Reluctant Partners?: Non-Governmental Organizations, the State and Sustainable Agricultural Development (Non-Governmental Organizations)

259 Pages·1993·1.65 MB·English

by  J. Farrington

RELUCTANT PARTNERS?
Insufficiencies and inequities in food production and supply in poor countries need
to be addressed as problems of both agricultural resource management and rural
democratization.
Reluctant Partners? combines comprehensive empirical insights into NGOs’ work
in agriculture with wider considerations of their relations with the state and their
contribution to democratic pluralism.
This overview volume for the Non-Governmental Organizations series
contextualizes and synthesizes the case study material in the three regional volumes
on Africa, Asia and Latin America, where over sixty specially commissioned case
studies of farmer participatory approaches to agricultural innovation are presented.
Specific questions are raised. How good/bad are NGOs at promoting
technological innovation and addressing constraints to change in peasant
agriculture? How effective are NGOs at strengthening grassroots/local
organizations? How do/will donor pressures influence NGOs and their links to
the state?
John Farrington and Anthony Bebbington are Research Fellows with, and Kate
Wellard and David J.Lewis are associates of the Overseas Development Institute.
NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS SERIES
Co-ordinated by the Overseas Development Institute
The titles in the series are:
RELUCTANT PARTNERS?
Non-Governmental Organizations, the State and Sustainable Agricultural
Development
John Farrington and Anthony Bebbington with Kate Wellard and David J.Lewis
NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS AND THE STATE IN LATIN
AMERICA
Rethinking Roles in Sustainable Agricultural Development
Anthony Bebbington and Graham Thiele with Penelope Davies, Martin Prager and
Hernando Riveros
NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS AND THE STATE IN AFRICA
Rethinking Roles in Sustainable Agricultural Development
Edited by Kate Wellard and James G.Copestake
NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS AND THE STATE IN ASIA
Rethinking Roles in Sustainable Agricultural Development
Edited by John Farrington and David J.Lewis with S. Satish and Aurea Miclat-Teves
RELUCTANT PARTNERS?
Non-governmental organizations, the
state and sustainable agricultural
development
John Farrington
and
Anthony Bebbington
with
Kate Wellard
and
David J.Lewis
London and New York
First published 1993
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of
thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001
© 1993 Overseas Development Institute
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue reference for this book is available from the British
Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data has been applied
for.

ISBN 0-203-97385-2 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-415-08843-7 Hbk
ISBN 0-415-08844-5 Pbk
CONTENTS
List of figures viii
List of tables ix
List of boxes x
Foreword xii
Preface xv
Acknowledgements xx
Glossary xxii
1 INTRODUCTION: MANY ROADS LEAD TO NGOs 1
What are NGOs? 3
Rethinking the state 5
Civil society and self-managed development 12
High external input agricultural technology: spreading it and questioning it 15
Three broad motivations in the interest in NGOs 20
Questioning NGOs: what roles for the state? 21
Conclusion and summary 24
2 CONCEPTS FOR ANALYSING NGO-STATE RELATIONSHIPS 29
Introduction 29
Functional roles and institutional advantages in agricultural technology 30
development
Institutions, histories and actors: NGOs between theory and relevance 41
Chapter summary 57
3 NGOs AND AGRICULTURAL CHANGE: TECHNOLOGIES, 61
MANAGEMENT PRACTICES AND RESEARCH METHODS
Introduction 61
vi
Some definitions 63
An overview and illustrative case studies of NGOs’ work in ATD 64
Characteristics of NGOs’ ‘alternative’ approaches to ATD 80
Conclusions 88

4 NGOs AND THE RURAL POOR: PATRONAGE, 93
PARTNERSHIP OR PARTICIPATION?
Introduction 93
Identifying the rural poor and the causes of their poverty 94
NGO performance in reaching the poor—recent evidence 97
Perceiving a poverty alleviating role for NGOs 101
Reaching the poor in agricultural technology development—evidence from 103
the case studies
Issues arising for NGOs, governments and funding agencies 116
Conclusions 122
5 RELUCTANT PARTNERSHIPS, HOSTILE 125
CONFRONTATIONS, OR PRODUCTIVE SYNERGIES?
POSSIBILITIES FOR NGO-state INTERACTIONS
A new dance floor? 126
Linkages between NGOs and NARS—a conceptual note 129
Technology paths and the division of tasks among NARS and NGOs in the 130
ATS
Linkage mechanisms supporting institutional roles 138
Government-led linkages 159
Sequential linkages: NGOs innovate in the expectation of ‘scaling up’ by 164
government
Collaboration and critique: incompatible strategies for scaling up? 170
Linkages between NGOs and the private commercial sector 172
Conclusions 175
6 WHERE FROM, WHERE AT, WHERE NEXT? 181
The case studies in context 182
vii
Where from: the State and NGOs in context 182
Where at: NGOs and agricultural technology development 185
Where at: NGOs and other actors 187
Where next? theory and the future 193
References 201
Index 219
FIGURES
1.1 NGOs: diversity in the crowd 4
3.1 The technological foci and wider developmental contexts of NGOs’ 62
approaches to agricultural change
4.1 The depth and scope of NGO approaches to participation ATD 106
5.1 The differing characteristics of forms of interaction 130
TABLES
2.1 Functional strengths and weaknesses of NGOs and government in 39
agricultural technology development for the rural poor
3.1 Approaches to agricultural technology development in case study NGOs 67
4.1 Agricultural population projections in the case study countries 97
4.2 The performance of a sample of Latin American NGOs 99
5.1 Roles played by NARS and NGOs in the development of technology and 132
of methodologies
5.2 Structural and operational linkage mechanisms found in the case studies 140
5.3 Types of government-led interaction with NGOs 159