By Catherine Squire
Iran has a vibrant and firmly established civil society, which has developed with strong roots in local traditions and communities. CSO support organisations are relative newcomers, with most established in the last 5 years. In that time, a great deal of experience has accumulated, and the approaches of CSOs are evolving constantly. However, learning from experience is largely undocumented, and there are no structures in place to help CSOs to learn from each other.
This paper outlines the various capacity building approaches and activities undertaken within Iran: from promoting the concepts of democracy, rights, and citizens’ participation through workshops and seminars etc; skills training courses for individuals; to capacity building at the organisational level. The paper details key civil society capacity building issues in relation to organisations’ internal organisation, external relations and programme performance, and provides a summary of priority needs relating to organisational capacity building practice.
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