Participatory Development in Fragile and Conflict-affected Contexts: An Impact Evaluation of Tuungane 1

Community Driven Development (CDD) is a bottom-up model of development that aims to put the people in the driver’s seat. To date, a number of CDD programs have been conducted and evaluated, but the evidence as to its effects remains inconclusive. This report presents findings from a long-term impact evaluation of the Tuungane 1 program, a major CDD program in Eastern Congo, funded by the UK government and implemented by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and CARE International between 2007 and 2011.

The Tuungane 1 program was carried out in 1,250 randomly selected Village Development Committee (VDC) areas, which were grouped into 280 Community Development Committee (CDCs) areas with a targeted beneficiary population of approximately 1,780,000 people in the eastern DRC provinces of Haut Katanga, South Kivu and Tanganyika and Maniema. Tuungane 1 had two components: 1) an intervention at the VDC level that involved $3,000 grants, and subsequently, 2) an intervention at the CDC level that involved $50,000 to $70,000 sub-grants to undertake infrastructure projects such as the construction of schools and hospitals. A core element of Tuungane 1 was a focus on women’s empowerment and on championing the rights and roles of women in collective decisionmaking.