First draft of the first paper ever written by Gavin on Unbounded Organisation (1999)
Unbounded Organisation
Gavin Andersson,
Development Resources Centre, South Africa
As the phenomenon of globalisation starts to affect all aspects of life in the South, increased attention is paid to the role of civil society organisations in social development. On the one hand they are seen as a means to counter excesses of the state as also the whim of the market and the power of private shareholders.[1] On the other hand development NGOs (NGDOs) are recognised as key players in efforts to improve the quality of life. Many of these organisations move away from the decades-old practice of purely ‘project-based’ development intervention, towards more systemic efforts to combat poverty and inequality, combining local level work with advocacy for pro-poor macro-economic and social policies.
It starts to be asserted that significant NGDO impact derives from the discrete contributions of individual NGDOs only to the extent that these lead to catalysis of or participation in large-scale organisation, often involving co-operation by a range of actors. It has indeed been argued[2] that ‘scaling up’ is not only about strengthening individual NGOs and influencing the broader policy environment. Instead participatory advocacy is seen as the first set of activities in a process of social mobilisation, where this is understood as bringing together all feasible inter-sectoral social allies to raise people’s awareness of and demand for a particular development programme, to assist in the delivery of resources and services and to strengthen community participation for sustainability and self-reliance[3]. In essence effectiveness starts to be understood in terms of contribution towards broader social organisation processes than were traditionally contemplated by most NGDOs. There is a new awareness of the need for cross-sectoral collaboration, local and national partnerships, global alliances and knowledge sharing, value or issue-based coalitions and networks, alignment of multiple organisational initiatives and the stimulation of a critical discourse throughout society around development.
Following Blauert’s definition[4] organisations can be understood as rules governing bounded sets of social relationships. The relationships and interactions between these organisations, or formal and informal social relationships outside the boundaries or ‘skin’ of these organisations, are held here to constitute the terrain of unbounded organisation.
There is obvious merit in reviewing the ways in which NGDOs in different situations have tackled ‘boundary management’ or ‘interface management’ in networks or coalitions, and insights derived from these and other forms of unbounded organisation. It is also worthwhile to reflect on the problems arising when the dynamic of unbounded organisation is not recognised: when all organisation is assumed to be bounded, or when methods derived from bounded organisation are applied to the unbounded reality. Finally it may be interesting to examine some instances where there have been attempts at innovation, to increase the impact of various kinds of partnerships, or to seek method that orientates organisations towards increased levels of unbounded activity. This paper will touch briefly on all of these areas, as they relate to Popular Development Organisations (see below). Through all this reflection runs a question: what theoretical lessons can be learnt from this experience; is there a theory guiding the seemingly complex and even chaotic terrain of unbounded organisation?
(Individual) Organisation Theory
There is little experience to guide most development practitioners as they embrace these more complex and diffuse modes of organisation, and little is understood about the appropriate linkages between intra-organisational processes and the effective governance of various forms of partnership. This is as true for intermediary NGOs as it is for Popular Development Organisations[5], accountable to a local constituency and intent on building enduring capacity to initiate and support action and learning for social development. Most Organisation Development (OD) literature is of limited help with respect to partnership building.[6] Organisational theory invariably, and naturally, focuses more on individual enterprises than the relationships between them and the possibilities for synergetic action. Interactions that take place outside the ‘skin’ of the organisation are usually viewed in the light of the organisation’s own programme imperatives, or as part of its ‘marketing’ or ‘public relations’ drive.
This is not to demean the body of theory that informs OD practice. Any fully competent OD practitioner would seek to assist a client enterprise to clarify and respond to the macro-management challenges of positioning the organisation with respect to its eco-system. [7] This will mean helping an organisation to focus not only on its internal management processes, but also the multiple relationships and associations to be formed with other organisations to achieve optimal impact. Each ‘internal’ element of organisation can in this light be seen to have a corresponding external aspect. Thus identity (mission, role, basic values etc) is influenced by the organisation’s position in the wider context, the way it is seen and the levels of dependency on certain actors. Each policy and strategy choice implies assessment of principles for dealing with other organisations, the strategic alliances and other relationships needed to strengthen impact or decrease difficulties, and logically even the appropriate division of labour between organisations.
The problem of the dominant theory and practice is thus not that it totally ignores the outside world (it would be totally ineffective if this was the case). The nature of the conceptual constraint it imposes is rather subtle. The approach is auto-centric, situating the organisation at the centre of the organising universe. Rather than seeing itself in perspective as one element of a system or family of organisations contributing towards a certain social practice, it is encouraged to look for its unique competence and competitive advantage through which it would make its individual way through the world. (It is no wonder then that sustainability is so formidably linked to finance in many people’s eyes, whereas it can be argued that its most important element is the value attached to the organisation by a range of social actors and partners in development….) Strategic thinking in this paradigm implies in the first place understanding the special role of the organisation within its social context and given its capabilities. If in this process it is recognised that other tasks need to be taken up (which are outside the organisation’s capacity), there is no responsibility, and certainly no encouragement from the theory, to think through the mechanism by which another organisation or grouping of organisations can take up this challenge. If the epithet ‘individualistic’ can be applied to organisations, then the dominant OD practice is individualistic rather than social. At its worst this can lead to a kind of organisational autism, with a corresponding loss of contact with reality and the urgency of the tasks facing society. There may also, as consequence of this ‘individualistic’ practice be many gaps in understanding, influence and coverage by the NGO sector in the struggles for social development, and the sector may then be correspondingly hampered in taking leadership on critical issues.
Working across Boundaries: Problems for consultants
Capacity building support inexorably follows the guiding organisation theory. It is no accident then that the strategic management approach that derives from such exercises sets great store in identity maintenance, coherence of mission and individual impact assessment while there has been minimal work around alignment with diverse initiatives or the synergetic impact of partners in a network. As somewhat more pathological consequence, destructive competition amongst social development organisations, and NGDO programming in isolation from CBO and constituency contributions, are accepted (though regretted) as commonplace, rather than being seen as abhorrent and bizarre practices.
Even where consultants are aware of the problems described above, and seek to pay conscientious attention to issues of macro-management or the positioning of the organisation within a system of organisations, they may find that it is difficult to win permission to pay adequate attention to these questions. Their importance is invariably undervalued. Terms of reference for a consultancy will usually be weighted towards intra-organisational concerns rather than issues of interdependence; there may well be some reference to interaction with a range of stakeholders but the organisation’s established orientation is paramount in this investigation. Differences in funding sources (in a climate where OD support is often the result of an agreement with a donor), and the jealous safeguarding of organisational identity mean that there is seldom a joint exploration with potential partner organisations about appropriate roles and working arrangements. In one example, the author consulted over a period of years with NGOs that had emerged in Grenada in the period following the implosion of the New Jewel Movement revolution and the subsequent American invasion. While the values and experiences of the social movement had contributed to the emergence of each one of these organisations, the ‘individual’ orientation of each OD exercise meant that there was little possibility for joint exploration of niche roles, potential synergies and broader social mobilisation strategies. Dialogue between these ‘partner organisations’ in the course of the consultancy merely served to refine their everyday attitudes to each other. Thus even in a situation where there is most coherent long term alignment of organisations, the design and conceptualisation of capacity building exercises tends to reduce joint strategizing to informal chats between individuals. Over time the individual organisational structures may indeed become blocks to exploration of unbounded organisation.
Unless an OD methodology is employed that directly challenges the ‘individual’ and bounded orientation of NGO practice, there appears little chance of any dramatic shifts to improve the situation. NGOs may well lag behind other sectors in devising systems and modes of organisation that are consistent with the information age, and rather cling to the power and control models of closed organisations. This is ironic for a sector noted for its versatility, innovation and commitment to process rather than power. It is as if the methods we have come to use have reduced rather than expanded our capacities for creative organising responses to new situations. More exactly we are not helped to think about the ways in which the issues can be taken up across many organisations, and move to a truly social scale. There is a habit of organising in certain ways (and the only reason that this paper lays so much stress on its negative effects is that this is not really accepted as a problem by most people in the sector). Secondly there tends to be real fear and scepticism about any proposal to seek a new practice, across and between the boundaries of our organisations.
The terrain outside the boundary of an organisation (the organising space which is only tangentially affected by its governance systems or internal ‘rules’) where there is an explicit or implicit undertaking to collaborate with others towards a (sometimes vaguely) specified end, is largely uncharted territory. Where there is no possibility of tight contracts, and direct control or supervision of objectives-oriented plans and activities, then most NGO management personnel seem to hold that the situation is too unpredictable, or random, or complex, to merit serious attention. Alternatively it is understood that even if there were such attention it would not be possible to bring much influence to bear on the situation. At the same time ex post facto analysis of certain achievements in the field of development and social change shows that they were possible only because of the alignment of the organising energies of many different organisations![8] Similarly while there is retrospective fascination with the emergence of social movements, the imagination about contributing towards such phenomena is relentlessly constrained by the continuing patterns of organisation within enterprise boundaries.
The problem is obviously worse where consultants are completely indifferent or insensitive to learning about unbounded organisation. A consultant operating within the paradigms and archetypes of classical OD theory may characterise a range of interactions with other organisations as ‘networking’ without investigating the subtle differences in the character, purpose and process of each interaction or interface with another organising reality. This leads inexorably to a diagnosis that the organisation is ‘over-networked’ and hence diverting time and energy away from its core work. The obvious solution is then to limit these interactions. Another consultant, viewing the same interactions from a meta-organisation perspective, might ask what purpose is being accomplished in each interaction, and then ask whether there is a way to learn from it, or influence its process, that would not be so debilitating in time and energy.
Networks and coalitions: maintaining balances
Networks and coalitions have provided a mode of organisation through which NGOs can address concerns that their members are unable to take up individually. They are the most familiar way for the NGDO sector, or sections of the sector, to advocate for policy shifts, campaign around specific issues or develop methodological coherence within a certain shared field of activity. The many experiences of networking have resulted in much learning and although this paper does not seek to provide a comprehensive ‘theory of networks’ any discussion of unbounded organisation certainly needs to touch on some of the insights derived from these experiences. Apart from anything else, this may serve to illustrate how differently they behave from the ‘bounded’ organisations that are so huge in our imagination and theory.
Experience suggests[9] that for continuing usefulness and vitality of a member-based network or coalition, it needs to maintain at least four ‘balances’ (or hold a creative tension along four sets of polarities).
In terms of governance there needs to be a balance between being structure-driven and members’ activity-driven. In order to find a mechanism for facilitation of any network it is common to establish a secretariat or staff team, and a governance structure. These provide leadership and maintain the focus and organizing coherence of the network. When the secretariat and/or leadership takes increasing responsibility for strategizing on behalf of the network, and carrying out its tasks, there is often a corresponding move away from involving its members and being sensitive to their ideas and proposals. If this drift were to be left unchecked the secretariat would in essence become a new organization, evolving its own rules and dynamics and separate from the members even in their own imagination. Of course the network/coalition could drift in the other direction too, becoming completely driven by the activities of individual members, and hence carrying out their agendas. In this case too it may lose its usefulness and role in fostering a new practice that the members alone are unable to achieve; there is continual need for structure and leadership across the network.
The second tension, around programming, is between service to members and synergetic impact. If a network does not provide a certain amount of benefits or service to individual members, but always looks to them to engage in work towards the network’s ends (which by definition brings possibilities for impact –and usually increased complexity – in excess of that which members would otherwise enjoy; otherwise there would have been no need to form a network), then over time members will grow exhausted by the network demands. On the other hand if the network takes responsibility for spearheading advocacy actions or other activities without member contribution there will be little strategic impact, and sometimes not even ownership of the position.
The third creative tension, around issues of outlook and attitude, is the tension between working towards a converging perspective (with its implicit demands for shifts in program focus and management) and the need for organizational space, identity and development by each member. If members feel forced to act in terms of the insights coming from the network they will pull away over time. On the other hand advocacy and other joint action depends on there being a similar understanding of issues amongst members. The challenge is to facilitate converging perspectives while allowing full freedom to organize.
The final tension relates to the network’s own boundary management, as it relates to other networks and coalitions – or similar initiatives across society. It is the tension between solidarity and maintaining own organizational identity and space. A few issues require the building of platforms across different networks, and any network will ‘duck’ involvement at the risk of lessening its own credibility as a thinking social actor (and hence its future ability to mobilize alliances). On the other hand a continuing need is to maintain and manage over the long term the specific identity and perspective of the network, and so there can only be very selective and limited engagement in campaigns initiated by others.
Holding a creative tension between these four sets of polarities does not mean veering from one pole to another at periodic intervals. It means maintaining awareness of each pole, and positioning practice along the continuum between them.