Support models for CSOs at country level: Bangladesh country report

How can civil society and NGOs be supported by donors? This paper reviews experiences Bangladesh, looking at different models for supporting civil society and investigating possibilities for improving and increasing effectiveness of direct support to NGOs/CSOs. The authors consider how this can be done through country level support models and consider different examples of donor joint funding, which is helping other donors who might not have capacity to deliver their programmes to CSOs directly.

The document focuses specifically on the strategic policy framework of the Nordic+ donors (Canada, Finland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden and the UK). The authors identify and analyse different support models, while reviewing possibilities for improving direct support to NGOs/CSOs through country level support models. The paper sheds light on constraints and possibilities of different types of support models, and explains how to increase outreach to a wider range of civil society organisations and reduce transaction costs. Conclusions include:

• in order to effectively support civil society as an agenda for change, especially with regard to civil society as a demand‐side mechanism for improving governance, the analysis of the various models has shown that key trade‐offs have to be addressed
• innovativeness in supporting civil society in contexts such as Bangladesh requires looking into new ways of brokering transformative relationships between civil society and governments
• the tender or bidding system, such as used by the European Commission is very effective at promoting transparency. However, at the same time, it promotes competition and can easily lead to erosion of mission/niche areas by CSOs
• harmonising around civil society agendas, as part of implementing the Paris declaration will require a lot of donor flexibility and willingness to take risks.