Participatory grants may be the future of aid: so what have the pioneers learned?

Who should decide what and who gets aid funding?

As the sector looks to decolonise and shift power, there is a growing realisation that these decisions should be taken by the communities where the money will be spent: that they, rather than funders based thousands of miles away, are best placed to decide what their needs are and how best to meet them.

Such thinking is at the heart of participatory grant making, which looks to put the local people and movements, who are the real experts in their own realities, in the driving seat of grantmaking. At an insightful webinar, organised by Bond, pioneers of this process shared their experiences.

How a participatory approach connects better with movements

Mama Cash is one of the oldest and largest participatory grant makers. At the heart of its funding approach is its Global Advisory Network: a diverse group of feminist activists who play a central role in decisions about who and what to fund.

Chantelle de Nobrega, Grants Manager at Mama Cash, explained that such participatory grant making has more visibly connected the organisation with the movements it supports. Because Mama Cash needs the activists involved in its advisory network to help with decision making, they feel free to offer critical feedback on Mama Cash’s decisions and priorities. It has also enabled activists to experience the hardship of having to say no to deserving applications.

For Mama Cash the key to participatory grant management was being transparent by sharing information to build trust, and being ready to make mistakes, learn and revise.

Chantelle added that it was important to balance shifting power in this way with the need to respect people’s time and labour. That is why Mama Cash advisors receive a stipend for the work they do.

What the webinar’s discussion made clear is the many ways participatory funding beats the traditional top-down, and often bureaucratic, grant-making process.

Advantages for partners

Benda Gard Ntegyereize is Country Director of World Voices Uganda which is supported by Oxfam’s Locally Led Emergency Response Fund. The fund provides standby grants that can be quickly distributed to small- and medium-sized partners in three countries, including Uganda. It operates through groups of local partners like World Voices Uganda which have taken over the design and management of their local fund.

Gard identified five key advantages of this approach for the partners compared with conventional processes:

Speed: The platform responds to funding requests in 72 hours. It does this by using simple documentation for applications and reporting, allowing for flexibility to respond to local conditions, and working with known organisations (that are either part of the platform or are partnering with a platform member).
Co-creation with direct feedback and adaptation: Applicants are in the same meeting as the vetting committee and discuss their application. This enables applicants to receive direct feedback from local experts, which enables them to alter their plans and learn from each other. They can even adapt, joining up with others or moving their work to an area not currently served.
High standards of compliance and accountability: Organisations work closely together and local communities challenge when they don’t receive what was promised
Appropriate procurement and value for money: Local knowledge on procurement means the platform can support strong value for money decisions
Increasing critical mass of humanitarian organisations, as new organisations join the platform

Advantages for INGOs

Janice Ian Manlutac, Oxfam’s Senior Local Humanitarian Leadership Advisor for its Locally Led Emergency Response Fund, described several advantages of participatory grant making which will help INGOs like Oxfam operate more effectively:

Participatory grant-making is nimble and cost effective and can respond flexibly to areas of need.
It encourages small and medium-sized organisations to share expertise and define the support they need from INGOs.
It increases and diversifies the range of humanitarian organisations responding to an issue.
It builds learning and quality through co-creation based on local expertise

What about funders?

The fact that this represents a relatively new approach for many funders was evident from Tyler Dale Hauger, Senior Advisor at the Norway-based Karibu Foundation, who pointed out that the Norwegian language doesn’t have a phrase for participatory grant making, so he had to coin one: eltakerdrevet tilskuddspraksis!

Karibu carried out a two-year pilot in which African activists and civil society members co-created and led the decision-making process on their grants. Tyler said this permanently changed the way Karibu thinks about grant making. It shifted power in decision making and enabled groups to receive funding that would never have been on Karibu’s radar.

So what did Karibu learn?

This approach requires trust-based practice rooted in relationship building, learning and mutual accountability
Power is always part of the picture. As Tyler said, “Power is like gravity- pretending it doesn’t exist won’t stop you from falling”. There are always new power dynamics.
The aim is to give wings to movements rather than creating more anxiety and stress through unnecessary compliance.
Building the new is hard and core group members have to combine vision with pragmatism.
It takes time but this type of investment creates accountability to movements and creates space for connection learning and solidarity.

As Gard said, if donors want aid that is swift, effective, flexible and informed by local expertise then they need to look urgently at participatory grant making.