Continuing an earlier post, I’ve been reflecting on my work using The RADIQUAL Framework and mainstreaming participatory, decolonial, intersectional, and inclusive approaches in PMEL. As I enter my sixth year with The SMC Group and my 11th working with these approaches, I’ve learned so much from others and been encouraged by the path we’re taking as these approaches become mainstream.

Power

When I joined Open Society Foundations in 2014, I led a portfolio promoting inclusive advocacy responses to the marginalisation of Roma people in Central and Eastern Europe and the Western Balkans. I then branched into anti-discrimination work more broadly through grant portfolios countering European Islamophobia and promoting the rights of People of African Descent. The work was incredibly fulfilling, and I met dozens of grantees with whom I’m still in touch and whose work inspires me constantly.

However, being in a position of relative power, especially in my 20s, clearly showed me the issues in our global ‘aid’ system and the problematic dynamics in how we do human rights work. Being in the middle of the whole mess, I saw precisely what was wrong with our work.

I was naturally drawn to PMEL to help us better understand our place in the world and view something as complex as social, political, and economic change through a lens of data and research. I also have an economics background, so it helps that it came pretty naturally to me!

Intersectionality and Inclusive Approaches

At OSF, I saw the need for an intersectional feminist approach to how projects and strategies are designed, for example – and how a problem is articulated. Back then, I didn’t know what it was called, though being a queer Indian woman, I had a lot of personal experience with it.

I viewed it from an external perspective and called it ‘double discrimination’ – how you are viewed and treated by the power holders around you. Rather than the empowering framework of your intersecting identities and how they all affect how you see the world around you.

My work exposed me to the need for an intersectional and inclusive approach to how philanthropy is run. I worked with a lot of young, queer Roma leaders, for example, and their compounded marginalisation, and the specific needs of diverse communities, were what started my interest in intersectional and inclusive methodologies.

My personal experiences also deeply informed this framework. I read everything AWID wrote and kept a close eye on the conversations around feminist approaches to MEL, which at the time were still just emerging.

Participatory Approaches

That directly led me to the work of incredible South Asian institutes championing participatory action research and feminist participatory action research. I’d read Robert Chambers’ work in university and was already a big fan of Participatory Rural Appraisal. Still, I hadn’t found a way to fold it into how we do PMEL since I didn’t have many opportunities to work directly with the communities my work affected. However, that exposed me to a fundamental problem – that the relationship between the funder and the community needs to exist and be respectful!

I then met Matthew Hart and The Global Philanthropy Project. I knew the only culturally appropriate way to do this would be through the Roma communities’ expertise. So that’s what we did, and we rolled out country-specific strategies in partnership with Roma-led organisations. The success of a participatory approach led me down the path of human-centred design and inclusive design, and I saw how all these approaches were related.

Decolonial Approaches

This journey is more personal. I grew up partly in India and partly in central Europe, and there’s no escaping the deep systemic racism and fear-based hatred that people still face in White society purely because of their skin colour. I always knew there was something deeper beyond an individual’s response to me. Still, as above, I didn’t see the phrase ‘systemic racism’ until I started working in our sector – though the concept is sadly very familiar.

I also grew up with a strong understanding of Indian history, the horrific violence of centuries of colonial oppression, and its consequences for modern India. Living in the UK and having personal relationships with British people also cemented that sense of being ‘othered’ – again, I didn’t have a word for it until ten years ago! Because of my age and the complexity of ‘White worship’, modern Indians end up hating and craving acceptance from British people. Including me, of course – I was desperate to fit in while being proud of my heritage. I hid parts of myself, including my real accent, the books I read, the films I watched (including 2006’s Rang de Basanti, which changed my life), and the writers I admired, like Paulo Freire. The word decolonisation has always been in my lexicon – but applying it to research and PMEL? Well, now that’s interesting!

My work experiences with the sector and others pursuing a power-dominated approach with their grantees also opened my eyes to the need to decolonise at work. Why aren’t we undoing our harmful histories, confronting power dynamics, and starting fresh? I saw too much of ‘that’s the way it’s always been done’ and too much apathy around change.

Then, I came across indigenous approaches to research methods through the power of storytelling. Through further research, I came across this (still somewhat) nascent field of decolonial research and decolonial practices. I was hooked!

The SMC Group and RADIQUAL

While at OSF, I also ran an ethical fashion business called Syra Brownlock. I designed the pieces, created patterns, sourced each piece from individual women’s cooperatives, and made the clothing. Everything from my supply chain to the postal services I used to send clothes around the world reflected my values. I applied a restorative justice approach to partnerships with women’s cooperatives and youth groups in South Asia, and it felt wonderful to finally do work that reflected my values.

I knew that I wanted to do PMEL for as long as possible and wanted my own company. I knew it would be driven by values, and my experiences with Syra Brownlock showed me that an ethical business could also turn a good profit and have an impact.

So, at the end of 2018, I launched The SMC Group and built The RADIQUAL Framework. Neither of them had a name, but they existed and were growing. I have been contributing to RADIQUAL every quarter, and I take what I learn from each client and project to it.

I knew that it should be a framework for how I do my work and run my business. I want to have as much transparency and accountability as possible without giving up my intellectual property since, while we change the system from within, we live within a specific system with its rules and norms.

I knew RADIQUAL had to combine various worldviews, methods, ideologies, and approaches. I knew these ideas were all related but still distinct—we all know that you can be one type of feminist and be an enemy of the LGBTQIA+ community. I wanted each section to have distinctive sections and contribute unique perspectives while strengthening the whole framework.

From RADIQUAL, I also built company policies and values, all linked below.

I also knew I needed an ongoing channel of communication with my communities online and that ideas must flow in multiple directions. Each month brings new ideas and learning, for which I am so grateful, and with that has to come to a lot of humility about the learning journey ahead.

What’s Next?

As the debates continue across these topics and as they gain prominence in mainstream conversations—and some would say become commercialised—I want to focus on these values as much as possible. I wrote this piece to reflect on my journey as a practitioner and a businesswoman and think about what I hope lies ahead for mainstreaming these important approaches. We’ve made so much progress in bringing the conversations to power holders, and there are many exciting avenues for me this year.

I want to take what I’ve learned, including what hasn’t worked, and share that widely.

That’s why this year, I will be offering two courses!

The first will be around PMEL, of course, and on mainstreaming these approaches. The second will scale up these approaches to organisations. Both will be very practical, sharing tools, templates, and resources created just for participants, which I’ve used to achieve great success with my work.

I would love to see a broad group of people attending, so if you’ve got any requests, specific ideas or tools you’d like to see or would like to hear more about as it develops, fill out the form below, and I’ll send you a message with further information!