Asset based community development is unifying for the social justice, social development sector.
Arriving at a workshop where the sea is sparkling below you, the sky is blue, the sun is shining and there are so many smiling friendly faces is always a good start. After many months of preparation, it was good to see how many people had come, and from all over the world. There were over 170 delegates from 22 different countries. It is not often in South Africa that we get to host an international conference. This was one with a difference. It was not about glitz and glamour it was more about collaborative effort and sharing of assets. I was part of the logistics team and because of that I got to see the amount of effort that went into organising the event. I would like to thank our colleague and fellow board member of the PLN for all the effort she put in. Bernie Dolly you were a star and I’m not sure how the rest of the logistics group would have coped without you.
The Willows in Port Elizabeth was a great venue. It has a great view; the food was amazing and the hosts were welcoming. There was plenty of space for breakaway groups and we all enjoy the various group sessions as well as the informal chats along the way. Sadly, I missed the meet and greet due to other work commitments but I hear it was a great way to start the workshop. After the introductions on day 1 I chose to attend a session facilitated by Ninette Eliasov on ABCD in the context of Organizational Development – organisational assessment, staff development, team building & strategic planning. This is a mouthful to say let alone facilitate and although Ninette did a great job of trying to cover the topic in 90 minutes the usual lesson was that we should focus on one element rather than try and cover so much in such a short space of time. There were many sessions running concurrently and it is always hard to decide what session you should attend.
In the next session I was one of the presenters and shared the SCAT Appreciative Inquiry process as a form of evaluation. There was a lot of interest in the session and wonderful empathy from the group for what our organisation had been through to get to the point where we are now. Other presentations in this session focussed on the principles of ABCD and the sharing of a personal ABCD story. I found that a lot of the ABCD stories were very personal and the way in which the use of the practice has shifted people and organisations has been interesting. It seems that ABCD can be a spiritual path for many and very practical for others.
Attempts to use the world café method were less successful with such a big group and I must admit I broke away with a person I had never met before who was also feeling overwhelmed by the big group and many group sessions, and we had a wonderful conversation about her work and ours. This is the value of being at a conference of this nature in that there are these opportunities to meet people you would never normally meet who do such different work from you but have use the same approach.
Without going through the detail of every session I attended and what it meant I will reflect on some of the experiences. The second day there were sessions in the morning and in the afternoon, there were field visits. I did not go on the field visit as I am originally from PE and know some of the projects quite well, but in the evening, I had the opportunity to reflect with others on the visits they had made. At this point it hit me that for some ABCD is almost like a religion and if it is not being applied in a pure form it is judged. In some ways it was a bit of a shock that colleagues in the development sector would judge others for not getting it exactly right. I know my organisation does not apply ABCD in a purist way and that there are elements that we find challenging being a grantmaker and a social justice organisation. The implementation of ABCD can be incremental and there may be times when it is not appropriate. I am still trying to find myself in this framework but I know that there must be a middle ground or a way of framing ABCD to fit different contexts.
On the last day one of the most interesting sessions was not a presentation or a group, it was in the World Café session where I found myself in a group discussing how technology and ABCD fit together. As we were talking we realised that access to data is a huge limitation for implementing any community driven solutions to sharing information or connecting people to discussions and opportunities. We also realised that technology does not wait for ABCD processes and this is a hindrance and a challenge to us as practitioners. This discussion keeps coming up in my mind even as we look at our work in SCAT and what we expect of our grantees as partners and in terms of their communication with us. I think this is a valuable discussion to have in the PLN. We encourage members to become more technologically savvy but access to data gets in the way.
One of the biggest challenges I have walked away from the ABCD Imbizo with has been the application to the social justice sector. My questions relate to the extent to which we place the burden on the community and not enough on the state/government. We look at the assets in the community and not what they have a right to as citizens and how this can be harnessed. I don’t believe they are mutually exclusive but I do think a deep discussion in this area would be useful. There were groups at the Imbizo that looked at ABCD and Human Rights, but unfortunately, I was not able to get to this session.
It was wonderful to have such a big contingent from Coady Institute present with us. They have invested a lot in the development of the ABCD methodology, of women in leadership and of communities in South Africa. They have applied their own lessons and from the conversations I had have also learnt many lessons working in South Africa. All the people who came from Coady or through them brought big smiles and lots of information with a warmth rather than an arrogance that they know it all, despite being world leaders in this area of thinking and practice.
I would also like to acknowledge SGS Consulting and Yolisa Shugu for all their hard work and contribution to organising the Imbizo. There was a great sense of community ownership of the Imbizo, that it was a collective effort and that the process was seamless when it never can be if you are getting such a big group of people together. I’m grateful for the opportunity, so pleased that my team could attend with me and be part of the process. I’m sure they will continue looking at ways to apply ABDC in their work. It’s an ongoing learning experience and we will keep reflecting on our successes and our lessons.
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