Power and its discontents: The long road to systemic change in the aid sector

• NGOs are taking incremental steps to reconfigure power dynamics and foster more equal relationships between Northern and Southern actors. • Most actions to address North-South power imbalances do not fundamentally change power dynamics or tackle the root causes of inequality. • Most actions are Northern-led, running the risk of reinforcing power relations in the aid system. • NGO are making slow progress in shifting power and individual actions cannot accumulate into genuine systemic change. • Collective action, with Southern leadership at the core, is critical to transformative systems innovation. Power inequalities between Northern and Southern NGOs have historically plagued development cooperation. A growing momentum towards localisation, locally-led development, and shift the power is indicative of widespread efforts to respond to these inequalities. Drawing upon new survey data, we explore the nature of specific actions taken by a sample of NNGOs and SNGOs to address these power inequalities and analyse the extent to which these equalize power. We find that organisations in our sample are taking important steps toward reconfiguring traditional power dynamics and fostering more collaborative and accountable relationships between Northern and Southern actors. Yet a deeper analysis of these raises questions around whether actions are deep enough to rebalance or upturn unequal relationships and contribute to broader systems change. We find that innovations within the aid system are making incremental improvements without fundamentally shifting where decision-making power and financial power lie. Significant to scholars and practitioners alike, these findings underscore the need for more substantive and systemic changes to achieve genuine equity in development cooperation.