‘Eye to Eye’ Democracy Partnerships

For decades, foreign assistance has mostly flowed top-down: donors design programs, engage international organizations or INGOs to run them, and local communities “receive” the results. A new OECD guide aims to flip that model, giving local governments, community groups, and organizations more voice, control, decision-making power, and direct resources.

The OECD is far from the first body to set out these aspirations, but despite pledges—from the Paris Declaration to the Grand Bargain to #ShiftThePower—most assistance still flows in a tiered manned through international intermediaries in a way that does not fully benefit local actors. The obstacles to locally-led development are often structural, not just around political will: fuzzy definitions of “local,” short-term funding, compliance-heavy approaches, and monitoring systems built for donors rather than communities:

At P4I, working to elevate rather than to replace local expertise is part of our core DNA. In democracy support, locally driven initiatives are key to success. Local actors bring context, trust, and access—core components of democracy building.

What we find promising about the new OECD guidelines on locally-led development

The guidelines provide practical, how-to guidance for donor agencies, setting out a non-prescriptive “menu of options” — grouped into four levers of change. These are all directly relevant to democracy support globally:

Lever 1: Clear policies & trusted partnerships

Use equitable, “eye to eye” partnership practices and discuss successful partnership formats that enable long-term collaboration and experience sharing. Co-create programs and foster innovative practices together with local partners.

Lever 2: Institutional setup

Local democracy CSOs need time to develop and consolidate expertise and reputation. Ensure local engagement and long-term local partner capacity building, not just short term projects.

Lever 3: Financing & delivery

Design long term support to local actors engaged on democratic governance. Advocacy for reform is not a short-term endeavor, and results require sustained engagement and relationship-building. Rethink the role of international “middlemen” organizations to make sure they add real value and comparative expertise where needed and as requested.

Lever 4: Management practices

Let local actors help design monitoring & evaluation and invest in long term capacity development. Increase transparency over budget drafting and allocation processes. Simplify due diligence and share risk fairly, including political risk and censorship.

Taking action

We endorse these guidelines and have integrated similar approaches into our own partnership and sub-granting policies.

We have also signed Peace Direct’s Call for Action on Locally-Led Development and encourage others to do the same.