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Here’s a challenge.  Type “theory of change template” into your favourite search engine, stare at your screen for five minutes and come away without a headache.  What comes up is a multitude of multiform flow charts with arrows and links and a whole technicolor set of slides.

Then, as I have over the past couple of days, you could call up some articles on theories of change. On the one hand you will find some over-blown eulogies to how you can change your organization’s effectiveness by adopting a particular approach to theories of change,  complete with those overwhelming templates. And on the other you will find the rather banal:  “An example of a theory of change is: “If we do A, then B will happen because of C.”   

In between these extremes there are quite sensible articles setting out the process of being clear about what any project wants to achieve, the sequence of steps needed, and the need to assess how it’s going, what needs fixing, and what lessons can be learnt.  Usually this is called planning.

I do strongly believe that organisations should be clear about their vision and mission, should develop strategies and implementation plans and review progress at regular intervals. It’s probably a good idea to be able to present all of this in graphic form.  This is what I know as leadership and management.

I have no problem with those who dispense development finance and philanthropy requiring the organisations they support to have effective planning, management, and monitoring and evaluation processes in place.   What puzzles and concerns me is the insistence that this be done under the heading of being “a theory of change.”

This is what I think, drawing on my decades of involvement in the field.

The essential narrative of the development sector is that the “We are changing the world.” The exact terminology goes through various fashions.  It started with “meeting basic needs” and evolved into “solving the world’s most difficult problems.”  Now it tends to be “achieving the SDGs” which is just another way of meeting basic needs.

The problem is that for all the effort, there is precious little to show for it, if changing the world is the goal.  In this context, it is somewhat comforting to be able to say: “Well here, in this project, we said we would change something, and we did, or at least we are making some progress.”

Before we articulate a theory of change, we need to take a clear eyed view of what needs changing, and how we might change it?

As human(e)  beings, we would like to see a world in which the extremes of poverty and inequality are banished; in which all people have an opportunity to live safe, healthy and fulfilling lives on Kate Raworth’s Doughnut, where the needs of all are met within planetary boundaries and where, by and large, there is mutual respect from all people for all people.

If that is our modest utopia, then, in truth, we already inhabit a truly dystopian reality.

• Inequality is rising precipitously between and within nations; globally, poverty levels are on the rise almost everywhere
• The climate catastrophe is already here for hundreds of millions of (mainly poor) people and getting worse
• The historical plague of racism is in an ascendant and particular toxic phase globally
• Cutting across all three of the above is the almost universal reality of patriarchy and the truth that whatever crisis you choose, women are at the sharp end of it.

Each of the above is a crisis on its own, with its own distinguishable features. They also intersect and reinforce each other and the consequences of each is layered over the consequences of the others.

And, in the end, they all reflect the overwhelming power of a global economic and political elite and the benefits that accrue from the way the world is ordered.

“Growth” (sometimes “inclusive growth”) is posited as the only logical solution to poverty and inequality.  But the more we grow, the greater the inequality, the more planetary boundaries are ruptured and the worse the plight of the poor and especially poor women at the “coal face” of climate change.   This is so transparently obvious that it takes billions of lobbyist dollars and the politicians who benefit to keep us believing anything else.  The racism that justified slavery and colonialism, (remember Kipling’s “White man’s burden”)  remains ever present in the boardroom and on the street around the world, and practically wherever you look around the globe, women are subject to violence, abuse and discrimination.

These ills manifest themselves in many different ways in different localities. Whether it is drought and starvation in Madagascar and parts of east Africa, or the destruction of indigenous livelihoods in the jungles of Latin America and Asia, whether it is the pittance earned by cocoa farmers in West  Africa or single mothers working three jobs in the US just to survive, or the refusal by western governments and the pharmaceutical companies to license the generic production of COVID 19 vaccines, you will find that power is being wielded in the interests of wealthy corporations and their investors, and the politicians who support them.  And the colonial lens and patriarchy are always either overt, or just below the surface.

If this is true, then we need only one theory of change:  “Power is wielded to benefit the rich and the powerful.  If you want to change the world then your task is to help to shift power from the powerful to those who have the least power”.

This in turn has deep implications.

• You need to be willing to give up your power, as a man, or an investor or an “expert”.  You don’t know what the most marginalized people need.  They do.  If you want to be helpful, find out, and work with them, and amplify their voices rather than speaking on their behalf.
• It must always be a priority to work with others who are genuinely committed to changing the balance of power.  This means working with community structures, political movements, trade unions – or any other grouping challenging the dominance of the rich and powerful.  Power is wielded globally, and it needs a global movement to challenge it.
• You may be engaged in a “project” with its own key success indicators.  But if you cannot also show how it has helped to challenge and shift power, then you should not claim to be addressing the world’s intractable problems.  You may be doing good things for some people (and that is admirable)  but you don’t need a theory of change for that.
• No evaluation is complete unless it addresses the question: did we contribute to changing the power relations? How? Are we sure? How could we do it better next time?
• In every aspect of our lives “first, do no harm” must be a key principle.  It means being sure that whatever else we did, we did not undermine the power, dignity or organisations of those with least power.  Because if you did undermine those with the least power, then you did no good, and contributed to the consolidation of the power of those in charge of the global political economy.

The theory is quite simple.  But it is an endless task to improve our understanding of where and how the power of the elite is embedded in all the institutions of society and our role in perpetuating or helping to change it.  We do this not by inventing a theory of change for each new undertaking, but by asking: how does this undertaking embody the only theory of change we need?