Questioning power structures and values – The range of responses from French civil society organisations (CSOs)

Understanding the decolonisation of aid

Coordination SUD, the national coordinating body of French NGOs working in the field of international solidarity (international solidarity organisations, or ISOs), sets out in the article below points for consideration in the debate on how to transform French ISOs in the light of growing interest in decolonisation. Our article offers a critique of the current general situation, as well as of Coordination SUD and its member organisations, recognising the origins of aid, and its link to France’s colonial legacy. Our analysis draws on – and is limited to – experiences encountered in Coordination SUD’s work.

Going beyond the familiar use of the term, ‘decolonisation’ is increasingly the subject of debate within the social sciences, and within the international solidarity sector, i.e., among the ISOs. Theories of decolonisation are progressing from observations about a given situation to interest in a process, moving on from a historical phenomenon at a fixed point in time towards the goal of emancipation, although the chronological, spatial and political dimensions of this emancipation are still undefined. These theories of decolonisation draw directly on critiques of neocolonialism. The definition of decolonisation does not, therefore, conclude with colonised nations’ struggle for the territorial and administrative independence that they obtained in the twentieth century. It draws on South American theories, especially the Peruvian sociologist Aníbal Quijano’s theory of coloniality¹. For Quijano, coloniality is a more complex phenomenon than colonialism, understood as ‘the condition of submission of some peoples to – essentially – the administrative and military authorities of the metropolitan entity’². It makes reference to the mistaken assumption about the existence of ‘western’ knowledge, hegemonic and universal, used to justify a geopolitical arrangement of power based on ‘what is claimed to be the natural inferiority of non-western places, population groups, types of knowledge, or subjectivities’³. The ISOs have taken ownership of this theory as a means of decrying the persistence of colonialism and of inequalities which imbue relationships among its own actors⁴. The decolonisation of aid refers to a process of wholesale transformation of ISOs’ modes of thought, actions and internal power structures.

Criticism intensified in the wake of the Grand Bargain⁵, the outcome of the 2016 World Summit on Humanitarian Action, which introduced the concept of the localisation of aid with the aim of involving local and national CSOs in every phase of humanitarian action. Despite the commitments made, the key objective of the Grand Bargain – that by 2020 at least 25% of the humanitarian aid budget should be channelled directly to local and national organisations – has, in 2024, still not been achieved. CSOs – local and national organisations – are frequently still the passive beneficiaries of humanitarian aid, and if they take an active participative role, they do so at the discretion of the western donors. Less than 10% of financial aid recorded by the DAC (the Development Assistance Committee of the OECD) is earmarked for CSOs in the global South⁶. International donors’ financing modalities still too often entail the provision of targeted assistance, which leaves no scope for local CSOs to set their own priorities, or to decide on implementation methods. Contractual, financial and administrative approaches are closely modelled on western management criteria and practice, which tend to favour similar types of CSO. Even though investing at local level would enable aid to be ‘swifter, less costly and better anchored in the specific reality of a given context’⁷, implementing the localisation of aid is proving to be very difficult. After consulting more than 150 CSOs, Peace Direct has warned of the risk of the localisation being reinterpreted to shore up organisational arrangements which reflect western systems and practices, thereby justifying the status quo and the intervention of international CSOs⁸. This is what happens when, for example, an ISO sets up a country office and describes it as a local organisation rather than as a sub-office of an international (and western) organisation. If localisation fails to recognise that colonialism is embedded in the international solidarity sector, it will be no more than a set of technocratic managerial manoeuvres.

The scepticism aroused by the reinterpretation of localisation, and the associated challenges, have highlighted the need to question the entire system of values on which the ISOs rely. Once we start asking questions, we see that there is clearly a gap, with differing interests and levels of awareness among the IOSs.

Towards a shared construction of aid that goes beyond the colonial legacy

Rooted in the development policies of the 1960s, international aid frameworks have primarily been developed from a western standpoint. Although these frameworks have improved, they are considered not sufficiently flexible, or too ‘technical’, often inhibiting local and national CSOs from taking the initiative. There are two risks: first, that all local entities – whether formal or informal – that do not match the expectations of these frameworks will simply be excluded; second, that there will be a general movement towards the standardisation of CSOs, of their adopting the methods and organisational practices of western ISOs, thereby (un)consciously replicating the very premises of international aid that are criticised as inadequate. Some CSOs do manage to work independently, outside the standard frameworks, although they are the exception not the rule. Examples include CARE’s local offices in India and Morocco, which have been set up independently of CARE USA and CARE France⁹.

French CSOs, like so many others, depend on the aid frameworks referred to above, and reinforce them. They attempt to meet different stakeholders’ expectations and to maintain some degree of balance. We see this approach adopted by, for example, intermediary funds such as the (French) Support Fund for Feminist Organisations (le Fonds de soutien aux organisations féministes)¹⁰. Backed by consortiums of international CSOs as well as CSOs from the global South, the Fund’s objective is to provide financial and technical aid to strengthen local feminist CSOs (projects, technical capacity, networking …). Although some of its actions may be transformative in their effect, in practice the Fund comes up against the hard realities inherent in contractual obligations, which ISOs and their local representatives have internalised.

With non-western countries the key stakeholders, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) theoretically bear witness to the UN’s willingness to explore the possibility of constructing shared values, and promoting solidarity by setting out agreed, interdependent targets and risks (on issues such as climate, biodiversity, water, peace, migration). Some French CSOs rediscover their original DNA within this type of framework that treats the issues not as competing but as complementary. A notable example is the organisation GRDR (Research into and implementation of rural development): Migrations-Citoyenneté-Développement, which guarantees that at every strategic level, from governance to operations, priority will be given to local input. The organisation acts as a site of encounter and exchange between professional migrants from the basin of the River Senegal – who constitute the members of the organisation – and French know-how designed to help them provide for their home communities. GRDR’s vision of international aid puts local skills and expertise front and centre.

Recognising local knowledge, and getting away from the colonial legacy, crystallises numerous hopes and expectations. A major challenge for sustainable development is reversing the invisibility of local knowledge. Such knowledge was abandoned in favour of extractive economics, and industrialisation, enriching the colonial powers while destabilising local communities’ ecosystems, ways of life and traditional structures, including social structures. Within the aid system, taking account of local knowledge and local skills is primordial. In 2023, F3E, which leads France’s specialist evaluation network – which addresses capitalisation and training (among other issues) – organised a panel of CSOs from five continents to debate the way that powerful knowledge and skills have been lost or made invisible¹¹. The panel concluded that ‘the South’ is treated by the North as a ‘zone of experimentation’, where western organisations develop approaches, methodologies, tools and processes that they themselves have devised, with the implication that this zone is essentially bereft of knowledge, even though there is a remarkable degree of oral transfer of knowledge and skills. Knowledge production is thus constrained by western frameworks. It is not even-handed. It therefore misses out – unfortunately – on crucial knowledge.

Double standards undermine the legitimacy of NGOs

Aid distribution records indicate that colonising countries direct their aid budgets to their former colonies¹². Two regional examples: in 2021 the majority of France’s official aid went to West Africa¹³; and Belgium gave most of its official aid to the DRC.

As well as being criticised for aid distribution patterns, countries are criticised for instrumentalising their aid budgets for strategic purposes. This becomes more obvious during geopolitical crises. Western countries often operate double standards in their foreign policy. Recently, France punished the military regimes in Mali¹⁴, Burkina Faso and Niger by suspending some of its official aid, including aid distributed via French and local CSOs – but it did not crack down on neighbouring governments in Chad, Guinea and Gabon. A direct consequence was that local populations were punished, being left without aid to fend for themselves. Defending strategic and economic interests at the expense of the rights of local populations, or of democracy itself, attracts severe criticism.

Taken together, the above observations tend to heighten our awareness of those ‘patterns of behaviour’¹⁵ that are the legacy of colonisation.

New and far-reaching social movements encourage CSOs to examine their own attitudes and practices

In recent years, several social movements emphasising respect for the dignity and integrity of the person have denounced discriminatory procedures and systemic inequality. Black Lives Matter (BLM) and #MeToo have confirmed the value to anti-discrimination movements of the concept of intersectionality, first proposed in 1989 by the American lawyer Kimberley Crenshaw¹⁶. Analysing structures of domination and inequality in terms of the intersection of different, mutually reinforcing types of oppression, results in social movements bringing different actors together to tackle issues of power relationships and dynamics. The ensuing claims about discriminatory practices have influenced CSOs, encouraging them to examine their collective conscience¹⁷, looking at systemic discrimination and the power structures that depend on western systems underlying the international solidarity sector. This exercise in introspection begins with an acknowledgement that we have failed to ‘combat institutional racism and [the assumption] of privileged white culture’, as recognised by Médecins Sans Frontières International, responding to the fury generated by the BLM movement¹⁸. Taking this as their starting point, organisations belonging to the Plan International network have established frameworks for fundamental changes in their habits, attitudes and practices, which they have concluded are based on western paradigms. These new frameworks propose first the deconstruction of paradigms, followed by restructuring towards an organisational culture which guarantees fair treatment for all stakeholders. Plan International France now trains its teams using a module called ‘Power, Privilege and Cognitive Bias’, developed in 2016, and further strengthened in 2020 in the light of the BLM movement. Teams explore their conscious and unconscious prejudices, and the use and abuse of their powers and privileges. Overall, the aim is for an inclusive organisational culture, reflecting strategic priorities of ‘being managed locally and connected globally’, and of being recognised as anti-racist.

From Western origins and identity towards decolonial approaches

French CSOs reflect the diversity of the sector, with many different institutional attitudes to the decolonisation of aid, and what this might entail in practice. In general, many initiatives aim at better balanced, more equitable and more reciprocal partnerships, setting aside the ideas of ‘doing’ or ‘having someone do’ in favour of ‘doing together’. The path towards the decolonisation of aid takes account of contextual dynamics, the demands of social movements and the urgently critical voices of non-western CSOs. Major geopolitical shifts, tending towards a multi-polar world, transform the different contexts and geographical areas where ISOs are active: they are forced as a result to have discussions among themselves which are necessarily uncomfortable.

The changes described have a destabilising effect on French CSOs’ ‘raison d’être’, calling into question their value to society. A complete rethink is required: of practices, attitudes and skills. The entire aid architecture must evolve and develop a collective, equitable response, with each organisation finding and defining the right place for itself.

The need to act collectively in a context where tensions abound strengthens the ISOs’ determination to change. Coordination SUD has therefore launched a study which will research in depth the scope for action. This study – due in 2025 – will record and analyse how changes at the global level presuppose and require the remaking of French ISOs.

Coordination SUD is a national platform grouping 180 French ISOs. Established in 1994, it brings together, strengthens, represents and supports actors in this sector.

Anna Diaz, Research and Analysis Officer – OngLAB, Coordination Sud
Mélanie Pelascini, Analysis & Advocacy Officer, Coordination Sud
Anaïs Tamani, FRIO & Quality Project Officer, Coordination Sud

1. A. Quijano. Colonialidad del poder, eurocentrismo y America Latina’. In E. Lander (ed.), 2000. La Colonialidad del Saber: Eurocentrismo y Ciencias Sociales. Perspectivas Latinoamericanas. Buenos Aires : Clacso. pp.201-245.
2. A. Escobar & E. Restrepo. 2009. Anthropologies hégémoniques et colonialité, Cahiers des Amériques Latines. 62. pp.83-95.
3. Ibid.
4. D. Alaouf-Hall. 2022. ‘Entre « universalisme » et « localisme », Les Degrés de Percolation des Standards SPHERE’. In Revue Canadienne d’Etudes du Développement 43, no. 4. pp. 487-508 ; WACSI. 2023. Décolonisation de l’aide : perspectives de la société civile d’Afrique sub-saharienne francophone. Accra, Ghana ; Partos. 2022. La décolonisation de l’aide au développement.
5. The Interagency Standing Committee. 2023. About the Grand Bargain.
6. Peace Direct. 2024. The founding bias against the Global South. p.9.
7. L. Ricart. 2024. Quelle(s) localisation(s) pour le travail humanitaire de demain ?, Alternatives humanitaires. No 26. pp.30-38.
8. Peace Direct. 2020. Décolonisation de l’aide et consolidation de la paix. p.11.
9. L. Caramel. 2020. Le mouvement Black Lives Matter contraint les ONG humanitaires à un examen de conscience (The Black Lives Matter movement has humanitarian NGOs examining their consciences), Le Monde, 7 July 2020.
10. https://www.afd.fr/fr/fonds-de-soutien-aux-organisations-feministes-fsof.h The website provides further information about the Fund.
11. F3E. 2023. ‘Equité et apprentissages dans un contexte de la localisation de l’aide : « Déplacer le pouvoir de la connaissance : quels chemins vers une plus grande équité dans les processus d’apprentissages ? »’ Webinar. April 2023.
12. D. Chiba & T. Heinrich. 2019.’Colonial Legacy and Foreign Aid: Decomposing the Colonial Bias’. In International Interactions 45(3). p.474-499.
13. France Diplomatie. Bilan de l’aide publique au développement française en 2021.
14. On 16 November 2022, France confirmed its decision to suspend its aid to Mali, including aid distributed via NGOs, while maintaining its humanitarian projects. The Malian authorities replied with a communiqué which forbade any international cooperation project involving French finance (Communiqué 042 of the transitional government of Mali, 21 November 2022).
15. WACSI, op. cit.
16. K. Crenshaw. 1989. ‘Demarginalising the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics’. University of Chicago Legal Forum. Vol. 1989. Issue 1.
17. L.Caramel. op.cit.
18. Ibid.