1. Success isn't necessarily what I thought it was.
It's just not sexy to say I'm working on evaluating the global coordination of national civil society campaigns on the ratification of the optional protocol of the international covenant on economic and social rights. In comparison, my PhD research sounds riveting. Revolutions aren't inspired because a bunch of people read the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Even people who are professionally immersed in the field don't keep track of every regional and thematic protocol and declaration. But, this is the level at which government commitments are made, so accountability starts there. Even for die hard policy wonks, it can be tedious wading through jargon and budgets to figure out what governments are actually going to do, and what can be done to influence it.
Somewhere, in the back of your head, you always know that all of these sub committees, statements, teleconferences, and working groups are supposed to mean something, in the real world, to people. There are occasional flashes of clarity, when your neighbor's daughter is going to be able to finish matric because the age of the child support grant has been extended, or the church around the corner can afford to offer a second free meal in the community each week because taxes on some basic foods have been reduced, and you realize this is why we all sit in meetings about MDG 1 and 2 progress….These moments are rare, and creating them is actually a specific kind of work. In addition to my 'actual' job, it's been virtually a second job to learn how to see, and reinforce why, the little bit that my organization does matters to people.
Finally, policy change is often a gold standard in a campaign's effectiveness. It is great when it happens; it's hard to accomplish, and makes a convincing story. But it's not the only thing campaigns can achieve. It's really impressive to be able to say that Russia's health care system is now much more accessible to people with disabilities because of a campaign. It sounds less exciting to say that this campaign is one of the first times civil society in Russia has come together to advocate collaboratively on issues outside of each organization's technical specialty. This may turn out to be irrelevant; or, it could be far more important than a specific policy change. We're not very good at measuring lots of things. That doesn't make them any more or less important.
After these 5 years, I am finally confident in saying that we have done some amazing things to make the world a better place. This is in spite of a range of frustrating inefficiencies and mistakes along the way. But there are also times when I have to admit that we don't know what works; or, in fact, for various reasons can't do what works. Statements of solidarity are good for the morale of the people who issue them; sometimes they may do something more, sometimes not. Sometimes, stories about 'things that worked' come back to us; sometimes it feels like energy is being thrown into a void, and we don't know if efforts were wasted or not. As the resident monitoring and evaluation person, it has been my job to make sure we have structured ways of thinking about our impact, we know what our outcomes are and have evidence about how we can work most effectively to achieve various sorts of things. This has been important, and I think it's an area where knowledge is growing very, very quickly. But one thing I never would have thought I'd say five years ago, is that there are things it's okay to take on faith. Donor reporting happens in log frames, but outcomes happen in people's lives. That may not change the way I do my job, but it does change where my motivation comes from.
No comments:
Post a Comment