EDIAIS :Conference papers

Mary Picard, Ph.D., Regional Design, Monitoring & Evaluation Advisor for CARE International, Middle East and Europe Regional Management Unit (MERMU)

Measurement and Methodological Challenges to CARE International's Rights-Based Programming

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ABSTRACT

In seeking to re-align the organization more closely with its vision and mission, CARE International is promoting greater understanding of and practice in rights-based approaches (RBA) to address the underlying causes of poverty and social injustice that include discrimination, social exclusion, and denial of rights to minority groups. A serious intent to apply rights language in poverty analysis and the different phases of CARE's program cycle places greater emphasis on partnership, civil society strengthening, and advocacy, while introducing new roles for CARE in conflict resolution, ethnic reconciliation, and a more facilitative mode rather than direct delivery. CARE's accountability is also seen to shift away from our donors and our own organization based on its strategic directions to the poor and marginalized. This paper is about the challenges faced by CARE as it takes on new roles and adopts rights-based approaches in its programming. Drawing on the experiences of two Country Offices in the MERMU region in the inchoate stages of the organization's re-alignment, this paper will demonstrate the measurement and methodological challenges of new approaches, situate them within the broader dialogue taking place across the whole organization, and, based on what has been learned in these two cases, identify the current set of questions typically being asked by CARE's practitioners as the organization moves further into uncharted territory.

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