Creative Capacity Development: Learning to Adapt in Development Practice

The development community seems constantly and restlessly in search of a singular approach that will “solve” poverty, unveiling new buzzwords every few years only to toss them aside. Author Jenny Pearson argues that the fundamental flaw with this system is that each new approach fails to break out of the underlying technocratic and specialized paradigm in development work. As Director of Cambodia’s leading capacity-building NGO, VBNK, Pearson explains how creative risks and an innovative spirit can revive development work, especially in post-conflict settings.

Creative Capacity Development provides an unflinching appraisal of the author’s own assumptions and setbacks as she established VBNK and explains how a dynamic and open learning process allowed the organization to move beyond them. Pearson’s account, drawn with insights from cultural studies, mental health practice, and the arts, will guide other practitioners in broadening their own understanding of capacity-building. The book reveals that development work, far from requiring a singular solution, is and should be a never-ending process.

Jenny Pearson has been living and working in Cambodia for more than a decade. She got Cambodian citizenship in 2007. In 1997, with support of the seven INGOs, she founded a capacity building NGO, which known as VBNK, and she has been its Director ever since.