EC Afghanistan CSO-LA

The overall objective of the action focuses on strengthening the participation of whole communities in planning local development, monitoring and improving local services, and increasing the responsiveness of local power-holders. The proposed action will seek to build holistic capacity in responsive local governance, both broadly (related to a range of projects and services), and also narrowly, taking up one critical state-provided service (education) in order to make an intensive investment in improving the governance of a particular sector. The action will also seek to explicitly address the current gap between women and men in local governance and civil society. Furthermore, whilst the proposed action will focus primarily on improving community-based governance processes, it will also contribute to a more vertically integrated system of local governance by building linkages to district-level decision-makers.