A Participation Revolution: include people receiving aid in making the decisions which affect their lives

The co-conveners: SCHR and The US

NGOs co-champion: SCHR

Helpful contacts: Gareth Price-Jones, David DiGiovanna

Official IASC page on this workstream available here

Main progress in the last 3 years:

What has been achieved to date?

• A definition of Participation for the purpose of the workstream has been agreed.
• Recommendations for action by Grand Bargain signatories (donors and aid organisations) to progress their Participation Revolution commitments have been agreed.
• Indicators to measure progress have been agreed.
• A close and complementary working relationship with the IASC Results Group 2 on accountability and Inclusion has been established.
• A stakeholder analysis has been conducted to identify how to turn agreement in theory into participation in practice.

Currently (February 2020), the workstream is focusing on

• Supporting a permanent and sustainable change in the way we do business, including the way that response programming and budgets are designed and react to the inputs of affected people.
• Promoting the link between effective participation and the quality and effectiveness of humanitarian response.
• Ensuring the inclusion of Participation, using the agreed indicators, in signatories’ Grand Bargain annual reporting.
• And aligning and incorporating our work with other workstreams.

Why should you engage?

Because without a change in the way individual NGOs and agencies design and deliver their programs, participation will remain theoretical. The Frameworks are agreed and exist – its up to humanitarians on the ground to make them real.

How can you engage?

Your engagement is an organisational commitment to participation, which translates in country-level responses which are influenced by what affected people are saying they need and want. You can demonstrate that your responses are influenced by what affected people are telling you.

If you are a Grand Bargain signatory, you report your progress on participation using the agreed indicators. If you are not, you use them to report internally, to your donors, and to affected people themselves.

Your country-level programmes collaborate with other humanitarian actors to ensure that affected people have coherent means to influence the decision-making of the different humanitarian organisations which are providing them with assistance and protection. You demonstrate how you collaborate with others in terms of participation and how this contributes to your own operational decision-making.

You engage with the co-convenors of the Participation Revolution workstream to share your experiences, challenges and learnings, to inform and influence Grand Bargain signatories and hopefully also benefit from their relevant experience.