Community organizing starts with the preparatory component which involves the CO working with a leader(s) from the community to establish a core group
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Box 9.2. Community Organizing in the Fisheries Sector Programme in the Philippines.
To become managers of coastal resources, fisherfolk in each village were guided to form an association which was eventually registered with the Cooperative Development Authority as a cooperative. The process began with the formation of a core group which recruited more members and initiated the formulation of the association’s articles of cooperation and by-laws. The expanded membership ratified the articles and by-laws and elected officials who, with help from the NGO, prepared and submitted the required registration papers.
Training on the knowledge, skills and attitudes required for cooperative management included leadership, team-building and organizational skills; participatory development planning; simplified financial and accounting systems; project feasibility studies; and problem solving and decision-making. Training in fisheries-related laws and ordinances and in the knowledge and skills for managing fish sanctuaries, mangroves and artificial reefs was also provided.
Source: Abad (1997).
Box 9.3. The Community Organizing Process in Peam Krasaop Wildlife Sanctuary (PKWS), Koh Kong Province, Cambodia.
In Cambodia, the word ‘community’ has come to mean a special group of people interested in organizing themselves and supported by programmes of NGOs or government agencies. For example, Cambodians refer to such things as community forestry, community fisheries, community land use planning, and community protected area, where these communities have been supported by government and NGOs.
Community, in this sense, may refer to a committee in a village, which is not necessarily the administrative boundary of a village or commune.
In Peam Krasaop Wildlife Sanctuary (PKWS), Koh Kong Province, the Participatory Management of Mangrove Resources (PMMR) has been doing community organizing work since 1997 to facilitate a process where a village structure called the Village Management Committee (VMC) is set up and strengthened. PMMR is based at the Ministry of Environment. The project team includes technical staff from the Ministry at the national level, and staff from technical line departments in the province such as: the Department of Environment, the Department of Rural Development and the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery.
When PMMR began this process in PKWS, meetings were held to discuss the community organizing approach. The PMMR project arranged a series of workshops and study tours in and outside the country for the key villagers and the PMMR team members.
Inside the country, study tours were conducted to similar projects of community-based natural resources management, such as Community Fisheries at Ream National Park, Sihanouk Ville and Community Forestry, FAO Project in Siem Reap province. Trips outside of Cambodia were held to see the participation of local community in coastal zone management in Thailand and Sri Lanka. These study tours provided challenges for the participants to exchange ideas and learn experiences from one another. Learning from training/workshops and study tours, the community members expressed an interest in working with the PMMR team and concerned government agencies to come up with a community management strategy that would work in this area.
In planning for the community organizing process, PMMR suggests considering the following questions:
● What are the villagers’ concepts/ideas for protecting their fishing grounds?
● Are the identified fishing grounds to be co-managed more or less free from interruptions by outsiders?
● Should the boundary for the community-managed area follow an administrative boundary or a natural physical boundary?
● What are the steps in establishing community fishing areas?
● Who is involved in the process of community regulation development?
● How does one gain official recognition of community regulations from local authorities and technical departments?
● What will community by-law look like? For example, will penalties be included, what sizes of gear will be restricted?
In the PMMR’s experience, community organizing is both a technique for problem solving and a way to improve income for people, strengthen local awareness and enhance natural environment. Communities are enabled to consider their problems on economic, political and social needs, and initiate conflict resolution within a natural resources management framework. In the community organizing process, local community capacity building is a central point. The community development worker or
to lead the community organization. This core group should be small (three to five people) and include individuals who are enthusiastic, have a common interest, and represent a cross-section of the community. The leaders should be individuals who are acceptable to the community and who command sufficient respect.
The core group should hold meetings to assess the situation in the area.
Information from the research activities conducted earlier can be utilized to
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field facilitator must understand well any issues and factors that affect villagers’
participation in the community organizing process.
In Koh Kong, four communities were established with strong support by the Provincial Governor and the Minister of Environment combined with good facilitation by the PMMR research team, and learning from other experiences.
Source: Nong et al. (2004).
Box 9.4. Local Government–Civil Society Group Partnership, Philippines.
During the past 14 years, Naga City, Bicol Province, Philippines has built a reputation for being a model local government unit that pioneered innovations in local governance. For example, the People Empowerment Programme (PEP) is a continuing initiative of the city government to promote political empowerment of its citizenry. In particular, the city government passed an ‘Empowerment Ordinance’ that mandated the partnership between the local government and the non-government sectors in the city and encouraged the federation of the NGOs and people’s organizations into the Naga City People’s Council (NCPC). The NCPC continues to improve the city’s conditions, with funding and technical assistance from the city government, the USAID-funded Governance and Local Democracy Project and, more recently, the Philippine–Australia Governance Facility for institutional development and the strengthening of the city’s basic sectors.
By giving premium to community organizing, the NCPC has given marginalized sectors a voice and an avenue for meaningful participation in governing their city. The NCPC even extended its reach by organizing a functional Barangay People’s Council. In doing so, participation and inclusiveness in direction-setting, policy-making, as well as programme and project implementation, monitoring and evaluation at the city level, has been widened. In addition, there is now a heightened level of trust, confidence and openness between civil society groups and government.
The innovative approach of the Naga City government now includes multi- stakeholder planning for resource management and rehabilitation. Under the Naga City Participatory Planning Initiatives, the rehabilitation of Naga River has started. So far, a draft of the Naga City River Watershed Strategic Management Plan was produced based on extensive inputs from stakeholders who have approved the plan themselves through a stakeholder congress.
Source: www.naga.gov.ph
gain a broad understanding of the situation. People in the community may be asked to identify issues.
The core group then decides on the initial direction of the organization and a mission for the organization. Questions to be asked include:
● What are we trying to do?
● What size of area are we going to organize?
● Who will support our efforts?
● What is a good idea for our first action?
● How are we going to reach out to others?
9.2.1. Leadership
Any community organization rises or falls with the quality of its leadership.
The importance of identifying and developing responsive and effective leadership from the community cannot be understated. Leaders are needed to direct change and mobilize people towards a common vision. Leaders are not necessarily born with special qualities. Leadership can be learned and practised. Leadership and management work hand-in-hand and are sometimes done by the same person, but they are not the same thing. A manager runs the day-to-day operation of the organization. A leader provides inspiration and motivation. Every member should be encouraged to take leadership roles.
Leaders should be changed regularly to discourage corruption. Future leaders should be identified and trained on a continuous basis (Box 9.5).
It is never easy to find community members who have the time to devote to organizational tasks. Often, the potential leaders with more time on their hands are from economically well-off families. The poorer ones are often too busy earning their living. It is important for a CO to look for potential leaders among the poorer sectors in the community who could provide even a little of their time to the organization. Equally important is to always be on the look out for possible women leaders. Not too many women are visible in community affairs but developing potential leaders among them is an important element in a co-management process.
Box 9.5. Local Leaders in Bangladesh.
In Bangladesh, local leaders of the baors (inland water bodies) were identified and elected by the fishers. Leaders’ terms of office were limited so as to give others the chance to gain leadership skills and to reduce the possibility of corruption. Reliance on one individual as a leader can be a problem. In certain Philippine cases, projects failed when the leader died, left political office, or left the area, because there was no one to take the leader’s place.
Source: Pomeroy et al. (2001).
Thus, leaders should represent, to the extent possible, the varied interests in the community. In some cases, co-management initiatives start with leaders from a specific sector or group in the community but this should always be expanded as the process moves along to ensure broader participation. In community organizing, first- and second-line leaders are also developed among community leaders with the former mentoring the latter.
Effective leaders:
● Challenge the process (pioneers, search for opportunities, experiment, take risks);
● Inspire a shared vision (visionaries, envision the future, enlist others);
● Model the way (practise what they preach, set an example, plan small wins);
● Enable others to act (team players, foster collaboration, strengthen others);
● Encourage the heart (coaches and cheerleaders, recognize contributions, celebrate accomplishments);
● Welcome criticism.