This thesis presents an ethnographic study of a small local non-government organisation (NGO) negotiating its way through the complex, multi-layered, postconflict, post-emergency environment of Timor-Leste. This is an environment that remains dominated by the aid industry, an industry that initially came to restore order and provide humanitarian support in the violent aftermath of the 1999 independence vote and stayed on to build a new Timor, in many ways created in its own image. In this environment a small local NGO struggled to maintain not only its vision and mission, but to fit within a new set of externally imposed conditions and regulations in order to serve its communities' needs. / Using ethnographic data gathered in the field over eleven months, this study paints a picture of a post-emergency environment on the ground and in the daily life of a local NGO within that environment. Combining ethnographic and interview data from local and international aid and development practitioners, the study also identifies the internal and external challenges faced by the local NGO in navigating its way through this environment. The internal challenges faced are largely in response to externally imposed conditions, and include the adaptation to new language and communication technologies, new styles of leadership and organisation management, new financial accountability processes and procedures. All of these challenges are coupled with the lack of experienced and skilled staff. The external issues relate to interactions and relationships the local NGO has with the aid industry, and the issues arising out of these engagements including ideological differences, donor dependency, unequal relations, and externally imposed directives. / While acknowledging that these are very real challenges, this thesis argues that it is the underlying factors behind the presenting challenges that are the real barriers to the effective participation of a local NGO in the post-conflict, post-emergency environment. Using post-development writings and Foucauldian theories as a theoretical framework, this thesis explores how thought, ideology and action are governed and controlled by the subtle mechanisms of liberal governance, (particularly in their redefinition), and local language is appropriated and reconceptualised as a tool of governance. It is the inability to understand or detect these subtle mechanisms of governance that often limits the degree to which an NGO can be said to act self-determinedly, or in full awareness of the situation, as they navigate a path through this foreign and often baffling post-emergency environment. / This research adds to the emerging academic body of research on NGOs in postconflict, post-emergency environments. On a practical level it provides aid and development organisations and aid practitioners with a detailed 'insider's' view of the operations of a local NGO and the impacts on a small organisation of externally imposed conditions, regulations and hidden agendas. Finally, it provides field workers intending to conduct research in post-conflict, post-emergency environments with an introduction to the issues and problems associated with this type of research.

Thesis (MBA)--Stellenbosch University, 2007. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study provides an overview of the medical aid industry in South Africa and highlights the impact of the formation of the Council for Medical Schemes through the implementation of the Medical Schemes Act of 1998. The regulatory framework that governs the medical aids in South Africa is analysed. In this study. different medical aid funds are compared in terms of administration costs, required solvency levels and membership numbers relative to the acceptable industry averages. The main cost drivers of medical aid funds that could also threaten the future of private medical care are identified, as these services may not be affordable to most South Africans in the future. The new vision of government in terms of healthcare is outlined, and the regulations that will be implemented to transform the healthcare sector into a Social Health Insurance system, and ultimately into a National Health Insurance system. are analysed. The proposed mechanisms, such as the Risk Equalisation Fund, the Government Employees Medical Scheme and lowincome medical schemes, are discussed, highlighting all their advantages as well as the associated risks for the sustainability of private medical care. The proposed new legislation and the potential negative financial impact on the private medical industry are analysed with detailed reference to the Medical Schemes Act of 1998 and the Medicines and Related Substance Control and Amendment Act of 1997. The implications of fundamental changes proposed in private health insurance, such as community risk rating versus the traditional individual risk rating, are discussed. The negative impact of prescribed minimum benefits (which include HIV/Aids) on the financial sustainability of the medical aid industry is highlighted. The impact of HIV/Aids on the sustainability of the medical aid industry is discussed and some conclusions and recommendations are made regarding the financial sustainability of the medical aid industry and hence the future of private medical care in South Africa. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie studie is 'n oorsig van die mediesefondsbedryf in Suid·Afrika, en beklemtoon die impak van die totstandkoming van die Raad van Mediese Skemas deur die impJementering van die Wet op Mediese Skemas van 1998. Hierdie regulatoriese raamwerk, wat mediese fondse in SuidAfrika tans reguleer, word in die studie ondersoek. In hierdie studie word van die grootste mediese fondse in tenne van administratiewe koste, voorgeskrewe fondsreserwes en lidmaatskapgetalle relatief tot die aanvaarde bedryfsnonne met rnekaar vergelyk. Die belangrikste koste-items vir mediese fondse wat die voortbestaan van privaat gesondheidsorg kao bedreig, word ontleed cmdat hierdie dienste in die toekoms vir die rneeste Suid-Afrikaners onbekostigbaar kan word. Die regering se nuwe visie vir gesondheidsorg word uiteengesit. asook die regulasies wat germplementeer sal word om die gesondheidsektor na 'n sosiale gesondheidsversekeringstelsel en uiteindelik na tn nasionale gesondheidstelsel te transfonneer. Die voorgestelde meganismes, seos die Risiko-egalisasiefonds, GEMS en laeinkomste-mediesefondse word bespreek, met al die relevante voor- en nadele, tesame met die geassosieerde risiko's vir die voortbestaan van privaat mediese dienste. Die voorgestelde wetgewing en die gevolglike negatiewe finansiele impak op die privaat gesondheidsbedryf, met spesifieke verwysing na die Wet op Mediese Skemas van 1998 asook die Wet op die Beheer van Medisyne en Verwante Middels van 1997, word ondersoek. Die implikasies van fundamentele veranderinge wat in terme van gesondheidsversekering voorgestel word, soos gemeenskapsrisikogradering teenoor individuelerisikogradering, word bespreek. Voorgeskrewe minimum voordele (wat MIV insluit) wat nou ingevolge wetgewing ten volle deur fondse betaal moet word, se potensiele negatiewe impak op die finansiele lewensvatbaarheid van mediese fondse word beklemtoon. Die potensiele negatiewe impak van die MIV-epidemie op die lewensvatbaarheid van die mediesefondsbedryf word bespreek en gevolg deur aanbevelings om die fmansiele lewensvatbaarheid en toekoms van die privaat gesondheidsbedryf in Suid-Afrika te verseker.

In the last two decades, there has been a significant rise in women’s rights Non-Govermental Organizations (NGOs) in Nepal, working on issues ranging from economic and political empowerment to violence against women and discrimination. Most of these local NGOs rely on international funding to pursue their advocacy and project work. This brings up questions of power imbalance regarding decision-making and agenda setting in their relations with donor International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs) as the latter wield substantial financial control. Academic and practice-based research on power dynamics between donor INGOs in the Global North and recipient NGOs in the Global South has mainly focused on the benefits of NGO involvement in the development sector. Drawing on postcolonial, transnational feminist theories, this study uses a critical perspective to identify and explore possible power imbalances and explores the following key issues: Funding sustainability, accountability, collaboration, and cooperation between local and international women’s rights NGOs, and finally, local ownership. The inquiry builds upon empirical data from in-dept interviews with local and international women’s rights NGOs working in Kathmandu and the limited available secondarysources on the situation in Nepal. The findings point to clear power asymmetries, with local NGOs having to conform to Western standards in project design, implementation, reporting and monitoring, leaving limited space for flexibility or considering the situation on the ground. Nonetheless, this study also concludes that NGOs are not under the complete influence of their international donors, as suggested by some literature, but rather use the available space to maneuver and push their cause. Finally, based on the insights of this research and considering new initiatives that attempt to transcend the current donor-recipient power dynamics, this study identifies a handful of potential principles to guide more equitable relations between women’s rights NGOs and donors.

Il coordinamento dell’aiuto pubblico allo sviluppo, evocato negli ultimi anni da più parti come la soluzione alla deludente efficacia degli aiuti è in realtà un argomento che nasce quasi contemporaneamente alle prime organizzazioni internazionali dedicate allo sviluppo . La funzione ambivalente delle Nazioni Unite, agente di mediazione diplomatica da un lato (mediazione tra stati e tra gruppi di potere all’interno dello stesso stato), e agente di sviluppo dall’altro, garantisce all’organizzazione un ruolo preminente nel coordinamento degli aiuti nei contesti di guerra e di post-conflitto. E’ questa stessa ambivalenza che impone all’organizzazione un rapporto ufficiale con i territori sottosviluppati, incardinato nella relazione con i governi centrali degli stati. La critica radicale all’aiuto pubblico allo sviluppo individua tutte le distorsioni politiche ed economiche legate all’afflusso dei fondi, sottolineandone le aggravanti possibili laddove esista una discrasia tra gli obiettivi di sviluppo delle Nazioni Unite e quelli dell’élite che occupa le posizioni apicali dello stato. Questa ricerca attraverso un’analisi storica del contesto, mette in luce l’interazione tra il sistema degli aiuti e il sistema-paese in Tajikistan dall’ingresso delle organizzazioni ai giorni nostri. L’analisi dimostra infine che la struttura politico-economica radicata sul territorio, pur conservando i tratti di uno “stato predatorio” (tratti non alleviati bensì aggravati dalle distorsioni legate all’afflusso dei fondi per lo sviluppo), sfugge in realtà alla definizione stessa di “Stato”. Questo dato rivela una debolezza insita nell’approccio metodologico del sistema degli aiuti che si fonda proprio sull’archetipo dello “Stato”. / The Official Development Assistance (ODA) coordination has been recently launched as a genuine mean to increase aid effectiveness. Actually, the “aid coordination” paradigm was born almost contemporaneously to the first international organizations dedicated to “development”. The ambivalent function of the United Nation that acts both as an agent of diplomatic mediation (among states and among different lobbies within the borders of the same state), and as a development agent, guarantees to United Nations a preeminent role in the field of aid coordination in conflict and post-conflict contexts. It’s this real ambivalence that compels the United Nations to deal with development countries through official relations with the central governments. The radical critique to development aid shows different political and economic distortions related to the incidence of foreign funds. At the same time, it underlines that wherever the goals of the official governments diverge from the development goals of the aid community these distortions might be even more burdensome for the country. This research, through an historical analysis, draws attention on the interaction among the development industry and the country-system in Tajikistan from the arrival of the international organizations to our days. The analysis demonstrates that the political and economic structure of the country, while maintaining the features of a “predatory state” (features which are not alleviated but worsened by the distortions brought about by the aid industry), simply do not comply with the definition of a “State”. This result highlights an innate weakness of the aid industry methodological approach that is in fact, fully based on the political archetype of the “State”.