S - Glossary

Glossary

The Development Management Networking Site

Glossary of terms for Development Management

Note: Within each definition, terms for which there are definitions elsewhere are highlighted.

Savings

A non-consumptive utilisation of income, i.e. both putting aside for later use and immediate use for investment. The purchase of means of production from the current income of a respective period represents savings (and at the same time an investment).

Secondary data review

A method of social research involving assembling and analysing existing (official) records, census reports, survey documents, maps, photographs, intervention documents, etc.

Self help

Everything that people do in order to improve their situation. Self-help takes place mainly in an individual form or within household or family units.

Self-help organisation

An alliance /association of people with a common purpose to improve their situation by joint activities. It is useful to differentiate between self help organisations in the narrow sense = formalised alliances, and self help groupings = informal alliances. The reasons why people organise in self help organisations are either economic (economies of scale, access to investment, markets, services) or political (protection/ cover, representation of interest) nature. The terms people's organisation, grassroots organisation, and community-based organisation are synonymous.

In the context of development interventions, organisations established and/or maintained by target groups of a development intervention for the purposes of enhancing their productive and creative capacities. A programme may enter into a partnership with such a self-initiative: then it becomes an implementing organisation of a development- project or programme.

Self-help organisations, promotion of

Measures to support self help organisations, used in the organisational development context; promotion of SHOs is a specialised task and is carried out by specialised promotion agencies.

Self-help promotion

Self-help promotion is a guiding principle of development- with the motto "Help for self help". This emphasises supporting people's own efforts supplementarily (and thereby stimulating them), but not replacing them (hence following the subsidiarity principle).

Self-targeting

A way of determining membership of a target group in order to achieve target group orientation. Measures are designed which suit the specific condition of a certain group (the desired target group) without excluding others from those measures (and without needing to name the members of a target group explicitly.) In contrast to administrative categorisation this way of targeting is politically and socially less problematic, less intervention driven and less bureaucratic.

Semi-structured interviewing

A method of social research conducted by means of informal discussions based on a flexible checklist of topics. Interviewing can be done with individuals or in groups, while taking casual notes.

Service agency

Agencies, institutions, organisations of government or outside government (i.e. non-governmental organisations) existing to deliver a service (e.g. primary health care, libraries, agricultural extension, literacy training) in the form of a programme.

Single-line organisation

A type of organisation with only one line of instruction and responsibility between superior and subordinate units. The advantages of this structure are: straightforward demarcation of competence, clarity, security; the disadvantages are: wearisome official channels, overburdening on top, bureaucratic inflexibility.

Situation

The actual state of affairs in a developmental issue being analysed; in which problems exist relating to a lack of basic needs (a situation of poverty).

Situation analysis

Situation analysis is a process which precedes planning; coming early on in the design process; and can be seen as the first step in planning. Situation analysis involves scanning or analysing a particular (developmental) problem situation, in most cases related to a region (suggesting geographical boundaries and coherence based on political, topographical but also economic, ecological or population factors).

Situation analysis proceeds from the point of view of those directly affected by the problems. It consists of a participants analysis, a problem analysis and objectives analysis, as well as an analysis of the project environment in order to define risks or assumptions. It can also consist of a target groups analysis. The purpose is to fully understand the context and problems in order to be able to formulate improvements or solutions adjusted to the situation. It demands a communicative approach emphasising participation and may make use of techniques such as Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA).

Information from a regional situation analysis can form the basis of regional development planning. However, as a rule it is not sufficient for this. A mix of both analytical /statistical methods of investigation and participatory methods of appraisal are required. Statistical or analytical methods have comparatively higher importance at regional level.

Solutions

The means of solving problems. Ideas for possible solutions may come from research, own experiences, experiences elsewhere.

Spatial principle approach

See Development from above / development from below

Stakeholders

see Participants

Starter problem

see Problem tree

Strategic objectives/strategy objectives

see Objectives

Structural adjustment

An economic programme started by the World Bank in 1980 to stimulate growth in developing countries, with the two main strategy pillars of: reduction of state expenditure (the trimming down even affected basic services), devaluation of the local currency in order to make export production competitive (which led to high rates of inflation due to import dependency). Other programme components depend on specific situations in the countries (e.g. establishment of a central bank, deregulation of internal trade, introduction of value-added tax, etc.). All measures were oriented towards liberalisation and the institution of free market systems according to neo-classical theory.

Sub-activities

see Activities

Subsidiarity

A principle of social doctrine with its origins in Catholic social ethics, which holds that all social bodies exist for the sake of the individual so that what individuals are able to do, society should not take over, and what small societies can do, larger societies should not take over. Applied in development, the principle holds that what people are capable of doing for their own survival and betterment should not be taken over by a development agent. This refers to all aspects of individual and societal life: the ability to fulfil own needs and identify deficiencies, to solve problems, to organise, and to handle conflicts, etc.. Help or self-help must be subsidiary: only what is beyond people's own capabilities and requires an external intervention, should be taken up by a development agent.

In political systems the term has come to refer to the principle of devolving decisions to the lowest level. Decisions over the use of public funds, institutionalised access to such funds, decisions on policies and sectors should be at the level of those concerned. For example, if communities (on average) have sufficient numbers of children to warrant a primary school, primary education (and its funding) should be on the communal level; similarly secondary education on district level, and tertiary education on regional/provincial level. National level educational institutions may have only regulatory functions to ensure compatibility of education processes.

Subsidy

A financial aid, grant or contribution, supplied from public coffers to the corporate sector / an enterprise, for a variety of reasons: "infant subsidies" to encourage and establish new enterprises; subsidies for periods of testing innovations; subsidies for positive external effects like reduction of unemployment; subsidies for the rehabilitation of degraded natural resources; subsidies for emergency cases like recovery from cyclones, epidemics; compensatory subsidies in case of competing imports that are subsidised in their countries of origin.

Subsistence needs

see Basic needs

Sustainability

In development this refers to the ability of the effects of a development intervention (e.g. project) to maintain themselves or keep going without continued inputs from external sources. Hence the capacities of people and their societies to maintain the targeted living conditions under given natural and economic conditions (which may change), must prevail. Thus sustainability requires maintaining the ecological balance and prevention of the degradation of natural resources (ecological sustainability), production promotion interventions adapted to foreseeable market conditions (economic sustainability), and the capacity of target groups and / or the organisations which provide them with services to maintain the necessary conditions for the improvements achieved, without external support (institutional / organisational sustainability).

Thus, the point is not (necessarily) the long-term maintenance of the activities implemented or initiated by an intervention, but rather the maintenance of the level of objectives achieved (for example of improved or stabilised living conditions). In view of social and economic dynamics, it cannot be the preservation of a certain "end of intervention status" (e.g. a certain production structure) which is aimed for, but the preservation of problem-solving capacities (adjustment of the production structure to the prevailing conditions).

Sustainable development

An approach to development based on the principle that all economic development depends on the natural resource base of the earth and a fair share of all people in the use of these resources. Development must therefore meet human needs without depleting resources or irreparably damaging the systems which produce those resources, or exploiting other countries and their resources. Maintaining ecological compatible production and ecological balance in order that future generations may also meet their needs is a central tenet of this approach.

Systems approach / Systems perspective

Systems are sets of elements or factors which are interrelated in a systematic manner. Characteristics of systems are: interrelatedness, balance seeking, embeddedness, equifinality and sub-optimisation. Adopting a systems perspective involves considering all relevant factors and their interrelation.

In the development context, a systems approach is useful in any analysis - via the tool of a systems model charting the interrelationships between frame conditions, resources, activities, outputs and the satisfaction of needs. Note that a comprehensive systems analysis (working with all factors and their interconnections) would not be a feasible basis for planning as interconnections between factors are typically too complex; as a result it is useful to select relevant levels or sections of the entire system for analysis. Breaking complexity down analytically without simplification is the approach.