Shooting Bambi? Critical Reflections on International Approaches to Local Ownership

Abstract

This chapter critically reflects on the panel on ‘International Approaches to Local Ownership’ at the swisspeace 2012 annual conference, which featured a representative of a donor institution, the founder and CEO of an international peacebuilding NGO, and a scholar with extensive experience in UN peacekeeping operations. The chapter exposes the nearly insurmountable difficulties that external actors face when trying to implement the concept of local ownership, even when they have the best of intentions. Aside from struggling to define what exactly the term means, they are not able to (or don’t want to, and perhaps shouldn’t) overcome the power imbalances between donor and target beneficiaries. As the concept of inclusiveness, suggested as an alternative to ownership during the panel, carries similar challenges, the author offers transparency and honesty of external interveners’ agendas and intervention approaches as a perhaps more empowering solution that could lead to a more equal partnership between the respective actors.