Editorial: The Challenge of Civic Action for Development

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Change usually comes with loss. Living in Europe right now, there is a sense of deep loss and uncertainty. For people living in other parts of the world pictures of burning houses and riots such as those in Athens over austerity measures are hardly surprising. The current struggles in Europe take their historic place alongside the Latin American debt crisis, the Asian crisis, the many and continuing upheavals in sub-Saharan Africa, the crushing lives in Central and Eastern Europe, and the recent regime changes in the MENA region. Europe’s governments and economies are tottering badly. One immediate sign of this are the abrupt cuts to development funding. Monti’s Italian government has slashed the development cooperation budget particularly the multilateral budget, which is practically ‘zeroed’, even if Rome is host to major UN agencies: FAO, IFAD andWFP. The Dutch, preeminent among the development donor community, are now considering whether to cut from 0.82 percent of GDP for development aid in 2009 to 0.6 or less in 2012. Such cuts are inevitably hitting the smaller European-based NGOs and networks dependent on small monies to do their work.With skeleton staff and lots of good will, these organizations are usually carrying out research, development education, policy and advocacy work in solidarity with partners in the South. I have been deeply saddened to learn that NetworkWomen in Development Europe in Brussels officially closed in December 2011and that the Irish women’s network (founded by among others Mary Robinson) Banulacht announced its closure March 2012. These organizations were, until the day they closed, actively engaged in major development social policydebates for human rights and gender justice.Their decision to close was not because they did not have work to do, on the contrary, the crises made them evenmore needed.Theyclosed partially because the general move to the right in Europe means that governments are not so willing to fund education policy, research or advocacy organizations. But they were hit also because development NGOs in Europe are structured in such a way that they could not continue without core funding (provided by the government grants) that allowed them to meet the obligations and rights of their employees. Tiny as they were, they were obliged to run with the same legal obligations as much larger entities. The inflexibility in the funding also meant that they were not Development, 2012, 55(2), (151–153) r 2012 Society for International Development 1011-6370/12 www.sidint.net/development/