Box 3. Community-based planning in Southern Africa
In Southern Africa, Practical Action has worked over a number of years to develop an approach
of ‘community-based planning’: a process for coming up with plans that can be implemented,
managed and maintained by local communities. This process empowers communities,
including vulnerable socio-economic groups and their leaders, to demand and actively
participate in development interventions that are relevant to them. The desired outcome of this
process is to ensure that people influence resource allocation in their area.
Community-based planning draws on ‘Training for transformation’, which is a methodology
rooted in participatory learning for local action, and challenges traditional ‘expert’-led
methods. It aims to empower groups by raising their critical consciousness – stimulating and
encouraging them to participate actively and take control of issues that affect their lives. The
key to this is a shift of mindsets from being dependent (associated with chronic, transient and
survival poverty) towards independence, liberation and interdependence (transformation).
The vision of transformation in community-based planning is about individuals, leaders and
communities setting their own development agenda and making their own decisions while at
the same time being open to others. It emphasizes that:
• identification, planning and designing of initiatives be driven by local communities while
support organizations (NGOs) play the facilitation role. The communities should be in
control of identified initiatives;
• communities take the lead in reviewing, reflecting and organizing events and platforms to
share their lessons and identify celebrating points;
• communities should have a sense of ownership of the initiatives. Initiatives should not end
as soon as support organizations stop supporting the initiative. There should be a shift from
doing things for people, or to them, to working ‘by and with’ them.
Further information
Hope and Timmel. (1995) Op. cit.
Gumbo (2009) Community Based Planning Guidelines. Practical Action Southern Africa http://
portal-zw.practa.org.zw/aims/aim1/community%20based%20planning%20manual/CBP%20
manual%20may%202009.doc
community analysis, visioning and planning.
Our experience shows that communities
are best able to mobilize to resolve their
problems when they are supported in
articulating their vision and when enough
space is given through careful facilitation.
Much successful work in this respect builds
on a ‘Freirian’12 approach: this seeks to
guide communities towards understanding
the underlying causes of their own poverty,
identifying their own vision for the future, and
taking control over their local development
process. ‘Training for transformation’13 and
‘Community-based planning’ (see Box 3)
are related methodologies which aim to
empower individuals, groups and communities
to analyse and resolve their problems
autonomously. These skills need to be broadly
shared so that the vision is not lost each time
there is a change of leadership.
9
Community planning to reduce disasters,
Dibyapuri, Nepal