Guiding Principles of the Unitarian Universalist Holdeen India Program
- Focus on those with the least power and fewest resources—the most excluded, marginalized and oppressed, especially dalits and tribals, with special emphasis on dalit and tribal women.
- Seek out leaders and groups that strengthen collective bargaining power, as well as institutions and movements through which these groups can improve their lives and conditions.
- Develop long-term partnerships with democratically governed organizations whose members own and control their institutions, resources and programs, advocate on their own behalf, challenge unequal power relations and unjust social conditions, demand their rights and share of development, influence policies in favor of the poorest, hold the government accountable, and no longer play the part of the ruled.
- Support collaborative, networking and mutually reinforcing activities in order to have a more broad-based impact on policies and other organizations. Each activity should strengthen the power of the organization, advance its issues and vision, and strengthen through networking the work of other like-minded organizations.
- Provide whatever support the groups require to strengthen their organizations and advance their issues, acting as a true collaborator in such a way that the Indian partners, not the Unitarian Universalist Holdeen India Program, define the work to be done and the means to do it; provide support as long as the organizations and their work continue to grow.
- Complement funding with personal and institutional support through strategic planning, advocacy, linkages, and other means; non-funding support should be at least as important as grants.
- Keep administrative bureaucracy to a minimum in both application and implementation phases, though partners should be expected to submit satisfactory financial and program reports on a regular basis.
Last updated on Thursday, June 4, 2009.
