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Abstract
This paper is an attempt to explore the micro-cosmos of one NGO called Unnayan in Kolkata, India. Much development literature has tended to take NGOs for granted as rational entities that act in a coherent manner, while more recently a critical approach to what NGOs can achieve has become apparent. During my fieldwork, I discovered an organisational universe characterised by numerous alliances and subgroups that were constantly formed and reformed across or within fragile and fluid boundaries. Instead of having a clearly separate existence as an easily distinguishable and successful NGO with an explicit social and political agenda, Unnayan was inseparable from the non-NGO world. Projects and workers related to Unnayan did not constitute a bounded entity, but were intimately woven into patterns of political and institutional experience in the city.
Cet article explore le micro cosmos de l'ONG Unnayan, de Kolkata. Si, dans le passé, la majorité de la littérature sur le développement avait tendance à dépeindre les ONG comme étant des entités rationnelles qui agissent de manière cohérente, une approche plus critique a récemment vu le jour. Lors de mon étude terrain, j'ai découvert un univers organisationnel caractérisé par de multiples alliances et sous-groupes qui se formaient et se reformaient constamment à travers ou à l'intérieur de frontières fragiles et fluides. Au lieu d'avoir une existence clairement séparée en tant qu'ONG facilement différenciée et ayant du succès avec un agenda social et politique explicite, Unnayan était inséparable de l'univers non-ONG. Les projets et les travailleurs de Unnayan ne formaient pas une entité qui existait uniquement par elle-même, mais étaient intimement unis par le biais d`expériences politiques et institutionnelles dans la ville.
Notes
Eldrid Mageli is historian and researcher at the Department of Archaeology, University of Oslo, [email protected]
1. The literature on NGOs is vast. For some analytical assessments, see Drabæk [1987], Korten [Citation1990], CitationEdwards and Hulme [1992, Citation1996 and 1997], Fisher [Citation1993], Farrington and Lewis [Citation1993], Tvedt [Citation1998], Hossain and Myllylä [Citation1998], Vartola et al. [Citation2000], Sooryamoorthy and Gangrade [Citation2001], Mitlin [Citation2001], Edwards and Fowler [Citation2002], Townsend et al. [2002], Hilhorst [Citation2003] and Tembo [Citation2004].
2. Unnayan means ‘development’.
3. Many can be mentioned. See for instance Tendler [Citation1982], Landim [Citation1987], Elliot [Citation1987], Fernandez [Citation1987], Garilao [Citation1987], Korten [Citation1990], Clark [Citation1991], Brett [Citation1993], Narasimhan [Citation1999] and Ulvila [Citation2000].
4. For a critical assessment of NGO literature, see Fisher [Citation1997].
5. This is discussed by Holmén and Jirström [1993] as well as by Hilhorst [Citation2003].
6. Weisgrau [Citation1997] is an exception.
7. NOVIB (Netherlands Organisation for International Development Cooperation) is one of the five large Dutch private aid agencies. 75 per cent of its activities are co-financed by the Dutch government. NOVIB has for the past five years been a member of Oxfam International.
8. For an account of this movement, see Banerjee [Citation1980].
9. There were a number of women active in this organisational environment. I had contact with several of them; however, they generally had subordinate positions and did not come across as key actors.
10. All three are pseudonyms. Jai Sen (not a pseudonym) is a well-known figure in the NGO movement in India, and has produced a number of articles and reports. He was one of the organisers of the 2004 World Social Forum in Mumbai.
11. Since I only had a rudimentary knowledge of Bengali, and since several of the activists were fluent in English, most interviews were conducted in English.
12. In the following, I will mainly use the term ‘squatters’ to distinguish them from slum dwellers, who were generally better off.
13. Hawking refers to the selling of goods, often in unauthorised places.
14. In the 1980s, the communist leader Prakash Karat had argued that NGOs were instruments of Western imperialism and as such a modern form of colonisation. His arguments exerted much influence on attitudes to NGOs among Indian radicals. See CitationKarat [1984, Citation1985].
15. Interview, February 1996.
16. Interview, February 1996.
17. Interview with Unnayan worker, November 1995.
18. The stories about Gautam were related by members of Unnayan and Sramajibi.
19. Several Unnayan informants recalled the disappointment on the part of the squatters.
20. Pseudonyms.
21. Interview with Rama, February 1998.
22. Several informants in Unnayan recalled this incident.
23. For a recent, interesting study which questions the simplistic and conventional use of ‘participation’, ‘village’, and ‘community’, see Botchway [Citation2001]. See also Dorothea Hilhorst's fascinating study of NGOs as organisations with fragmented and fluctuating social networks, [CitationHilhorst, 2003].
