Nonprofit Nongovernmental Organizations Research Articles

Constraints To Farmers Effective Participation In Agricultural Extension Programmes Of Non-Profit Non-Governmental Organizations In South –Eastern Nigeria

Part of the activities of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in South-eastern Nigeria is the provision of agricultural extension services to farmers. This study, therefore, examined the constraints to farmers' effective participation in the agricultural extension programmes of four non-profit NGOs in three states of South-Eastern Nigeria. A total of sixty-four (64) participating farmers in the extension programmes of the NGOs were interviewed using structured interview schedule. Mean scores, Factor Analysis and ANOVA were employed for data Analysis. Results showed that unfavourable financial terms, poor extension agents' outputs, poor farmers' educational trainings, poor farmer-agent contacts and complexity of recommended technologies were the major impediments to farmers' effective participation in the extension programmes of the NGOs. ANOVA result showed that there was no significant difference in the factors affecting farmers' participation in the extension programmes of the respective non-profit NGOs in the study areas (P> 0.05). Global Approaches to Extension Practice Vol.1(1) 2005: 74-82

Institutionalizing the Sustainable Development Approach: Co-ordination across Traditional Boundaries

Water-based development is a catalyst for economic, social and environmental changes. Currently, this development is framed in the discourse of sustainability, based on such concepts as participation, gender equity and the containment of environmental and social impacts. Policies concerning these changes are implemented via state institutions, often in tandem with private institutions, both commercial (banks and businesses) and non-profit (universities and non-governmental organizations). The success of sustainable integrated development depends on the ability of these institutions to incorporate the concepts of sustainability, to adapt to changing environments and to optimize co-operation with other institutions. However, these institutions may vary greatly in their interpretation of the sustainability discourse, as well as in their capacity to implement those concepts consistently. This paper presents some of the current issues related to the need for capacity building and multisectoral co-ordination in order to ensure ongoing sustainable development (SD) where most, if not all, actors have a critical understanding of development discourse and are able to apply the concepts of sustainability in their normal operations. These issues are then discussed in the context of the experience of the South-eastern Anatolia Project Regional Development Administration in introducing SD to south-eastern Turkey.

Factors describing functioning of management team

The article presents the complex analysis of variables related with team effectiveness. We applied Input-process-output concept (J. E. McGrath) and P. Vinai, G. Hjelm model. P. Vinai, G. Hjelm's model describes the aspects of organizational functioning that are controlled and influenced by top management team: objectives, performance-output, resources, development and change, management, influence, external relations. In our research 17 top management teams from non-profit non-governmental organizations were assessed.According to our research data following input and process variables related with team effectiveness were determined: financial dependence, activity of members, external relations with sponsors, authorities, strategy, goals, administration and communication. Six factors describing team functioning were defined: I. Purposeful action, II. Communication, III. Conscious competence, IV. Planned activities versus resolution of financial problems, V. External orientation, VI. Structure. Regression analysis allowed to determine variables predicting team effectiveness - they are relations with other organizations (input variable), strategy, goals and communication (group processes).

Writing public policy: A practicum

Practical experience teaches the difficulty and the messiness of democratic public policy processes. A discourse analytic perspective on rhetorical action in the institutional settings of policy work reveals the dynamics of effective agency. By simulating practical experience and by developing a discourse analytic perspective, academic instruction in professional and technical communication can show students what elected officials, governmental staff, and non‐profit non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) do to make or to implement policy.

Opportunism and NGOs: Entrepreneurship and green north-south transfers

Through the lens of entrepreneurship, this paper applies the New Institutional Economics to examine two case studies of environmental nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Latin America to clarify their political economic roles. Southern NGOs that rely on Northern donors are viewed as entrepreneurial economic entities producing international public goods. These nonprofit NGOs take their place alongside for-profit firms as contributors to economic production, employment, institutional innovation, and technology transfer. The theoretical framework proposed assumes that self-interested behavior coexists with loyalty, commitment, and altruism as well as opportunism.

Peter F. Drucker and Decentralized Administration of the Federal Government

This article examines the outlook of Peter E Drucker toward the national government and public administrators in the United States. The main theme of this study is Drucker's belief that the federal government can become more effective by reducing its role as a problem solver and adopting a much diminished role as the arbiter of national purposes whose accomplishments would be left mainly to nongovernmental institutions and nonprofit organizations. The article covers three subjects: (a) Drucker's background, (b) his major allegations of deficiencies in the federal government and its civil servants, and (c) his vision of a goal-setting, environment-regulating role for this government sector.

A step back as donors shift institution building from the public to the “private” sector

Frustrated with public sectors in developing countries, donors have shifted support to nonprofit nongovernmental organizations. This paper questions the preferability of the nonprofit or public sector from the donor and host country perspectives. Case study experience from agriculture and natural resource institutions in Ecuador and the Dominican Republic is presented to expand upon current thinking about the role of the nonprofit sector. Nonprofits are found to possess substantially increased flexibility for donor purposes and avoid many of the pitfalls of the political process. They are, however, subject to free-rider problems and bear no responsibility to the general public.