Setor social

Na Índia, a grande preocupação na área educacional é fazer com que pelo menos as 32 milhões de crianças que se calcula estarem fora das escolas tenham acesso à Educação Elementar Universal. O apoio à descentralização dos serviços públicos é generalizado, devido aos benefícios em termos de igualdade e eficiência que estão associados a essa estratégia. Em particular, a descentralização é vista como algo que facilita a sintonia dos serviços com a preferência local, aumentando assim as chances de serem alcançados os objetivos propostos.

O modo como as organizações e associações podem trabalhar em conjunto por um determinado período a fim de desenvolver novas normas e práticas que garantam a sustentação de iniciativas de desenvolvimento é um problema permanente.

Urban and industrial growth in developing countries makes the provision of adequate waste management services vital. Public sector-private sector partnerships (the authors describe potential structures for these partnerships) offer one way to manage this provision.

A Tailândia vivencia atualmente o fenômeno pouco familiar de receber empréstimos em dinheiro através de organizações de ajuda e agências multilaterais, tais como o Banco Mundial e o Banco de Desenvolvimento Asiático, para programas de desenvolvimento doméstico. Durante os anos de boom econômico, o país não buscou nem solicitou tal ajuda, uma vez que seu desenvolvimento estrutural era financiado pelo crescimento que os países do sudeste asiático viam como garantido.

This Practical note describes the work of the Southall Black Sisters, a group, based in London, England, which provides a variety of assistance to, mainly Asian, women who have been victims of domestic violence and abuse. The author discusses how the UK legal system fails to help some of these women, as well as how patriarchal Asian social structures enable this abuse to go unchecked and unreported.

The Assuit Burns Project (ABP) is a small Egyptian NGO working to help burns victims. The author describes the work of the Project, setting out its various capacities, and criticises funders' and donors' over-emphasis on preventative medicine at the expense of this type of curative work. Burns victims can become economic and social outcasts, and this impacts on development, and equity (particularly gender equity). This article also appears in the Development in Practice Reader Development and Management.

Using the example of a project in Sheffield intended to promote user-involvement and participation in planning healthcare services, the author criticises the failure of the project to actually provide any forum for user-participation. The structures used to set up these partnerships are often too prescriptive, he argues, setting out a framework in which consultation may take place, and leaving no room for legitimate local interests which may not fit this framework. This article also appears in the Development in Practice Reader Development and Management.

An examination in presented of a pilot project to strengthen Primary Health Care (PHC) in Sheikhupura District, which was initiated by the Department of Health, Punjab, Pakistan. The project seeks to create a viable PHC model, providing accessible and sustainable services. Community Development Workshops for Village Health Committees (VHCs) to promote local participation are being held, and several experiences have been gained, from conceptual shifts to implementation issues.

The author, formerly Director of the Clearinghouse Project, describes the aims, achievements and underlying philosophy of the Project, which was set up in 1979 by the American Public Health Association (funded by USAID) to improve access to information for health-practitioners in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

SatelLife was set up by the organisation International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) in 1985, with the aim of providing a forum for the involvement of medical colleagues in the South in discussion of health and peace issues. SatelLife set up and run a satellite linking service (HealthNet) providing email and a medical information network for organisations and communities world-wide, integrating people working in countries with limited communications infrastructure into the debate. The author provides an overview of the system and the ethos behind it.