Successful multi-stakeholder efforts that have transformed disagreements over water into collaborative partnerships have shaped human history and often contributed to the rise of great civilisations such as Mesopotamia, Egypt and the pre-Columbian cultures of Latin America. History teaches us that the more effective stakeholders are at engaging in dialogue, the faster development progresses. This is why, in 2009, SNV-Netherlands Development Organisation initiated a learning event consisting of the facilitation of multi-stakeholder process (MSPs) on water-related issues in 12 countries throughout Africa. Most of these MSPs consisted of forums on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH forums) in which a wide variety of stakeholders were represented.

SNV authors share interesting lessons from this in a recent issue of Capacty.org magazine. They broadly distinguish between MSPs that emerged from a crisis and those that emerged from a funding opportunity. The risk with the latter is that the MSP will cease to exist as soon as the funding comes to an end.

Other factors that affect the sustainability of MSPs include that MSPs may be vulnerable to political interference, elite capture (when a pressure group uses the MSP to serve its own interests), or the lack of clearly defined roles, responsibilities and mandates.The wide variety of MSPs represented in the WASH forums sometimes made it difficult to draw comparisons between them. Even so, participants were able to formulate five broad key aspects that are important to consider when facilitating an MSP. They included: participation, representation, results-orientation, leadership and funding.

Related web site: IRC - Learning Alliances

Contact: Michiel Verweij and Jackson Wandera, SNV-Netherlands Development Organisation  

Source: Capacity.org, no 41, Dec 2010

Tags: africa, learning alliances, rural wash, urban wash