RINGO Connect: March Highlights

On the last Wednes­day of every month, the RINGO Con­nect meet­ing holds a space for com­mu­ni­ty solu­tion­ing. We invite par­tic­i­pants to share a chal­lenge and draw on the exper­tise and expe­ri­ence from with­in the group to address this issue.

“At the heart of this move­ment [to re-imag­ine glob­al civ­il soci­ety] are the month­ly RINGO Con­nect meet­ings. These are not for­mal con­fer­ences. They are work­ing spaces. Prac­ti­tion­ers bring real dilem­mas — cli­mate jus­tice, gov­er­nance reform, dias­po­ra col­lab­o­ra­tion — and the group engages in what they call ‘com­mu­ni­ty solu­tion­ing’. Silos break down. Pat­terns emerge. Sol­i­dar­i­ty deep­ens.” Charles Kojo Vandy­ck (WACSI / RINGO)

On 25th March 2026, we wel­comed mem­bers of the RINGO com­mu­ni­ty from across glob­al civ­il soci­ety, includ­ing net­works, move­ments, local and nation­al CSOs, INGOs, fun­ders, inter­me­di­aries, aca­d­e­mics and more. Themes of trust, pow­er and voice ran through all the break­out dis­cus­sions. RINGO Con­nect is not a space for lamen­ta­tion; instead, par­tic­i­pants shared prac­ti­cal insights and ideas on how we can col­lec­tive­ly co-cre­ate a more just and equi­table glob­al civ­il soci­ety.

Collective temperature check

To start the meet­ing, we ran our month­ly poll which asks three ques­tions about how you feel things are shift­ing across our sec­tor at the begin­ning of every RINGO Con­nect meet­ing. Over the months, we hope to notice pat­terns about whether hope is ris­ing or falling; whether trust and sol­i­dar­i­ty are strength­en­ing; and whether peo­ple are try­ing out new ways of work­ing. Here are the results for Feb­ru­ary and March:

Thematic Discussions

Par­tic­i­pants chose to join dis­cus­sions focussed on the fol­low­ing themes:

Future Roles of INGOs

A key reflec­tion by this group is that while there is no short­age of con­ver­sa­tion around the future of INGOs, many feel there are lim­it­ed oppor­tu­ni­ties to trans­late ideas into prac­tice. Under­pin­ning these dis­cus­sions was a sense of uncer­tain­ty about the cur­rent role and influ­ence of INGOs, with some ques­tion­ing whether they still hold the same pow­er with­in the sys­tem. To address these chal­lenges, we sug­gest­ed start­ing small, pri­ori­tis­ing lis­ten­ing and com­mit­ting to inter­nal change. We recog­nised the val­ue in learn­ing through exper­i­men­ta­tion, includ­ing embrac­ing fail­ure as part of the process, and being more con­scious of organ­i­sa­tion­al posi­tion­al­i­ty. 

Fund­ing / Resource Flows

This group high­light­ed that fund­ing chal­lenges are deeply struc­tur­al, not just finan­cial. Access to resources remains unequal, with rur­al and mar­gin­alised com­mu­ni­ties often exclud­ed, while restric­tive fund­ing con­di­tions lim­it flex­i­bil­i­ty and respon­sive­ness. A key issue is the dis­con­nect between fun­ders and com­mu­ni­ty real­i­ties, where lived expe­ri­ences and local­ly defined pri­or­i­ties are not ful­ly under­stood or reflect­ed in fund­ing deci­sions. To address this, we empha­sised the need for stronger com­mu­ni­ca­tion, more inclu­sive engage­ment and greater trans­paren­cy. Inno­v­a­tive and flex­i­ble report­ing for­mats (such as video, audio and dia­logue) can help bridge under­stand­ing, while direct inter­ac­tion between fun­ders and com­mu­ni­ties can lead to more respon­sive sup­port. At the same time, fun­ders must be clear­er about the legal and com­pli­ance require­ments they oper­ate under, as these often cre­ate ten­sions with local­ly-led approach­es.

Cli­mate and Con­ser­va­tion

This group reflect­ed that civ­il soci­ety is often not ready to take advan­tage of oppor­tu­ni­ties emerg­ing in the cli­mate sec­tor, such as cli­mate finance, and local actors are being left behind or crowd­ed out by the pri­vate sec­tor. We sug­gest­ed pur­su­ing rad­i­cal and proac­tive col­lab­o­ra­tion to ensure that local actors claim space and have a col­lec­tive voice at the table where deci­sions are made. This would require stronger mobil­i­sa­tion from local groups and an open­ness from big­ger INGOs to work with local actors.

Strength­en­ing Col­lab­o­ra­tion between the Glob­al Com­mu­ni­ty

Empa­thy was the com­mon thread bridg­ing the issues that were dis­cussed in this group. We high­light­ed the impor­tance of build­ing trust and real­ly lis­ten­ing in order to explore what unites us and find mean­ing­ful ways to col­lab­o­rate. We also reflect­ed how there is some­times a lack of aware­ness around what ‘dias­po­ra’ means.

Pow­er and Voice

This group dis­cussed chal­lenges around fundrais­ing which enhance the pow­er imbal­ance, includ­ing exces­sive donor require­ments and how you often need con­nec­tions to gain access to fun­ders. Trust was also high­light­ed as key in this group, and how capac­i­ty build­ing to strength­en an organisation’s abil­i­ty to ‘friendraise’ before they fundraise could increase nego­ti­at­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties and open the door to part­ner­ships.

Next RINGO Connect: Are our efforts to shift power regressing? Let’s talk about it…

In April 2026, we would like to do some­thing a lit­tle dif­fer­ent from our usu­al meet­ings. We recog­nise that across glob­al civ­il soci­ety we are con­tin­u­ing to expe­ri­ence unprece­dent­ed tur­moil — and in the face of pop­ulist pol­i­tics and dras­tic cuts to fund­ing for inter­na­tion­al devel­op­ment across the board, many of our efforts to shift pow­er seem to be regress­ing while INGOs are oper­at­ing in sur­vival mode. So we want to cre­ate a space to dis­cuss what this means for our local­ly-led agen­das. How do we keep shift­ing the pow­er in this moment of regres­sion, when the sys­tem seems to be push­ing back? We’d like to invite the INGO com­mu­ni­ty to share some of the strug­gles and con­tra­dic­tions they are going through, and col­lec­tive­ly explore how this impacts the sys­tem — and what we can do to strength­en and sup­port each oth­er’s efforts.

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