Mushtaque Chowdhury, along with Ray Offenheiser and Emmanuel Gyasi, recently published the report “New Challenges for the 21st Century: Do NGOs in the Global South have a future?” along with an accompanying policy brief.
The publications outline the history of NGOs based in, or working on, the Global South and how they have impacted millions of people by working to mitigate poverty, inequality, corruption, and ecological degradation, among others. The authors also highlight the challenges facing NGOs today, such as repressive laws and regulations, poor accountability mechanisms, succession issues, and shrinking funds in the neoliberal landscape, among others.
Taking the background and current issues facing NGOs in the Global South, the authors propose recommendations to help them adapt to today’s complex landscape and remain viable into the future. Their recommendations include diversifying funding sources, building evidence-based learning organizations, giving target populations more power and autonomy, incorporating collaborative responses to climate change, and fostering collaboration with states and businesses.
Chowdhury spent four decades working for BRAC—the largest and among the most celebrated NGOs in the world—as the Vice Chair and in various other roles. Currently, he is a Population and Family Health Professor at Columbia University and serves on various boards. He is interested in global development, especially in poverty alleviation, equity, education, population, health & nutrition, women’s empowerment, improving NGOs, and climate change.
The collaboration between Chowdhury and his co-authors was made possible through the Pulte Institute’s Policy and Practice Visiting Associates Program. Through this program, visiting associates write evidence-based, strategic publications that positively influence global development policy and practice. While Chowdhury was a visiting scholar from September 2023 to February 2024, he wrote these two publications, completed the English version of his memoir about his work with BRAC, and promoted his book, 50 Years of Bangladesh: Advances in Health.
Originally published by at pulte.nd.edu on July 14, 2024.