Center for Community-Based Development
Clark's Center for Community-Based Development (CCBD) is the research
and training arm of the University's Program for International
Development. Building on 30 years of development experience in Africa,
Asia and Latin America, CCBD works in partnership with organizations and
institutions world-wide to strengthen grassroots planning and action to
build sustainable development. Clark's Center for Community-Based
Development is unique in its ability to link community institutions,
development planners, external agencies and policy-makers.
Housed within the University's George Perkins Marsh
Institute, the cross-disciplinary Center is committed to field
research and action that develop methods, build capacities, and strengthen
local groups to assume a larger role in managing their own livelihood
systems and resources. It works with communities around the world to
gather data, analyze problems and find collaborative, creative
solutions.
The result is local action. Participatory approaches create communal trust,
commitment, and stronger grassroots institutions that empower individuals and
organizations where centralized initiatives have failed.
The Goals of CCBD
Clark created the Center for
Community-Based Development with the mandate to form partnerships to achieve
effectiveness, efficiency and expansion. It achieves these goals through
research, action, and outreach.
Research: Learning to be Effective
Communities use participatory activities to analyze the causes of their
problems and explore possible solutions. At the same time, the community members
apply these analytical abilities to their institutions.
Action: Learning to be Efficient
Having determined their highest priorities, community groups prepare action
plans and implement them, often working with external partners such as
government or humanitarian organizations. After implementation, villagers
monitor and evaluate their activities using performance standards that they have
set.
Outreach: Learning to Expand
CCBD publishes handbooks, case studies and training materials to prepare
staff to manage new community development projects.
Grassroots Approaches
Clark's Center for Community-Based
Development works toward these goals using the following grassroots approaches:
Analytical Tools
CCBD offers practical alternatives to centrally-planned development. Its
analytical tools are unique in several ways: They help rural and urban
communities to support activities that they design and implement. They also
strengthen local leadership and institutions and integrate those involved in
managing livelihood resources. These tools include Participatory Rural Appraisal
and social and gender analysis.
Participatory Approaches
CCBD's data gathering and analysis rely almost exclusively on visual tools
(charts, maps, tables, and graphs). These tools help to cut across social
ethnic, gender, age and class groups in a community; to rank priorities; and to
keep the data within the community for future analysis, ranking, and
action.
Social and Gender Analysis
Social and gender analysis clarifies the relevance of factors such as gender,
class, age, caste, ethnicity and religion in determining access to and control
over resources. When community planners and policy-makers understand the
relationships among people, social structures and resource bases, they are
better able to change conditions that hinder development.
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