Theories of Change in social justice initiatives.

To what extent are social justice initiatives in South Africa guided by coherent theories of how they make an impact and how can such theories be made more likely to succeed?

October 2012

Paper Commissioned by the Raith Foundation and written by SPII

Table of Contents

Interview Process......

Overview of Theories of Change......

South African Social Justice Organisations and Theories of Change......

Conclusion......

Bibliography......

Introduction

Social justice organisations have played a dominant role in the liberation of South Africa and the development of a new and democratic post-Apartheid in the transition since 1994. Paper One in this series of critical essays addresses the question of how the social justice sector self-defines itself within the broader family of civil society.

Spurred on in part by the concern about the ever-decreasing financial support for civil society organisations in general, as well as by growing concerns about the low pace of transformation within South Africa and the attendant impact on social cohesion, equality and apparent regard for the rule of law and the effectiveness of constitutional rights by the many millions of people marginalized by the mainstream economy and social and political institutions within South Africa, it is pertinent and germane to explore the extent to which social justice organisations, as key potential actors to catalyze inclusive and transformative change within South Africa, can be said to be conscious of their theory of change, and guided by a reflective praxis that marries theory with action.

In this paper, we highlight some of the diverse understandings with which the concept of a theory of change is viewed, where after we set out the discussions captured in the interviews held with leaders of social justice organisations in South Africa towards an understanding of the topic of this paper.

What emerges from this paper are a number of key reflections about the practice of social justice organisations post Apartheid.

An overwhelming impression that emerges is that social justice organisations to a large extent are still struggling to define the most effective and most appropriate modes of interaction with power, and in particular, the state, and also the mass populace, representing another locum of power for change.

Pre-1994, progressive civil society, including under the umbrella of the United Democratic Front, located its power base in the mass organization of ordinary people whose lives and realities, choices and aspirations, were directly affected by the unjust laws of Apartheid. Much of the work of the internal opposition to Apartheid consisted in the organization and mobilization of civil society from a very localized grass roots presence through street organisations, youth structures, faith based structures, women’s movements etc., to sectoral bodies such as the National Education Crisis Committee, structures that represented support for people affected by the detentions and direct impact of the militarized state, as well as progressive professional affiliations, such as NADEL (the National Association of Democratic Lawyers). Grass roots needs were advocated through a wide network of advice offices, usually staffed by volunteers, which provided both legal advice, but also looked to advancing development issues and furthermore in many instances provided infrastructure for some of the emerging civic structures that often took on a far broader role of providing a state substitution to people whom the state refused to provide for, or, in the latter days, decided not to subject themselves to the parlous delivery that the Apartheid state offered, packaged as it often was with insidious conditions of submission to what was seen as an illegitimate state. Front line delivery organisations, such as advice offices, often had support from more professional bodies, whether in the legal profession, or health care profession, for instance, and so civil society structures offered a role as intermediary to advance peoples’ needs and claims. Structures, whether internal in South Africa, or externally based, had a growing consciousness that the objective of their work was in fact to overthrow the state as the first step towards building a new, democratic, non-racial, non-sexist and equal South Africa that provided for a liberated and united people.

And so we see, interestingly, a re-formulation of this multi- class assistance with the emergence of organisations like ProBono.Org that also seek to provide for access by poor people to services of professional lawyers, through facilitating the application of the profession’s self-regulated rule of voluntary pro-bono service of members of the profession.

Trade unions and faith based- structures played a significant role as the fulcrum for other organisations, and also as larger bodies who sought to grow and mentor new activists and train people to undertake struggle, aspiring to do so in democratic and transparent ways, subject to the prevailing conditions at the time.

Post –Apartheid however, with the spread of ‘normalization’ of some of the more oppressive conditions, many structures of civil society began to have to seek news ways of operating and new realities and roles for themselves. As the same time, international support become more formalized and organisations, more ‘professionalized’ in the sense of introducing salaried positions, having to produce strategic plans and following flows of proposal writing, undertaking activities and producing reports.

Supporting organisations in the early nineties provided very directed support to structures around the practice of developing and strengthening the institutionalization of these structures. Handbooks were produced and workshops held to transfer the new skills required. A very real challenge at this time however, was the loss to the sector of many of the experienced leaders who were called to begin to rebuild the state through government, and also, business positions. The support organisations that sought to teach and replace these skills were keenly aware of this, but at the same time, the widespread nature of the exodus of this leadership in effect, proved irreplaceable.

As the years progress, and as we move deeper into this so-called normalization of society, we also see the movement into the sector of younger people who have not had the same political training whether at school or at tertiary institutions, or through community-based affiliations, as before. The tools for strategic engagement that provided in a sense the bedrock for earlier action, are no longer guaranteed, and, through the interviews, we see that this is something that people have not factored in to their organisational development and training.

What the overriding objectives of civil society are or should be, eighteen years into democracy, and the strategies and tactics for the realization of these objectives, emerges as an underlying question through the interviews undertaken for this paper. Critically, at the same time organizations identified the real need for more reflective practice, to enable organisations to answer this question and to reflect on more effective modes of working. What emerges is that few organisations have in fact defined clearly a theory of change for their practice, although keenly aware of the need for one.

Activities are easier to implement than reflective thinking, especially when organizations are funded to do, and deliver, rather than to reflect. This is the way that many respondents portrayed the current state of strategic engagement within the sector. One has however to probe whether it is more than merely a lack of time and resources that prevents the strategic reflection, and to ask whether the initial question, namely that of the function of civil society in a democratic but highly divided society, is and should be.

Emergent thus in this paper are the sense of the need for strategic reflection that is informed by the aims of the organization and its own ability to effect change in its sphere of influence, but also the sense that there has been a loss of intellectual investment in the sector. This was ascribed to a variety of forces, but in particular, the sense of the promotion of equality in a narrowly applied way that questioned an intellectual theorizing of work in favour of a more widely accessible, collective process of thinking and planning, and secondly, that due to a pressure to advance a culture of equality in civil society, both internally but also due to donors, prescribed salary structures within organisations began to operate as a barrier to the retention of highly skilled and experienced actors who were constantly being headhunted by both government and business, for positions that carried far higher remuneration. As one respondent said, not only are the salaries much lower in civil society, but you are also expected to deliver in advance an additional commitment, voluntarily, to keep the work of the organization going in the face of ever-decreasing resources. Leaders feel sucked dry, and often left high and dry.

Finally, the growing anomie within the sector was identified, with respondents expressing a desire for effective and mutually supportive social networking within other organisations within the sector, and yet a certain wariness accompanied this desire with people’s recent experiences dwelling on situations in which networking was sometimes seen as an excuse for no-one in particular taking full responsibility for the actual doing of the work, and also situations in which donors promoted the concept of a network where in fact it was not an appropriate vehicle in the circumstances.

This paper, in short, is intended as providing an indicative overview of how leaders in the sector view the current state of strategic planning and evaluation. The nation is currently seeing a growth in protest as a form of communication between ordinary people and power – both state power and the power of capital. Many of these protests have been met with an increase in state violence through police action, and hardened responses by capital as evidenced in threats of wide- spread retrenchments.

How does civil society, and especially, social justice organisations, act to address structural change? What are the modes for facilitation and intermediation that are required and where should the human and financial resources come from to drive this?

These are the conversations that we hope to see emerging from these papers.

Interview Process

The interviews were conducted either telephonically or face to face between August and October 2012. In unpacking the above question, the interviews sought to probe the following sub-questions:

  • Are social justice organisations guided by any theory of change (or any similar notion of the relationship between the work that is done and its intended consequences)?
  • If so, how well do those theories of change reflect in their actual operations? (I.e. do they plan/think in advance about how their activities will deliver the consequences they are wanting to achieve - in the short, medium and/or long-term?)
  • What are the direct and indirect consequences of work done?
  • How do organisations think about whether they are making a positive difference?
  • Do they monitor and document their performance in terms of their achievement with regard to any theory of change?
  • How do organisations think through future programmes and priorities? Do they see the need to link this to theories of change? If so, are there any barriers to the development of such plans?
  • What are the most important characteristics/components required for increasing the value of social networks?

Framing the reflections from the interviews, the paper begins with a theoretical overview of the applied notion of a ‘theory of change’ as presented in works of two documents produced by Comic Relief[1], and a report jointly commissioned by Hivos, the Democratic Dialogue and the UNDP[2], where after the inputs from the interviews are set out.

This paper is one of three critical essays commissioned by the Raith Foundation from Studies in Poverty and Inequality Institute towards the development of broader engagement about the role of social justice organisations as catalysts or agents of change and transformation in South Africa in 2012[3]. The papers should be viewed as a baseline for understanding future developments and trajectories, and represent an indicative rather than an exhaustive study and scope of opinions within the social justice sector.

Overview of Theories of Change

According to Eguren[4], a theory of change (TOC) is a process by which the assumptions that inform our view of how we can effect social change are made explicit. He identifies both the visioning aspect of the process, as well as the ability of the process to be used to create a tool for the monitoring and evaluation of the implementation of the activities and strategies chosen to effect such change. It is, accordingly, the ‘change logic’ and the reflective learning process of the implementation of that logic that, together, constitutes a comprehensive TOC necessary to address the multi-layered reality of the ‘holographic’ nature of our interdependence.[5]

The following six-point definition of a theory of change is taken directly from the work of Eguren.

  • A conscious and creative visualization exercise that enables us to focus our energy on specific future realities which are not only desirable, but also possible and probable
  • A set of assumptions and abstract projections regarding how we believe reality could unfold in the immediate future, based on i) a realistic analysis od the current context, ii) a self- assessment about our capabilities of process facilitation, and iii) a critical and explicit review of our assumptions.
  • A thinking- action approach that helps us to identify milestones and conditions that have to occur on the path towards the change that we want to contribute to happen.
  • A multi-stakeholder and collaborative experiential learning exercise that encourages the development of the flexible logic needed to analyze complex social change processes.
  • A semi-structured change map that links our strategic actions to certain process results that we want to contribute to happen in our immediate environment.
  • A process tool that helps us to monitor consciously and critically our individual and also collective way of thinking and acting[6].

The Raith Foundation articulates their theory of change as follows:

The Foundation’s vision of success is a just and fair society in which (a) people are aware of and able to exercise their rights and responsibilities and (b) organisations, the state, private sector and civil society are held accountable for their actions.

According to the Theory of Change Review commissioned by Comic Relief, there are a variety of ways in which people use the concept of a TOC. James identifies twelve in the Review, namely:

  • Programme theory/ logic/ approach
  • A causal pathway/ chain/ model/ map
  • Interventions theory/ framework/ logic
  • A clear and testable hypothesis
  • A blueprint for evaluation
  • A direction of travel
  • A road map for change
  • Pathways mapping
  • A process of open enquiry and dialogue
  • A logic model
  • Back to basics
  • A sense of direction[7]

James then proceeds to define two broader approaches to the use of the concept of a theory of change, namely an approach that seeks to identify how an interventions brings change, and using this analysis, then uses the logic to develop a clear path between cause and effect, and those that seek to identify more broadly how change happens, and thereafter applies this analysis to develop an understanding of how and where a particular intervention can fit into that broader understanding[8].

Participating Organisations and their Objectives and Models of Change[9]

1.Alliance for Children’s Entitlement to Social Security (ACESS) believes in society that takes care of its vulnerable members and ensures its children do not suffer from hunger, abuse, cold, illness or hardship. Children should be able to survive and develop their full potential.

Acess’s objectives are to make children’s rights to comprehensive social security a lived reality by:

  • Advocating for, and facilitating, coordinated models of service delivery;
  • Advocating for improved policies, laws and service delivery;
  • Monitoring and evaluating the implementation of laws, policies and service delivery;
  • Identifying and pioneering collective responses to emerging challenges and opportunities in the area of comprehensive social security.

2.Afesis Corplan

Is guided by the understanding that development is a political process, and we work to place the needs of the poor and marginalized on the development agenda. We do this by offering the following services:

  • Technical support on land issues and physical development projects
  • Capacity building and training in institutional development, local governance and various technical fields
  • Research relating to settlement development and local government
  • Information dissemination on key development issues

3.Black Sash aims to ‘enable all. To recognize their human rights, particularly their social and economic rights’ and to ‘work towards a South Africa in which the government is accountable to all its people and attends to their basic needs, and members of society (individuals and the private sector) also take responsibility for reducing inequality and extreme poverty’.

4.Corruption Watch ‘intends to ensure that the custodians of public resources act responsibly to advance the interests of the public. By shining a light on corruption and those who act corruptly, we promote transparency and protect the beneficiaries of public goods and services. Corruption weakens institutions, criminalizes individuals and undermines social solidarity. Corruption Watch will provide tools of support for a more engaged and active civil society in South Africa.

Each act of corruption that is prevented by our citizens underpins and fortifies civil society and thereby enhances democracy, the rule of law and the establishment of a more caring and just society.’

5.Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI)

Their mission is to ‘fight for freedom of expression and eliminate inequalities in accessing and disseminating information and knowledge in South Africa and beyond’.