Dr Marlie Holtzhausen writes from Pretoria, South Africa. She is a postdoctoral fellow in the Centre for Mediation in Africa at the University of Pretoria, and an embedded researcher for the James 1:27 Trust.
South Africa’s high level of inequalities, poverties, and unemployment is difficult to process. We are already in the third decade of democracy yet confronted with a poverty rate of approximately 55% and a 34% unemployment rate. As a Political Studies student, I have often felt that something is missing in the debates on understanding and addressing these development challenges. We need tools to measure, manage and keep each other more accountable in order to meaningfully address these staggering numbers.
With the above continuously on my mind, I started volunteering at a nongovernmental organisation (NGO) in 2015. In the following two years, I was introduced to a development model that focuses on the holistic care of households and especially children who are in particularly precarious situations due to the lack of resources. This organisation provides support for food and nutrition, shelter, and education, as well as coaching, emotional, psychological, spiritual, and other support. The organisation introduced me to Relational Thinking and the Relational Proximity Framework (RPF) since they were looking for better ways to do holistic care and manage it with greater intentionality.
We used Relational Thinking and the RPF to measure the relationships in the NGO. The aim was to see whether a relational tool can help fill in some gaps that are missing in development models to ensure greater sustainability of resources and care. The study found that development is a circular, “messy” and often unpredictable process where belonging, pain, “family”, forgiveness and learning in an intricate, embedded network of relationships are valued beyond material resources. Finding solutions to development problems such as inequality, poverty, and unemployment seem to require philosophies, measurements, and practices that are not currently considered in development studies.
With these insights, and having received SSRC funding with a colleague at the university for research which focuses on Covid-19, we decided to build on the above research by testing the RPF on two additional development organisations in South Africa who felt that they were relationally “in tune” during the peak of the pandemic crisis. We wanted to further explore the significance of relationships for development interventions during a crisis. One of the organisations we selected has ongoing programmes to support homeless people, as well as education, skills and training, and other centres. The other organisation provides resource support to a few households in close proximity to their personal network as a group. Both organisations received an increase in resources during Covid-19 strict lockdowns and extended their reach of care during the peak of the crisis.
We found that “success” for these organisations was not defined by quantifiable measures like funds raised or people helped but by the dignity of the care and aid provided, which is possible thanks to a foundation of strong relationships. Based on these relational indicators, the study found that one of the central reasons why these organisations have been able to respond well to the crisis seems to be because of the relationships within the organisation and with recipients of their interventions. The findings pointed to the importance of the quality of relationships between people in ensuring effective responsiveness during a crisis. Both organisations emphasised that the amount of time and investment into the relationships have helped in developing trust, becoming increasingly vulnerable through open and difficult conversations, being accountable to each other, and protecting the dignity of those in need.
In development studies and practice, a lot of research is going into why certain interventions are sustainable and others not. People-centred approaches to development are increasing in interest, but the nuances of relational dynamics remain under-researched. It seems that the relational dynamics of an organisation may be key to ensuring it is able to adapt, thrive, and meaningfully reach the people most in need.
We are hoping to continue this research on a much larger scale enabled by the work that has already been done on Relational Thinking. This may facilitate deeper understanding of the relationships that bind us together and the development of tools to better manage those relationships in sustainable ways.
The article on the SSRC funded research that was done on the two organisations can be read at https://items.ssrc.org/covid-19-and-the-social-sciences/covid-19-fieldnotes/a-relational-response-to-the-covid-19-crisis-perspectives-from-two-case-studies-in-south-africa/
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