Exploring how philanthropy can support community-led change, the article suggests that community-led efforts can be effective if driven by people with knowledge of and respect for community members, their culture, and context. Relationships are the basis of community-led work and play an essential role in priority setting, project design, implementation, learning, and improvement. Flexible funding and non-financial resources are crucial in promoting community-led approaches. Funders can support the processes by communicating openly, operating in partnerships, appreciating the local context. Community-led efforts require robust and collective leadership and a commitment to equity and sharing power. Some of the challenges community‐led initiatives face are inherent in collective organizing, while the rest of them result from historical, political, and cultural contexts. The group of community leaders conducting the research created a self-assessment survey, as well. Read more here.
Source: Alliance