Our Approach
ActionAid exists to end poverty and the injustices that cause it. It is how we pursue this lofty goal that makes us different. All ActionAid work – from direct services provided in the field to the policy solutions we propose in the halls of power – is driven by poor and excluded people we work with around the world.
Our rights-based approach means that we fight to help the people we seekto benefit claim the rights, tools and access they need to put an end to the poverty in their own lives. We provide immediate assistance where it is needed, deliver long-term health care and educational services to give communities the support they need to thrive, and we work in the halls of power to ensure the policies of influential countries and institutions help rather than harm the interests of poor people.
Our rights-based approach also demands that we be accountable to the people we serve and to our supporters. ActionAid’s Accountability, Learning and Planning System(ALPS) creates an annual 360 degree review of our work on the ground and the policy solutions we promote. In addition to identifying practices and policies that really work, ALPS helps us learn from what does not. In addition to ALPS, ActionAid does in-depth reviews of programs through Critical Stories of Change.
ActionAid’s ALPS system underpins our commitment to transparency. Our financial systems, fundraising practices and policy work are conducted with a commitment to transparency. We believe that any supporter and any poor person should be able to examine our work and understand why we spent resources and effort on any given activity. This commitment earned ActionAid the top ranking for transparencyin OneWorld Trust’s Global Accountability Project review of ten large international nonprofits.
Our Philosophy
Poverty matters. It matters to poor people, fighting to feed and care for their families in the face of injustice and want. It matters to our supporters who want a better world for all of humankind. Together with our supporters and with the poor people whose voices direct our work, we are making real change.
We listen to and learn from poor people to identify and help them fulfill their own needs, encouraging them to lobby decision-makers in their own countries, and campaigning and calling for change from those who hold power on the international stage.
Our community-driven approach works. ActionAid’s founding and leadership in the Global Campaign for Education helped 40 million more children into schools in the last eight years. Our work in Ghana nearly doubled women’s participation in the electoral process. In Kenya, we helped in a campaign that resulted in a 35 percent increase in the number of HIV and AIDS patients with access to treatment.
ActionAid works on the ground and in the halls of power to end poverty. In communities in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, our work includes on-the-ground provision of health care, education, food, assistance in the face of natural disasters and conflict, and developing capacity of civil society to effect change in the countries where we work.
Our work concentrates on women’s rights, education, food rights, conflicts and emergencies, HIV & AIDS, and the right to fair and just governance. We recognize that women’s rights must be addressed if we are committed to ending poverty and the injustices that cause it. We are leading an international campaign to end violence against women and we fight daily – nationally, internationally and at the communitylevel –for women’s rights to land, inheritance and a living wage.
Our emergencies work responds to major disasters throughout Africa and Asia, while continuing recovery efforts in Tsunami-affected areas and the site in Pakistan devastated by an earthquake two years ago. We also help communities prepare for disasters and to develop their resiliency to flood, droughts, and other natural disasters.
Poverty is our problem. But we are hopeful. Our optimism comes from the people we work with every day. They are making change in spite of the odds they face. They are an inspiration. Together, we will end poverty once and for all.
ActionAid’s Approach in the United States
ActionAid works with coalitions of poor and excluded people from around the world, bringing their perspectives to bear on US policies that affect developing countries. Our office builds international solidarity with counterparts in the global south, challenging governments and institutions like the World Bank and the United Nations to better respond to the half of the world’s population that lives on less than two dollars a day.
ActionAid helps bridge the gap between activist networks and organizations in the developing world and their counterparts in the United States. We bring their voices into the American political arena and strengthen domestic support for changes in development policy.
To address these core themes, ActionAid provides solid research, targeted outreach, and timely advocacy activities, both to inform the US public and to build solidarity with poor and excluded people seeking to exercise their rights and assume greater control over their lives.
Creating Opportunities for Americans to Support Effective Anti-Poverty Work
ActionAid’s work with communities and social movements has long been recognized for its innovative and effective rights-based approach that puts partnership with poor and excluded people right at the center of our work. The combination of credibility, innovation and impact makes ActionAid an excellent partner for Americans looking for ways to fight poverty.
You can support our policy change work in the United States and invest in ActionAid’s anti-poverty programs across the developing world. Join us as we generate new channels for fighting poverty and securing human rights.
