In the latest of this series of podcasts with UN and other aid leaders making change happen on the frontline, I talked to Federico Dessi of Humanity & Inclusion, about a breakthrough in the treatment of national staff in humanitarian settings. Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa · GELI Stories – Federico Dessi on how INGO advocacy won better protection for

Andreas Ulfsax works for IM (www.imsweden.org/en). IM is a Swedish member-based development organization supporting civil society organizations in 10 countries. As a Change Developer, he focuses on getting everyone to experiment more. For contacts andreas.ulfsax@imsweden.org This blog post describes how IM experimented with Power Funding, a new funding modality, and the surprising results. Can we fund better than Core/Institutional funding?

Been having a series of conversations on the general theme of ‘backlash’. Some thoughts: Background: a lot of activist thinking is predicated on being on the front foot – this is a law, policy, spending commitment or social norm that we want to change. Lots of case studies, toolkits and experience on how to do that – problem and power

In the fifth of this series of podcasts with UN and other aid leaders making change happen on the frontline, I talked to Panos Moumtzis, who now leads the GELI programme, about some top influencing he did in a previous job as UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Syria Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa · GELI Stories – Panos Moumtzis on how

Guest post from Kelly Hawrylyshyn, Head of Global Resource Mobilization at Fairtrade International; and Harriet Lamb (CEO WRAP, former CEO of Fairtrade International & Fairtrade Foundation UK) On February 13th, the Fair Trade movement mourned the passing away of the liberation-theology worker-priest,  Father Frans von der Hoff,  the co-founder of a global movement that now generates over €8 billion in

In the fourth of this series of podcasts with UN and other aid leaders making change happen on the frontline, I talked to UNICEF’s Pia Britto about how she and a group of colleagues managed to include Early Childhood Development in the SDGs.  Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa · GELI Stories – Pia Brito on getting Early Childhood Development into

Journalist, activist and anti-corruption legend John Githongo reflects on the shifting story of anti-corruption in Africa, from Western models to new agendas. This is an edited-down version of a piece published in The Elephant. Corruption, however you define it, is so integral to the way human commercial and political affairs play out that all major global developments in its regard

In the third of this series of podcasts with UN and other aid leaders making change happen on the frontline, I talked to OCHA’s Vincent Omuga about the challenges of working in closed and informal political spaces like Eritrea (although I think his experiences are probably much more widely applicable) Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa · GELI Stories – Vincent

In the second of this series of podcasts with UN and other aid leaders making change happen on the frontline, I talked to Cissy Kabasuuga of WFP about how she managed to unblock a school feeding programme in Eswatini. Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa · GELI Stories-Cissy Kabasuuga on building coalitions within UN & Eswatini for school feeding Duncan: Welcome

One of the best things about the course I give on ‘Influencing for Senior Leaders: Analysis, Strategy, and Practice’ is the anecdotes from the participants, who are working in the most difficult of circumstances and often achieve amazing results. So recently I started recording some of them to come up with a series of ‘GELI Stories’ (GELI is the name

For this podcast, I sat down a few months ago to discuss data and development with Claire Melamed, who runs the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data. Apologies for delay, Claire – got caught up in internal traffic. Also apologies for length of this transcript – turns out 30m talking = 2 blog length pieces. Duncan: Like any good Englishman,

The title is a line from Rebecca Solnit’s ‘Hope in the Dark’, which I read over Christmas as an antidote to the grimness of the daily news. It’s a beautifully written collection of her essays and, at 140 pages, mercifully short. In the afterword, Solnit explains: ‘This book was written for the encouragement of activists who share some of my