularly in fragile states, where conflict can exacerbate the importance of even-handed distribution of assistance. As stated here: "Approaches in common use by civil society organisations can improve service delivery much more widely. Service provision can also provide a basis and legitimacy for civil society to advocate for changes in the delivery of government services."

DFID assumes the task of building a critical mass of thinking, expertise, and action around support for UK-sponsored development and focuses champions and leaders on encouraging civil society to raise the profile of development by promoting it to a broad and diverse audience who can then advocate on a national and international level. Developing the skill base of voluntary organisations can increase civil society motivation and individual personal commitment to support DFID's work, e.g. the Make Poverty History campaign of 2005.

Tools and strategies used by DFID to work in partnership with civil society include: consultation and dialogue with civil society; country office support to engage civil society; and the Conflict, Humanitarian and Security Department's engagement with civil society for such things as help with service delivery in conflicts and emergencies, as mentioned previously, and such activities as building engagement in development through a range of organisations including the formal education sector, development education centres, trade unions, and the media. Research is another tool of engagement: "Research programmes on women’s empowerment, effective states and sustainable agriculture all aim to improve their effectiveness and relevance through working with civil society."

The document’s conclusion reaffirms DFID’s intention to continue its work in partnership with civil society, intending to apply its inclusivity to the challenges of accelerating progress towards the Millennium Development Goals.