Gender at Work: Theory and Practice for 21st Century Organizations by Rao, Sandler, Kelleher and Miller, Routledge, 2016 This was another book that came to my rescue as I was struggling towards the finishing line on How Change Happens. In particular, it pulled together thinking about different kinds of power and change in a practical format for activists. The book

Many years ago, around the time of the invention of the printing press, interweb, I worked in a small publisher and was given a ‘guide to handling authors’. One passage stayed with me – publishers should expect authors to throw a hissy fit when they first see roughs for the cover design. It’s their first chance to vent their anxieties

One of the criticisms of the big picture discussion on governance  that’s been going on in networks such as Doing Development Differently and Thinking and Working Politically is that it’s all very helicopter-ish. ‘What do I do differently on Monday morning?’, comes the frustrated cry of the practitioner. Now some really useful answers are starting to come onstream, and I’ll

So the consultation on the draft of my forthcoming How Change Happens book is over, the draft has been removed from the website (if you want to read it, you’ll have to wait til the book comes out next October). How did it go? The draft went live at the end of October, allowing for six weeks of consultation before

Spent an afternoon recently discussing the lessons of UK history with an eclectic mix of historians and modern day campaigners. Organized by Friends of the Earth’s Big Ideas project and the History and Policy network, it was the second instalment in a really interesting process (see here for my post on an earlier session). This time around, H&P had commissioned

Reminder – if you are one of the truly alarming number of people who have downloaded the 160 page draft of How Change Happens, the deadline for comments is just two weeks away – 10th December. Background to the book here. One of the main messages already emerging from feedback is that I need to ‘throw readers a bone’ in

Some great news from the Philippines. The Philippines Survival Fund, which I blogged about a couple of years ago, is finally open for business – local governments and community organizations will now be apply to apply for funds up to 1 billion pesos (US$21m) a year, for projects that help communities adapt to climate change. The first lesson is the

Now for the scary part. Can I ask for a big favour? The first draft of my next book, How Change Happens, is ready, and I’m keen to get comments from as wide a range of people as possible. Deadline 10th December. Anyone out there prepared to chip in? If so, you can download the whole manuscript here  – it’s

Craig Valters of ODI is consistently incisive on Theories of Change, cutting through the flannel surrounding one of the aid business’ favourite new(ish) fuzzwords to identify what is genuinely significant. His new, crisply written paper is a must read for anyone interested in how change happens, doing development differently, or the results agenda. Some excerpts: ‘The development industry is unbalanced

Just read a new case study of women’s empowerment in Colombia, part of ODI’s Development Progress series (summary here, full paper here). What’s useful is the level of analysis – a focus on the national rather than global or a project case study enables them to consider the various drivers of change at work. Some excerpts: Signs of Progress: Colombia

Part of the feedback on last month’s post calling for a ‘lessons of history’ programme was, inevitably, that someone is already doing it. So last week I headed off to Kings College, London for a mind expanding conference on ‘Why Change Happens: What we Can Learn from the Past’. The organizers were the History and Policy network and Friends of

As you may have noticed, I’ve been writing a series of 10 case studies of Oxfam’s work in promoting ‘active citizenship’, plus a synthesis paper. They cover everything from global campaigns to promoting women’s leadership to labour rights. They are now all finished and up on the website. Phew. Here’s the accompanying blog which summarizes the findings of the exercise