USAID Local Systems Position Paper

HOW CAN YOU USE THIS RESOURCE:

Development practitioners in NGOs, governments, philanthropy and elsewhere who are committed to locally-led development principles can use this resource to learn ways to better understand and engage local systems, so that they can support them in producing more sustainable results.

OVERVIEW:

“USAID defines a “system” as the interconnected set of actors, elements, relationships, rules, and resources that jointly produce and sustain a particular outcome. Local systems exist at all scales, from national-level government services, to a community forest and its use, to household financial decisions. Systems are also interconnected, and often transcend traditional development or humanitarian sectors or funding streams.”

To understand and engage systems, this resource unpacks six approaches that are integral to better managed systems change:

• Seek to understand systems, in all their complexity
• Inquire with humility and curiosity
• Embrace emergence, ambiguity, uncertainty
• Facilitate diverse relationships based on trust, dignity, and care
• Prioritize learning from the system; and
• Be patient

For a deeper dive into systems literature, also take a look at the annotated systems practice literature review associated with the Position Paper, also by USAID.

Publishing organization: USAID

Read the Position Paper