In a district level meeting of NGOs some time ago, it was told that the agenda was for the government to meet NGOs operating in the area and to get to know what they were doing. Since the district did not have many meet and greets with civil society, this meeting was looked at as an interesting initiative to get to know one another and meet the new organisations on the block as well.
Of course, working in a small area for over 5 years, I knew the older organisations and they knew me. I was excited to regroup, if only to let people know that we were winding up half the work we were earlier doing. The person managing the meeting from the civil society end was an efficient person (for a change) and had sent everyone a link with questions about the work each organization did and our expectations from the government. We were also told that the government body facilitating this meeting was known as the Jan Abhiyaan Parishad. I was hearing about this wing for the first time, since I live under a rock on most days. As an initiative that functions in 10 remote villages of a district, we are very hands on and have blinders to most of the other things happening in our surroundings, much less the state.
The meeting started with about 10 organisations, and over the next 3 hours, about 10 more joined in. Then a list was read out, and apparently there were a little less than 400 government affiliated organisations in the District, which was quite the news and elicited murmurs for a while. As the organisations started introducing themselves, we realised that a lot of the organisations were new and were working in 1 village, its representatives were from the community. The government department then proceeded to explain to us the purpose of the meeting and to introduce the newer organisations.
The Jan Abhiyan Parishad has roots that spans over decades in the state of Madhya Pradesh, but has recently been incorporated as a wing of the government. Its mission is to bridge the gap between government and civil society organisations by fostering and mentoring new local organisations and helping them grow in alliance with the needs of the community. That being said, one of the goals as explained by the government officer was to have ‘a CSO (Civil Society Organization) in every village’ that can be supported by the government, and that carries out development at the grassroots level. There are also government provisions to help individuals register their non profit organisation under this department and get small amounts of funds for 3 years, until they can actually apply for grants and development projects (which is the current mandate).
Among the many comments about localising development work to the smallest unit, we also heard lines such as, ‘the government needs to know what kind of work is happening, and the profile of the organisations in their District.’ Another one was ‘why should organisations coming from outside get all the funding. We will give our own home grown organisations a chance at that.’
It is an interesting and noble thought, that local organisations need to be empowered so that the real issues can come forward and we can actually understand the realities on ground. Maybe it’s also important that current civil society organisations become more transparent and their work has some external monitoring. And for the sake of fruitful collaboration, there needs to be some relationship between civil society organisations and the government.
But the premise that the government will help in the creation of local civil society organisations, and nurture them so that they can work alongside one another, is a redundant one. The role of civil society in a welfare state is to act as a catalyst in communities where the government is unable to reach or resolve the challenges faced. And in a democracy, the role of civil society is often to show the government a mirror, depict the challenges on the ground, many a times to the disdain of the government. A home grown civil society that is also funded by the government is essentially an extension of itself, and by design will be unable to have the freedom to express itself, or expose any challenges faced, because that would mean the government is not up to its task of welfare.
This is not to say that governments and civil society should not work in tandem with one another. It is crucial sometimes for both entities to understand one another and for each to bring accountability in the other. A robust civil society will always aid a good government by providing additional services. And strong government collaboration also keeps civil society from maintaining their efficiency and quality. A quote by a researcher in this field says, “You take that high expectation and add under-delivery and, voilà, you get this negative effect.”
Prof. Dean Karlan. There are some pitfalls of NGOs working independently and not being able to work as efficiently, and the required checks needed can be provided by a government that is invested.
Traditional view points suggest that the role of an NGO (non governmental organisation) is to create an environment where it is not needed, after a certain period of time. Where the reins can be transferred to the community or the government and they can take it further, while the organisation itself retreats. For a government whose primary role is welfare by itself, why another parallel system of welfare needs to be established, is confusing.
A similar kind of precedent is seen in China, where the government opens its own NGOS. An article written by the London School of Economics talks about it by saying, ‘Paradoxically known as government organised non-governmental organisations (GONGOS), these entities help the state govern but don’t come with the risk they may go against state interests.’1 Is this the only kind of future we can expect from a civil society birthed by governments?
We are still to see how this initiative taken by one state government will bring impact in the future but hopefully some critical thinking and nuance will be taken into consideration as to the possible impact of government created non profit organizations. And if in the future, the government chooses how civil society functions, what will that end up looking like?
https://www.lse.ac.uk/research/research-for-the-world/society/ngo-activism-authoritarian-states
Photo credit https://www.thentf.org/
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