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Oxfam and BRAC: the links between Bloody-Mindedness and Innovation

March 29, 2023
Spent a buzzy couple of days IRL with Oxfam colleagues recently – the first such get together since Covid, and very moving/energising to be in a room together with others working on policy, advocacy, research etc in Oxfam GB’s ‘Impact Division’. One of the conversations was about innovation (isn’t it always?). Rather than generic thoughts on what helps/hinders creativity, I
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Naila Kabeer on Why Randomized Controlled Trials need to include Human Agency

June 7, 2019
Guest post and 20m interview with Naila Kabeer on her new paper There’s a buzz abroad in the development community around a new way to tackle extreme poverty. BRAC’s Targeting the Ultra Poor (TUP) programme combines asset transfers (usually livestock), cash stipends and intensive mentoring to women and families in extreme poverty in order to help them ‘graduate’ into more
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How assets + training can transform the lives of ultra-poor women: new evidence from Bangladesh

December 9, 2015
People are often very rude about ‘big push’ approaches to development – the idea that you can kickstart a country (or a millennium village) by simultaneously shoving in piles of different projects, technical assistance and cash. The approach hasn’t got a great track record, but now a kind of micro Big Push, targeting the ‘ultra poor’ in a range of
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Is BRAC the first international NGO from the South?

March 5, 2010
Thinking Big, Going Global is a new IDS working paper on what is arguably the first fully fledged international NGO from the South. Since 2002, BRAC, a Bangladeshi NGO, has gone global, expanding its programme of ‘microfinance plus’ (education, health, enterprise support, etc) to Afghanistan, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Southern Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Pakistan, formally establishing BRAC International in mid
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