MAKING STAKEHOLDER PARTICIPATION HAPPEN:
CASE STUDY EXERCISE
SCENARIO A – EMERGENCY RAPID ASSESSMENT
In country X, an earthquake measuring 7.2 magnitude on the Richter Scale shook the A region with the
epicentre at J city. Latest reports from CNN and the local media say that the earthquake killed 450 people,
injured more than 2,500, and caused more than 100 multi-storey buildings to collapse, trapping hundreds,
perhaps thousands, of people. Water and sewage and electrical systems throughout the city are damaged.
The number of fatalities is expected to rise. J city has a population of 300,000, with another 200,000 in
slums and surrounding villages. There are two religious-ethnic groups in this region, the Ipsy and the Upsy.
While they have long co-existed harmoniously, there have always been tensions at the national level, as the
majority Upsy are perceived to dominate the government administrative positions unfairly. Local authorities
are paralysed with district offices destroyed and most of their staff personally affected. The same is true of
religious institutions in the area, except for those in villages on the edges of the affected area. Only one
other international organisation has ever had much presence in the area. Your organisation has had
dealings with the district in question in a wider programme of support to decentralisation. Many big donors
are interested in providing funding and asking your organisation what it plans to do. Your organisation wants
to support and be involved in an emergency rapid assessment to define what it can do to help and to ensure
that the interests of children and women are sufficiently addressed. Your office has not done anything to
prepare for undertaking an emergency rapid assessment.
SCENARIO B – PREPAREDNESS PLANNING FOR EMERGENCY RAPID
ASSESSMENT
You are working in country A, which is becoming increasingly unstable as historic ethnic tensions between X
and Y groups heat up, spurred on by their conflicts in a neighbouring country. District and local structures
tend to be dominated by the X ethnic group. The Y ethnic group is often represented by its local religious
institutions and a few national NGOs. As part of its emergency preparedness activities, your organisation
wants to develop an emergency rapid assessment capacity to assess the situation of children and women in
the event of any humanitarian crisis, including develop methodology and tools, train staff for assessment
teams, train translators, establish a format for assessment reports and establish a mechanism for finalising
and disseminating assessment reports when done. Your organisation is very interested in doing this with
the involvement of relevant actors to ensure that the results of assessments can be used widely by national
and international organisations in defining humanitarian response.
SCENARIO C – PROGRAMME MONITORING
You are working in country C. You are a group of programme managers from one international organisation,
the national ministry of education and two districts that have worked on a joint pilot strategy to increase girls’
education. The strategy was based on an assessment of key constraints in the two districts, chosen as
representative of the bottom quarter of districts in terms of indicators for girls in education. It combined
several tested measures considered appropriate to the context, including: incentives for enrolment and
attendance (school meals, girls’ scholarships, etc.); improvements to facilities available in schools (e.g. water
supply, sanitation, play and recreational facilities, etc.); provision of “escorts” to improve safety for the
journey to school; provision of water supply and community childcare to help release girls to enrol and attend
school; mobile schools for remote rural populations; and public pronouncements by local leaders to promote
enrolment and attendance. Information systems were already established in schools and village councils,
both reporting to districts and various relevant ministries. The existing monitoring system covers all of the
basic enrolment and attendance indicators disaggregated by sex at the level of each school and so you will
be able to monitor impact. In order to monitor the implementation of the strategy, however, you will need to
tweak the existing systems, adding a few additional indicators. You want a system that will ultimately allow
UNICEF M&E Training Resource Module 3.2.1
Making stakeholder participation happen 1/2
village councils and districts and eventually the ministry to monitor progress, to quickly identify problems
blocking implementation and address them, or at least draw attention to those who can address them.
SCENARIO D – FORMATIVE PROGRAMME EVALUATION
You are working in country D, which is fairly stable but facing a severe, but up until now under-publicised
HIV/AIDS crisis. The previous government leadership has been unwilling to use mass media to address the
situation. You are the programme managers for a pilot programme supported by one international
organisation and two major national NGOs involving youth in HIV/AIDS education through theatre and peer
education. The programme has been under way for a year and a half across two districts and has gained
the attention of some potential donors because of the involvement of youth ( through the schools). There is
some tension between NGOs and the District’s education officials who felt bypassed at some stages of the
project though District education and health officials are generally committed to doing something to address
what they see as a burgeoning HIV/AIDS crisis. The purpose of the evaluation, as defined by your
organisation, is to refine the design of the pilot approach and assess its replicability at a national level.
YOUR TASK
The key steps in carrying out your M/E activity are provided on your VIPP board as a reference. Each step
entails a number of tasks (see Carrying out M&E activities – key steps). The steps are not perfectly sequential
— some overlap.
Identify which of the stakeholders listed below you would choose to help carry out the M/E activity described.
Specifically, try to identify:
 In what step and which specific tasks would you try to involve the key stakeholders?
 In what role? Decision-maker, provider of validation, doer, etc.
 What mechanisms, fora, techniques, methods would you use, particularly where involving stakeholders will
not be a simple meeting with equal partners?
Consider the following stakeholders






Other international organisations (specify if useful)
National level government ministries
District authorities
Community leaders (specify if useful)
Members of the communities
Children
Hint: you may find it easiest to start with the step “sharing and using M&E results” in order to identify the key
users and the influencers of that use. You then might move to the step “collecting evidence”, trying to define
from whom will you collect data, who will need to be involved in actual data collection and who needs to be
involved to facilitate all this happening. The stakeholders whom you choose to involve in these two key steps
will often shape which stakeholders need to be involved at other steps in the process.
Use the VIPP board provided to present your group’s work. Be ready to present the rationale for your
choices.
UNICEF M&E Training Resource Module 3.2.1
Making stakeholder participation happen 2/2