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self-correcting programs and projects with built-in cycles of decision-making between more and less sustainable alternatives: more not less efficiency, more participatory less top-down, more organic less chemical, more local less imported, more solar less diesel, more not fewer profits, closer not farther, more communication, more transparent, more women and girls...
- projects in partnership with movements that last beyond the project period, and reach out beyond the project zone.
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participatory capacity building activities grounded in local strengths, as determined through simple organizational design methods, such as appropriate forms of participatory appraisal and goal setting, including appreciative Inquiry (AI), as well as appropriate training in management, technologies, leadership, conflict resolution etc
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initiatives that work not just in communities, but primarily in networks of communities with their own leadership structures and dynamics
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project and program opportunities that are announced across networks, and that begin their activities by working first with communities willing to cover their own counterpart participation and operating costs
- headquarters - project relationships that do not envolve micromanagement except during technical assistance and participatory research phases that enable communities to improve their own management capacities and procedures
- constantly working to improve communications and clarify concepts
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decentralized decision-making and training capacity within networks
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large-scale on-task trainings of trainers
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activities that combine training, action research and implementation, for example training in web design during which the trainees create their local government websites, training in Permaculture in which the trainees from different villages complete the creation of a garden in the training village and go home and replicate the garden in their own villages
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cross-cultural immersion learning that engages Senegalase and international volunteers and university students with community members in development work in rural villages and poor urban neighborhoods
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time for processing experience, rigorous evaluation of sustainability indicators based on local and international norms, and writing and sharing research results and lessons learned
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