Doctoral Dissertation Research: Competing Donor Imaginaries: Gender, Development, and Comparative Aid Chains

世界各地的许多国际非政府组织使用性别与发展这一宽泛的类别来描述其工作，但在这一总括术语下开展的方案编制各不相同：一些国际非政府组织促进涉及健康、教育和职业技能的项目，而另一些则侧重于生殖健康、经济赋权、公民权利和政治参与。许多研究报告都记载了信息技术中心在传播全球规范和根据当地情况调整这些规范方面发挥的关键作用。但最近的研究表明，国际非政府组织的规划是由当地的政治经济形成的。我们对这种变化如何影响INCLUB组织运营的方式以及对当地利益相关者的影响知之甚少。该项目探讨了国际非政府组织的做法、信念和优先事项如何沿着沿着援助链或方案从国际非政府组织总部到国家办事处，最后到执行伙伴的各个环节传播。具体而言，本项目提出的问题是：（1）不同国家的国际非政府组织组织的援助链在多大程度上以及如何存在差异？(2)执行伙伴，如与这些援助链有联系的政府各部的雇员，如何理解和谈判在当地政治和文化背景下供资倡议的优先事项？以及（3）与INCONDITION的接触在多大程度上塑造了这些本地从业者的自我理解，包括他们的专业身份？该项目将推进关于国际发展援助在促进全球公民社会方面的作用的政策辩论，更具体地说，发展部门不断变化的格局和重要的新行动者的出现，以及如何提高美国向非美国国家提供援助的效率和有效性的影响。该项目的数据由100个深入访谈组成，10个月的参与者观察和20份文件的文本分析。它正在收集两个援助链中每个组织的质量数据。首先，它在美国国际非政府组织总部组织进行了深入访谈，并在美国双边机构进行了访谈。然后，通过10个月的实地考察，该项目收集了三个地点的民族志观察和访谈：一个美国的外地办事处，国际非政府组织;国际非政府组织在国外的一个外地办事处;以及这些办事处的一个执行伙伴组织。最后，该项目将在国际非政府组织海外总部办公室进行短期观察和采访。为了补充访谈和人种学调查结果，将完成对国际非政府组织文件的文本分析。所有数据将使用ATLAS. TI和开放编码技术进行编码。该研究设计将使该项目能够分析国际发展计划如何通过三个环节进行阐述和沟通，从国际非政府组织总部和捐助者，到国际非政府组织外地办事处，再到当地合作伙伴。该项目将通过展示国家优先事项塑造全球规范的微观一级组织和组织间进程，扩展全球民间社会的社会学理论。该奖项反映了国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Many international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) around the world use the broad category of gender and development to describe their work, but the programming carried out under this umbrella term varies: some INGOS promote projects addressing health, education, and vocational skills, while others focus on reproductive health, economic empowerment, civil rights, and political participation. Numerous studies document the key role INGOs play in transmitting global norms and adapting those norms in local contexts. But more recent research has established that INGO programming is shaped by its local political economy. We know relatively little about how this variation affects the way that INGOs organize their operations and with what consequences for local stakeholders. This project explores how the practices, beliefs and priorities of INGOs are transmitted along aid chains, or the links through which programs travel from INGO headquarters to INGO country offices, and finally to implementing partners. Specifically, this project asks: (1) To what degree, and how, do aid chains organized by INGOs from different countries vary?; (2) How do implementing partners, such as employees in government ministries connected to these aid chains, understand and negotiate the priorities of the funding INGOs in local political and cultural context?; and, (3) To what extent does engagement with INGOs shape the self-understandings of these local practitioners, including their professional identities? The project will advance policy debates regarding the role of international development aid in promoting global civil society, and more specifically, the changing landscape of the development sector and the emergence of important new actors, with implications for how to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of U.S. aid provided to non-U.S. countries.Data from this project are comprised of 100 in-depth interviews, 10 months of participant observation, and a textual analysis of 20 documents. It is collecting qualitative data on each organization within two aid chains. First, it conducts in-depth interviews in U.S. INGO headquarters organizations, as well as interviews in the U.S. bilateral agency. Then, through 10 months of fieldwork, the project collects ethnographic observation and interviews in three sites: the field office of a U.S.-based INGO; an INGO field office abroad; and an implementing partner organization of these offices. Finally, the project will conduct short-term observation and interviews in an INGO headquarters office abroad. To supplement interview and ethnographic findings, textual analysis of INGO documents will be completed. All data will be coded using ATLAS.TI and open coding techniques. This research design will enable the project to analyze how international development programs are articulated and communicated across the three links, from INGO headquarters and donors, to INGO field offices, to local partners. This project will extend sociological theories of global civil society by demonstrating the micro-level organizational and inter-organizational processes through which national priorities shape global norms. It will also help to inform sociological theories of development, particularly those that inform issues related to gender in the developing world.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.