Article from ROAPE Volume 24 Number 71
Happy Ever After in the Marketplace: NGOs & Uncivil Society

This following declaration, about NGOs and civil society, is typical of the hallowed tones used to discuss both. This article sets out to examine what I have called the ‘NGO phenomenon’ which has arisen in the last decade. It is not a critique of NGOs per se, but a critique of the way in which development policy has focused on NGOs, to the extent that expectations of NGO performance are unrealistically high and exclude other options for development.