Doing the ‘Donor Dance’: Agency in Unequal NGO Partnerships in Nigeria’s Farmer–Herder Conflict

Abstract

Partnerships between international and local NGOs (INGOs and LNGOs) have often been analysed using principal–agent theory, where INGOs treat LNGOs as implementing agents and control their actions. The paper examines how LNGOs can improve their agency in these relationships to create more equal partnerships and thus greater local ownership. We propose a framework in which LNGOs can draw on material, organizational and ideational sources of power to improve their agency. The framework is applied to a case of a peacebuilding project in Nigeria’s farmer–herder conflict. The project was run by an INGO in partnership with two Nigerian LNGOs. The LNGOs had rather different experiences of the partnership. The paper argues that these are explained by differences in their organizational power and how this power was enhanced by ideational power. Material power mattered, but did not play a central role. The findings show that LNGOs can enhance their positions in partnerships if they have effective internal policies and procedures, local and contextual knowledge, and can frame these strategically.

Introduction

International non-governmental organizations (INGOs) from the Global North regularly partner with local non-governmental organizations (LNGOs) from the Global South in order to implement projects. These partnerships are now common in development and humanitarian assistance, peacebuilding or human rights and democracy promotion, and their benefits can be substantial (INTRAC, 2001): by working with LNGOs, INGOs can foster ownership, improve post-implementation sustainability, develop capacities and empower ‘the local’ (Altahir, 2013). ‘Partnership’ has become buzzword, frequently used by donors and INGOs to signal their prioritization of local needs.

However, research shows that INGO-LNGO partnerships in reality often fall short of ideals. Agency theory has frequently been employed to explain how these partnerships function (Wallace et al., 2007), with INGO principals setting priorities and tightly controlling the actions of their LNGO implementing agents. The consequences of these power imbalances on the effectiveness and sustainability of projects have been well documented (Banks et al., 2015; Krawczyk, 2018), including how they lead to a silencing of local voices and the imposition of Northern solutions (Tortajada, 2016). LNGOs lack resources to engage in large-scale projects independently, and thus accept these unequal situations to ensure their own survival. A key question therefore is how these partnerships can be improved to give LNGOs stronger voices. Contributions to the literature have emphasized that INGOs should actively build the capacities of their LNGO partners (Altahir, 2013), and some have also identified actions that LNGOs themselves can take (Rivera-Santos et al., 2017).

Despite this body of work, there is still an over-emphasis on resources (Dolšak & Prakash, 2022), implying that LNGOs can do little to improve their influence towards INGOs without more money. These resource-based views however cannot explain everything. Even though the literature has acknowledged that LNGOs can be creative (Appe 2007), the strategies they can use to improve their power in partnerships remain under-investigated. The literature also tends to focus on relations between Northern donors and INGOs, neglecting power dynamics between INGOs and LNGOs. There is therefore a gap in our empirical understanding of how LNGOs bargain with and influence their INGO principals.

This paper aims to fill this gap by analysing the various sources of power LNGOs can draw upon to improve their bargaining position in principal–agent type relations. We distinguish three such power sources: material, organizational, and ideational, and argue that LNGOs that possess some combination of these and are able to strategically deploy them can create more ‘equal’ partnerships with INGOs. To examine this empirically, we use a case study of a peacebuilding project in Nigeria’s farmer–herder conflict, run by a large INGO in partnership with two LNGOs. These two LNGOs experienced the partnership very differently, which we explain with differences in their organizational power and how this power was enhanced by strategic deployment of ideational power. Material power mattered, but was not central. The findings contribute to the theoretical debates explaining NGO partnerships using agency theory and resource dependency theory. They show that beyond (financial) resources, LNGOs can use other strategies to improve their bargaining power in partnerships by creating organizational capacities (i.e. the ability to effectively implement projects) and mobilizing knowledge and ideas. This calls for a rethink of resource dependency theory: while we do not dispute that money matters, an excessive focus on it can lead to conceptualizing LNGOs as actors who give up their agency in order to access resources, overlooking more subtle tools they can use to gain influence. Contrary to arguments that attribute the responsibility for fostering more equitable partnerships to INGOs, who may be disincentivized to do so (Schmitz & Mitchell, 2022), these findings demonstrate that LNGOs themselves can drive change, even when operating with limited resources.

The following section reviews the literature on INGO-LNGO relations, followed by a discussion of the analytical framework. The subsequent section provides some notes on methods, succeeded by the presentation of the case study findings. The final section concludes.

NGO Partnerships: a Review of the Literature

Northern INGOs have increasingly seen value in partnering with LNGOs¹ in the past decades due to perceptions around their cost-effectiveness and grassroots connections. Such partnerships also steadily became requirements for the donors of INGOs, and their desirability reflects a ‘well-established consensus’ in the literature (Harrison, 2007). For an inter-organizational relationship to be regarded as an ‘authentic partnership’, it needs to include a ‘joint commitment to long-term interaction, shared responsibility for achievement, reciprocal obligation, equality, mutuality and balance of power’ (Fowler, 2000: 3).

In practice, partnerships between Northern and Southern NGOs are often characterized by inequality and imbalances. Agency theory, coupled with resource dependency theory (Cooley & Ron, 2002; Keck, 2015; O’Brien & Evans, 2017; Wallace et al., 2007) provides important insights on how partnerships work. Principals, such as donors and INGOs, set goals and define projects, and then delegate implementation to LNGOs as agents. As they often lack trust in LNGOs’ ability to implement projects (Redvers, 2015), fear corruption (Olawoore & Kamruzzaman, 2019), and do not have full information about the agent’s actions, principals will implement mechanisms to control the agent (Keck, 2015). These mechanisms can include requirements on governance, financial controls, regular reporting and quantitative indicators in results-based management frameworks (Ashman, 2001). While acting as principals towards an LNGO agent, INGOs themselves can also simultaneously be agents of their funders, leading to ‘aid chains’ with complex systems of control mechanisms (Harrison, 2007; Wallace et al., 2007). These mechanisms impose administrative and financial burdens on LNGOs, and reduce their autonomy and voice (Hearn, 2007).

Resource dependency theory explains why LNGOs accept these disadvantageous relationships. An organization’s success depends on its ability to engage in relationships that allow it to acquire resources (O’Brien & Evans, 2017). The need to obtain resources will impact the organization’s behaviour in ways that prioritize this need, potentially over other organizational goals (Fruttero & Gauri, 2005; Szent-Iványi, 2022). In competitive environments characterized by a scarcity of resources, LNGOs may especially be willing to accept situations where their actions are strictly controlled (Cooley & Ron, 2002), and they will prioritize accountability towards donors over accountability towards other stakeholders (Dolšak & Prakash, 2022).

The need to access resources creates power imbalances and transactional relationships between INGOs and LNGOs (Tortajada, 2016: 3). Their control of resources gives INGOs the power to control LNGO agents. LNGOs have little voice in designing the projects they are tasked with implementing (Hearn, 2007), which then reflect Northern ‘best practices’ instead of solutions based on local knowledge (Green, 2015). This impacts project effectiveness, leading to low local ownership, inappropriate solutions for the needs of communities, and poor post-implementation sustainability (Islam, 2014). For example, Grant et al. (2023) analysed a partnership between NGOs in Timor-Leste active in water and sanitation as well as gender equality. They found that project success hinged on addressing power imbalances and ensuring that local knowledge and leadership were at the centre. Without these, partnership is little more than ‘a Northern-imposed idea [aimed to] establish a legitimacy for operations in the South’ (Lister, 2000: 3). These arguments imply that the presence of INGOs in the Global South has adverse effects on LNGOs and more broadly on development (Megersa, 2022).

Some in the literature however dispute this overwhelmingly negative assessment of NGO partnerships. Authors have drawn attention to how INGOs differ in their partnership practices, making it difficult to draw generalizations (Elbers & Schulpen, 2013). Others have argued that even partnerships with mostly negative processes can provide benefits for LNGOs such as through organizational learning (Corbin et al., 2013). Furthermore, Harrison (2007) questions whether organizations should indeed be expected to meet the requirements of a normative and vague concept like partnership, and argues for acknowledging that inter-organizational contestation can bring benefits to a project.

The literature tends to highlight the responsibility of INGOs, as the stronger partners, in creating more equal relationships (Wright, 2011). Building LNGO capacities, ensuring their access to resources for continued operations, or creating frameworks which detail responsibilities have all been put forward as solutions (Altahir, 2013). For example, Dijkzeul (2021) showed how Caritas Germany developed long-term partnerships with its Ugandan LNGO partners, building trust and implementation capacities to improve food security. A significant strand in the literature however disputes the value of such capacity building, questioning the motivations of INGOs. Due to the principal–agent logic outlined above and perceptions around their own ‘superior’ expertise and knowledge, INGOs may be more interested in maintaining control (Eade, 2007; Schmitz & Mitchell, 2022). While they may support the capacities of long-term partners, as it makes working together more efficient (Lewis, 1998), they will often focus these efforts on issues which matter for project implementation, such as improving financial expertise. Empowering LNGOs by giving them a greater voice in priority setting and project design are less emphasized (Humphries et al., 2011), as this would decrease the power of INGOs in the relationship (Eade, 2007). There have been some efforts in the literature to investigate how agents can improve their power and autonomy vis-à-vis principals. These contributions have emphasized how NGOs with ‘dual identities’ can play off multiple principals against each other (Rivera-Santos et al., 2017), or how they can influence donors by setting agendas through advocacy (Nie, 2023; Szent-Iványi, 2022).

Summing up this review, partnerships between international and local NGOs are desirable, but in practice these are unequal, INGOs dominate, and this has detrimental impacts on project effectiveness. While INGOs should build the capacities of their LNGO partners, they are often disincentivized to do so. Nonetheless, there are two gaps. First, there is an over-emphasis on (financial) resources, with resource dependency theory remaining the most popular explanation on why LNGOs accept these situations (Dolšak & Prakash, 2022). Little has been done to investigate the strategies that they can use to improve their power in partnerships. Second, much of the literature focuses on the relations between Northern donors and INGOs. LNGOs are often portrayed as passive actors, stripped of agency, even though there is ample evidence that they can creatively adapt to changing environments (Appe, 2017). There is a clear need for more work ‘lower down’ the aid chain to understand how LNGOs can create agency. This paper contributes to filling these gaps by examining a case of an INGO-LNGO partnership to identify the sources power which enable LNGOs to increase their agency in partnerships.

Analytical Framework

This section provides an analytical framework for explaining the various sources of power LNGOs can draw upon to improve their agency and bargaining position in partnerships characterized by principal–agent relations. We first discuss how we conceptualize power, then present the framework based on this conceptualization.

Power is a key concept in INGO–LNGO relations, and is unequally distributed, with principals being the more powerful actors due to their control of resources. Our understanding of power is based on Bourdieu (1996) who sees it as multifaced and embedded in societal relationships (Harvey et al., 2020). Power can be derived from the possession of economic, social, cultural or symbolic capital. Actors can actively accumulate these forms of capital, and can thus shape the degree of power they wield. The various types of capital are transmutable to a degree, although the combination which can maximize an actor’s power will depend on the specific field (Harvey et al., 2020). We conceptualize three sources of power which LNGOs can draw on to improve their position in partnerships. These map directly on to Bourdieu’s four: material (economic capital), organizational (social capital) and ideational (cultural capital). We incorporate symbolic capital, which Bourdieu sees as sources of authority and legitimacy, into organizational and ideational power. The remainder of this section operationalizes how each of these power sources can help LNGOs improve their positions with INGOs.

Material power relates to the financial resources of LNGOs. As discussed, LNGOs depend on financial resources to survive, and need to compete for funding. This has an impact on their activities, making them more likely to prioritize links with donors instead of their grassroots (Amagoh, 2015; Cooley & Ron, 2002; Paragi, 2021). LNGOs may be incentivized to tolerate unequal relationships if these provide access to resources needed for survival. Conversely, for analytical purposes, this implies that LNGOs with larger and diversified sources of funding have greater scope to negotiate more favourable partnerships. Greater financial security guarantees independence from donors (Batti 2014). LNGOs that are flexible and demonstrate capacity at mobilizing resources locally are also favoured by donors (Makoba, 2002), allowing them to pick among funders. If a project makes up only a small share of an LNGO’s overall budget, then it can credibly threaten to exit an unequal partnership. Therefore, we expect LNGOs with larger budgets and diversified sources of funding, including grassroots funding, to have more power in partnerships with INGOs.

Organizational power comes from LNGOs’ operational structures, processes and networks, and is linked to the concept of ‘professionalization.’ Professionalization, while at times used derisively in the literature (Lewis et al., 2021), implies that LNGOs build organizational attributes which allow them to efficiently carry out their missions. These attributes in turn are sources of power when negotiating partnerships with INGOs. We identify six of these attributes. First, an LNGO should have a clearly defined mission statement. Smaller LNGOs cannot afford to be experts at everything (Amagoh, 2015), and defining a niche guides what expertise is required. Second, an LNGO needs to have strong governance mechanisms (Gourevitch & Lake, 2012), which give it credibility, show its local embeddedness (Mwenja & Lewis, 2009), and improve access to government. Third, the organization needs to have personnel with skills in functional areas, including project management and finance. Fourth, it needs to have well-documented policies guiding its operations (Arhin et al., 2018), such as around staffing, procurement, or performance measurement. Fifth, it needs to be transparent by publishing annual activity and financial reports (Nazuk & Shabbir, 2018), along with regular online communication. Finally, organizational power can be derived from meaningful embeddedness in the communities that the LNGO represents, allowing it to be experientially acquainted with local dynamics and build trust (Awio et al., 2011). We expect LNGOs meeting these six attributes to have greater power in partnerships, as they will be seen as professional and desirable to work with. Such LNGOs can find it easier to get invitations to projects, and can thus afford to exit unequal situations.

The final source of power for LNGOs is ideational. These intangible factors are either associated with what LNGOs know, or broader ideas/ideologies within the development system. In terms of what they know, LNGOs may possess proprietary knowledge or techniques which make their project implementation more effective (Howe et al., 2019). Local contextual knowledge, or ‘minimalist cost-effective’ people-driven approaches, using ‘bottom-up’ methods, have been favoured by donors and INGOs (Makoba, 2002). Knowledge possessed by an LNGO makes it a more attractive partner and confers legitimacy (Harvey et al., 2020). Broader ideologies and narratives in the development system may also help LNGOs, especially if they deploy these strategically when negotiating partnerships (O’Neill et al., 2004). These include narratives around localization or grassroots links, which are seen as desirable in terms of improving project effectiveness. These discourses are specifically about shifting power to Southern partners, which some INGOs claim to embrace (Ismail, 2019: 4), and LNGOs can ‘remind’ them of these rhetorical commitments. Therefore, we expect LNGOs with stronger local knowledge, or the ability to frame narratives and ideas strategically, to have more power in partnerships with INGOs.

LNGOs that can draw on the three sources of power will have stronger bargaining positions with INGOs. This increase in their agency in turn can yield more equal partnership outcomes, allowing a greater degree of influence over decisions. The precise connection between the power sources and greater agency differs between cases, making it an empirical question. Two points however are worth mentioning. First, LNGOs that have access to more than one source of power are likely to experience greater agency than those relying on a single source, as the material, organization and ideational power can reinforce each other. Second, as with Bourdieu’s (1996) types of capital, the three power sources are transmutable. Material power helps build strong organizations. However, organizational power is not an automatic consequence of money, it also requires strategic leadership and time. Organizational power allows the accumulation of knowledge, although innovative ideas can also emerge in small informal organizations.

Methods and Context

A case study of peacebuilding project is used to examine how the three sources of power create agency for LNGOs in partnerships with INGOs. The project selected focused on reducing violence and building peace in communities affected by clashes between herders and farmers in Nigeria, implemented between 2012 and 2016. Its objectives included increasing the capacities of local leaders to resolve conflicts; support resource management across conflict lines; and deliver long-term policy solutions (Document#2). To achieve these objectives, the project provided training in interest-based negotiation for leaders, developed a network of negotiators, supported local development projects (such as community gardens, marketplaces, rice mills) and researched the costs of conflict. The project, worth $5.44 million, was implemented in 19 farming communities in three of Nigeria’s North Central states: Benue, Nasarawa, and Plateau; and Kaduna in the Northwest (Document#2). These communities were selected after a conflict mapping exercise and discussions with local leaders, as they had all experienced violence with itinerant herders, leading to a loss of lives and livelihoods (Document#1). The project was funded by a European donor agency, and was implemented by a partnership of an INGO and two LNGOs (LNGO1 and LNGO2). The INGO was a large Northern organization, with global revenues close to $600 million and a presence in 36 countries in 2022. Their work in Nigeria had focused on humanitarian assistance, peacebuilding, entrepreneurship and the empowerment of youth and women.

Data included project documents and in-depth interviews, carried out in late 2022 and early 2023. Full details about the data collection and analysis process, including ethical issues, can be found in the paper’s online Methodological and Contextual Appendix, which also provides contextual details about Nigeria’s farmer–herder conflict.

Findings from the Case Study

We present our findings in two steps. First, we analyse how the partnership between the INGO and the two LNGOs operated, using insights from agency theory and Fowler’s (2000) authentic partnership. We show that LNGO1 had a very different experience than LNGO2. The subsequent sub-section then uses material, organizational and ideational power to explain these different experiences.

The Nature of the Partnership

The INGO used several mechanisms to control the activities of the two LNGOs, as predicted by agency theory, leading to an unequal partnership. Nonetheless, the experiences of the two LNGOs varied: LNGO1 perceived the partnership to be more authentic than LNGO2. Both LNGOs were seen as implementing agents rather than partners, although they played some role in developing the project. The INGO had frequently implemented projects with local organizations, and saw this as a path to creating ownership and sustainable outcomes (Interview#1), but its staff were clear: ‘We subgrant to [the LNGOS] and they implement’ (Interview#1). In this specific case, when advertising for local partners, the INGO had not yet secured funding, although it had a close relationship with the donor, having received funding from it previously. While the INGO had a clear concept, the fact that it had not yet secured funding allowed LNGO1 and LNGO2 to take part in designing the project, although much of this meant ‘finetuning’ the existing concept. LNGO1 played a stronger role in this, as it was named in the project proposal submitted to the donor, while LNGO2 was not (Document#1). The INGO therefore controlled the project design phase, and it mainly needed the LNGOs to implement its ideas and to show legitimacy towards the donor (Wallace et al., 2007). This is relatively common practice (Green, 2015; Humphries et al., 2011), but it creates an unequal situation from the start of the project. With their input limited to shaping the project only on the technical level, LNGOs are less likely to channel local knowledge into its design, or influence it in other ways. This questions the ‘equality’ criteria of authentic partnership, and also whether a ‘shared responsibility for achievement’ can exist if some partners do not really have ownership.

The lack of ‘the local’ in project design was also shown by the fact that beneficiary communities were not involved either. This is evidenced by interviews with community leaders, with statements like ‘[t]hey already knew what they want to do for us and came here with it and we agreed’ being emblematic (Interview#5; Interview#6; Interview#7). Most communities agreed to participate because they had few other options (Interview#8). Despite not having consulted the communities, the project did rely on traditional institutions and did not seek to upend existing power structures (Ayaji 2014), rather empower these by providing leaders new skills in mediation. Regardless, not involving beneficiary communities in designing a project aimed at solving their problems is a recipe for irrelevant activities and poor post-implementation sustainability (Olawoore & Kamruzzaman, 2019; Wright, 2011). Indeed, many of the communities did not continue with organizing further trainings of their own, and some components in others were either not completed, or never used (Document#3, Interview#5).

The two local organizations were involved heavily in the implementation phase (Interview#1). LNGO1 covered the communities in Plateau and Kaduna, while LNGO 2 covered Benue and Nasarawa. They organized ‘technical clinics’ around natural resource management and conflict prevention, and worked closely with the INGO in collecting monitoring data (Interview#1). The INGO led all other activities (Document#2), reflecting a fairly typical division of labour in similar projects (Lewis, 1998). Despite this, the two LNGOs were not visible to the local communities: community members only referred to the INGO as the project implementer, even though in practice they mostly engaged with LNGO staff (Interview#5; Interview#6; Interview#8). All the project materials and on-site displays during workshops carried only the logo of the INGO. The LNGOs were hardly visible in the project documentation either: they were not mentioned at all in the project’s final evaluation (Document#3), and only very briefly in mid-term reports (Document#2). Not only does this mean that all the credit for the project went to the INGO (Interview#4), it also shows illustrates the mechanisms through which the INGO controlled the actions of the agents, including their messaging.

The INGO also used a number of further administrative and financial controls, as stipulated by agency theory, but the experience of the LNGOs differed on these. LNGO1 argued that it was trusted to carry out implementation, without interference from the INGO, who in many cases tried to work with their policies (Interview#2). LNGO2 on the other hand had a very different experience:

We were micromanaged and told what to do at every stage by the INGO. They told us the vendors to use […], hotels, and transport companies. They arranged for their project person to visit us frequently […] to ensure we followed the project plans. (Interview#3)

LNGO2 argued that INGO personnel were present during almost all the activities it implemented (Interview#4). The INGO also made unilateral decisions on issues impacting the work of LNGO2, such as granting higher expense payments to workshop attendees. While others at LNGO2 were more positive, arguing that the project gave them ‘the opportunity to build [their] staff in the area of peacebuilding and conflict resolution’, they also acknowledged that no matter ‘how well or good you are in doing your work’, you will still be micromanaged (Interview#4). While these types personal interactions between NGOs can be beneficial (Mawdsley et al. 2020), they can also signal a lack of trust and a need to control. The project’s mid-term report (Document#2) also shows that the project was managed in heavily top-down fashion: all decisions are attributed to the INGO and partners are ‘called upon’ to implement these. The funder also remarked in this document that the INGO needed to ensure stronger local involvement. The different experiences with the partnership are further shown by the fact that LNGO1 went on to implement a similar project with the INGO between 2015 and 2019; however, the cooperation between LNGO2 and the INGO did not continue.

The INGO therefore used different controlling mechanisms vis-à-vis its two agents: while LNGO1 was trusted to implement its share of activities, LNGO2 had little autonomy (Hearn, 2007), with the INGO imposing its rules on it (Redvers, 2015). The relationship between the INGO and LNGO2 was perceived by the latter as lacking equality and trust. INGOs often use excessive financial controls in partnerships, partially due to fears of corruption (Olawoore & Kamruzzaman, 2019), which is supported by the level of intervention into LNGO2’s implementation activities. LNGO2 therefore not only had little impact on project design, but also on implementation, as opposed to LNGO1, which seems to have had greater agency. These differences show how principals can discriminate between their agents in terms of the levels of controls they use. We now turn to explaining these differences.

Power and Partnership Outcomes

The experiences of the two LNGOs can be explained by differences in their material, organizational and ideational power.

Material power. Our analytical framework assumes that larger budgets and diversified funding give an LNGO more power and thus greater scope to negotiate more favourable terms in partnerships, as it can credibly threaten to walk away (Batti 2014).

LNGO1 is a broad, membership-based organization, representing around 200 local herder/pastoralist associations. Incorporated in 1999, it has offices in 13 Nigerian states (Document#5). Its director argued that they are very strict in working with INGOs: if an ‘INGO is satisfied with our terms of reference and policies, then we can go into partnership. If not, then we simply say we are not interested’ (Interview#2). Although the organization cannot sustain itself purely from internal resources, it is able to raise these, and has access to volunteers and philanthropists who are willing to contribute (Interview#2). This resonates with the literature: donors prefer organizations which can mobilize resources (Makoba, 2002). LNGO1 has long been a sought-after LNGO for implementing peacebuilding projects, given its grassroots links with herder communities, with an interviewee hinting that the INGO ‘came to Nigeria’ because of their organization (Interview#13). At the time of the interview, LNGO1 was implementing three projects, each expected to last five years, and was being invited to bid for a further two (Interview#2). While the project was therefore clearly important for LNGO1, it also had access to other funding streams and could potentially afford to decline participation in unequal partnerships. Indeed, the director mentioned an example of this, where the donor expected all work to be credited to them, without naming LNGO1. They found this ‘unacceptable’, even though they seem to have accepted this in the case study project. An interviewee further stated that.

[w]e have often walked away from project meetings because of impositions that are contrary to our policies. We don’t accept anything in the name of implementing projects. Some local NGOs will quote small amounts to implement projects […], we don’t undervalue our project costs because we want to be accepted. (Interview#2)

LNGO2 also gives an impression of a strong organization. Founded in 2000 by Nigerian expatriates returning from the United States, it focuses on children and education. In 2012, it had offices in Abuja and four other states, mainly in the North Central region (Document#7). Their 2014 annual report (Document#6) shows a diversified funding structure. Twenty international donors made up the bulk of income (65%), in addition to individual donations, investment income, and funds from the Nigerian government. Further annual reports (Document#4; Document#6; Document#7), show that LNGO2 has been involved in a range of projects, with the case study project only discussed briefly in its 2016 report. The reports also show that the mid-2010s were golden years for LNGO2, with its annual revenues peaking at USD 910,000 in 2014 (Document#6; Interview#4). The share of the case study project is unclear, but given how rarely it is mentioned, it is unlikely to have been substantial. All these imply that LNGO2 met the analytical criteria of having a large and diversified budget, taking part in the project was thus not a financial necessity (Batti 2014).

LNGOs rarely say no to projects though, even in cases where they have little choice but to ‘dance to the tune of the donor’ (Interview#10; Njoku, 2018). LNGOs also need to save money where they can. This broader environmental pressure explains why both LNGOs agreed to participate from a financial perspective, even though they were both financially relatively strong organizations, and the terms of the projects crossed their red lines. It however does not explain their different experiences of the partnership. This shows that resource dependency theory, the dominant framework used to explain these partnerships (Dolšak & Prakash, 2022), is inadequate to explain all experiences.

Organizational power, the second source of power in our framework, assumes that NGOs will have greater power in partnerships if they are more ‘professional’, i.e. define clear missions, have strong governance, professional staff, well-documented policies, transparent activities and community embeddedness.

Both LNGOs are professionalized organizations, which interviewees emphasized. Both had clear visions and mission statements on their websites, strong boards of directors with active members (Gourevitch & Lake, 2012), and sufficient professional staff to implement projects. This includes expertise in human resources, accounting, and project management (Interview#2). In the interviews, LNGO1 especially emphasized the robustness of its policies, especially around project implementation, procurement, and finance. It argued that these were key in ensuring that it had power in partnerships (Interview#2): ‘When you don’t have a policy guiding how you do your thing that is when the international partner will dictate to you what to do. Once you have your own, they look at it and see how they work around it or work with you on it.’ This resonates with Ahrin et al. (2018), who argued that LNGOs which build credibility and capacity through structures and systems find it easier to attract financial resources.

LNGO2 however does not seem to have had the same emphasis on policies. At the time of the project, they had no procurement policy, and so needed to follow that of the INGO (Interview#3). They have partly seen the engagement with the INGO as an exercise that supported their capacity building, and have since developed their processes, especially those around procurement and payments approval (Interview#4). This implies that what LNGO2 saw as micromanagement was driven by the INGO’s need to compensate for its agent’s perceived operational weaknesses and lack of credible capacities (Ahrin et al. 2018).

Despite its strong policies, LNGO1 was not especially transparent towards the broader public. Its website features relatively little information other than basics about the organization’s vision and some limited project details (Document#5). It contains no annual reports, provides no financial information, and does not seem to have been updated since 2016. LNGO1 did however argue in an interview that they are accountable to donors and ‘when we have any visits from [them], we don’t arrange fabricated information from our beneficiaries as other organizations do’ (Interview#2). This lack of transparency can decrease bargaining power (Nazuk & Shabbir, 2018), but LNGO1 seems to have compensated for it by being transparent regarding donor visits and inspections. LNGO2 on the other hand has an informative website, generally up to the standards expected from NGOs (Nazuk & Shabbir, 2018), including annual reports, publications and some project evaluations (Document#8), although financial statements and operational policies were missing.

Interviewees from both LNGOs have been vocal about how they are embedded in their communities (Awio et al., 2011). LNGO1, representing local herder communities, states that they use (Interview#2):

a grassroots approach, where we put more emphasis on our beneficiaries. We give them the power to determine what the project should be, […] because they know it better than we do. […] We look at the nature of the proposal and decide how to come in and what programmes we can implement. With that, we are able to bargain with donors. This […] shows donors that we have the capacity to deliver.

While this quote does not reflect the case study project, where the beneficiaries had no input into project design (Interview#5; Interview#6; Interview#7), it does evidence that LNGO1 understands how being locally embedded supports bargaining with donors. As argued by Awio et al (2011), this type of bottom-up accountability can supplement more formal accountability obligations to funders, on which LNGO1 may have been weaker.

LNGO2 had less of a field presence, although its presence in Benue state was most likely important for the INGO. According to respondents, this overrode its glaring weakness, namely lack of peacebuilding expertise (Interview#3). LNGO2 made similar claims as LNGO1 regarding its community links (Interview#4):

One of our uniqueness is working in partnership with the communities in terms of project design and implementation. […]. Also, another thing that makes us unique [is using] existing community-based structures that the community has, to build their capacity to respond. […] It has been very effective because the community always owns the intervention.

While this may have been true in general, LNGO2 clearly lacked the embeddedness with farmer and herder communities that LNGO1 had. Furthermore, local links are not a panacea, as an interviewee warned: ‘Even in a project where we did the co-creation together, writing the proposal together [with the community], we still didn’t get equal partnership in the project’ (Interview#10).

Differences in organizational power between the two LNGOs provide some explanation regarding their different partnership experiences. While neither organization was ‘perfect’, LNGO2’s bargaining power was likely reduced by a lack of written policies, limited peacebuilding expertise, and lower degrees of community embeddedness (Awio et al., 2011). These deficiencies incentivized the INGO to control its activities more closely. LNGO1 on the other hand heavily emphasized its policies, expertise and embeddedness, which allowed it to build more trust with the INGO.

Ideational power focuses on the knowledge that an organization possesses and its ability to strategically deploy ideas (Howe et al., 2019). In this project, two types of (closely linked) knowledge were important: knowledge about peacebuilding and the farmer–herder conflict, and knowledge of the local contexts. Local knowledge matters especially in Nigeria, given the complex layers of conflict and the many languages spoken. As stated by an interviewee, ‘if an INGO has a project, but they don’t have a good knowledge of the context, you see that the local NGO becomes the driver of the process’ (Interview#11).

LNGO1 possessed both peacebuilding and local knowledge, whereas LNGO2 only had the latter. LNGO1 claimed to be a highly sought-after NGO in the farmer–herder conflict: ‘Our knowledge of the conflict dynamics and local communities is top-notch (Interview #12).’ Or, as stated by another interviewee: ‘We are basically the best, the first, and the last in dealing with conflicts between herders and farmers’ (Interview #13). LNGO1 also highlighted that working with pastoralists can be difficult for organizations which do not possess similar knowledge (Interview#2): ‘For [pastoralists] to accept someone, it takes time […]. We speak their local language, and we always try to blend ourselves whenever we have an intervention, we fuse ourselves into their community.’ This meshes with LNGO1’s local knowledge, where the interviewee specifically emphasized the advantage of having staff members speaking local languages: ‘[donors] are impressed to see that our team speaks the local languages of the communities where the project is being implemented, be it Fulfube, Idoma, Igala, Igbira, and different other languages’ (Interview#2). This strong local and contextual knowledge, and how strategically vocal LNGO1 was about it can further explain why it managed to play a larger role in formulating the project, and why the INGO was less intrusive during its project implementation work. The interviews show that staff were conscious that their knowledge made them a more attractive partner (Harvey et al., 2020).

LNGO2 however had no previous experience in peacebuilding, as their core activities were in the education and vulnerable children. LNGO2 had no peacebuilding specialists, and staff struggled to understand the goals of the project (Interview#3). They did have local experience through their activities in Benue state, but not in Nasarawa where they were also designated as implementers. This, however, did not compensate for their lack of peacebuilding expertise, and they seem to have made little efforts to play up their existing strengths towards the INGO. This partly explains the INGO’s strict controls and micromanagement, as it saw LNGO2 lacking capacities.

Ideational power therefore again put LNGO1 into a stronger position: not only did they possess the relevant knowledge for this project, which LNGO2 lacked, but they were also conscious about this and strategically emphasized it.

Conclusions

Improving partnerships between Northern INGOs and Southern LNGOs is vital for effective and sustainable peacebuilding and development interventions. This paper aimed to explore how LNGOs can increase their agency in partnerships with INGOs, using a case study of a peacebuilding project in Nigeria’s farmer–herder conflict. The case supports perceptions that many Nigerian LNGOs simply do ‘the donor dance’, i.e. accept the terms donors impose on them in exchange for funding. However, the need to access resources did not explain why the two LNGOs experienced different treatment in the partnership, pointing to the deficiencies in purely resource-based explanations. The paper argued that beyond resources, LNGOs can also gain agency in partnerships from organizational and ideational sources of power. The importance of these was borne out by the case study: LNGO1 had stronger systems and procedures, stronger grassroots links, and better contextual and local knowledge, which it emphasized heavily. LNGO2 was weaker in these regards, and found itself more closely managed by the INGO.

These findings have implications on how Northern and Southern NGOs work together and the theories explaining these relationships, especially agency theory and resource dependency theory. They show that while Southern NGOs’ dependency on financial resources may explain why they enter principal–agent type relationships with Northern NGOs, it does not explain how these relationships work. Indeed, Southern NGOs can use various strategies to improve their bargaining power, autonomy, and thus influence in partnerships. These strategies include developing robust procedures and policies, especially around procurement, which are credibly adhered to, as well as building local and contextual knowledge. This links to the literature on LNGO ‘professionalization’ (Lewis et al., 2021), showing that despite the needs prioritize donor requirements, maintaining and developing local, grassroots networks should also be seen as part of being a ‘professional’ LNGO. While developing these capacities undoubtedly requires resources, much can be achieved through strategic leadership, communication and framing techniques. Furthermore, LNGOs should not wait for INGOs or donors to empower them, who may be disincentivized to do so, rather they should take the initiative to drive change.

Our theoretical framework can have relevance as an analytical tool in many project implementation and service delivery settings characterized by principal–agent type relations between and an NGO and a donor. Being based on Bourdieu’s widely used conception of power, the framework’s three sources of power encompass all potential factors which may support an organization in improving its ability to exert influence. The paper’s key limitation lies in its single case study research design. We have made mitigated this by interviewing NGO experts not involved in the case study project. However, further research is required in different settings, to test whether our practical conclusions regarding LNGO strategies and our theoretical contribution on sources of power in partnerships are indeed applicable more widely.