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8 Participants’ Recommendations for O&G Social Investment
project’s framework and power relations. In discussing her/his company’s actions,
s/he drew on working with discourses of social investment.
Another participant who drew on working with discourses of social investment
to articulate her/his social investment ideals was P10. In the following quote, P10
asserted that O&G companies have to acknowledge that communities know what
they want from the social investment and how they want it undertaken:
I had learnt from this [experience], … we don’t really have the best ideas at all, you know,
most times we don’t have the best idea of what the community needs, but almost always
the community themselves know. … And so, these farmers in upper [country] told us very
clearly what they wanted and how they wanted it. And fortunately, everyone was receptive
and so the project changed … they didn’t need experts to come in and tell them, you know,
how they should be farming. (P10, social investment expert)
In the above excerpt, P10 engaged in a reflexive account of an experience that shaped
her/his understanding that communities know best what they need. P10 acknowledged the importance of letting communities’ voices shape the social investment
design and implementation to enhance the community’s sense of empowerment and
ownership of projects. P12 shared a similar rationale:
There was also another project on draft [risk] mitigation, where we used participatory rural
appraisal and planning and we really looked at not just the demographic protocol of the
community, but what is the local community’s coping mechanism in terms of draft [risk
mitigation plan] and then you realise that the people themselves actually already have solutions and coping mechanisms and if you do not consider those and work along those and
then include them in the participatory planning process, that there is often no buy-in and then
you will have no commitment from the community to be part of it. (P12 social investment
expert)
P12’s recommendations for O&G social investment included eliciting the communities’ own resolutions and coping mechanisms as a way of enhancing the community’s
sense of ownership of the investment.
According to Mosse (2001, p. 19) “local knowledge reflects local power”; in
other words, knowledge is shaped by power relations (Foucault, 1982). According to
Mosse (2001), communities’ ‘local knowledge’ is shaped by dominant local groups
and by investors’ criteria. The presence of dominant local groups and company
members influences whose needs and knowledge are prioritised in designing and
implementing social investment. Additionally, according to the participants, when
implementing social investment, the company generally hires the “project facilitator”,
who controls the research tools. The company also normally establishes the criteria
of relevance for social investment projects. When participants talked about engaging
with communities through social investment as a way to promote communities’ sense
of empowerment and project ownership, experts drew on working with discourses of
social investment. However, the fact that companies are not passive and neutral actors
in the design and implementation of O&G social investment means that working on
discourses can also be operating in a ‘participatory’ and ‘community-centred’ social
investment.
In the next section, I focus on how interviewees discussed engagement with
communities’ expectations. In particular, participants talked about the importance
8 Participants’ Recommendations for O&G Social Investment
project’s framework and power relations. In discussing her/his company’s actions,
s/he drew on working with discourses of social investment.
Another participant who drew on working with discourses of social investment
to articulate her/his social investment ideals was P10. In the following quote, P10
asserted that O&G companies have to acknowledge that communities know what
they want from the social investment and how they want it undertaken:
I had learnt from this [experience], … we don’t really have the best ideas at all, you know,
most times we don’t have the best idea of what the community needs, but almost always
the community themselves know. … And so, these farmers in upper [country] told us very
clearly what they wanted and how they wanted it. And fortunately, everyone was receptive
and so the project changed … they didn’t need experts to come in and tell them, you know,
how they should be farming. (P10, social investment expert)
In the above excerpt, P10 engaged in a reflexive account of an experience that shaped
her/his understanding that communities know best what they need. P10 acknowledged the importance of letting communities’ voices shape the social investment
design and implementation to enhance the community’s sense of empowerment and
ownership of projects. P12 shared a similar rationale:
There was also another project on draft [risk] mitigation, where we used participatory rural
appraisal and planning and we really looked at not just the demographic protocol of the
community, but what is the local community’s coping mechanism in terms of draft [risk
mitigation plan] and then you realise that the people themselves actually already have solutions and coping mechanisms and if you do not consider those and work along those and
then include them in the participatory planning process, that there is often no buy-in and then
you will have no commitment from the community to be part of it. (P12 social investment
expert)
P12’s recommendations for O&G social investment included eliciting the communities’ own resolutions and coping mechanisms as a way of enhancing the community’s
sense of ownership of the investment.
According to Mosse (2001, p. 19) “local knowledge reflects local power”; in
other words, knowledge is shaped by power relations (Foucault, 1982). According to
Mosse (2001), communities’ ‘local knowledge’ is shaped by dominant local groups
and by investors’ criteria. The presence of dominant local groups and company
members influences whose needs and knowledge are prioritised in designing and
implementing social investment. Additionally, according to the participants, when
implementing social investment, the company generally hires the “project facilitator”,
who controls the research tools. The company also normally establishes the criteria
of relevance for social investment projects. When participants talked about engaging
with communities through social investment as a way to promote communities’ sense
of empowerment and project ownership, experts drew on working with discourses of
social investment. However, the fact that companies are not passive and neutral actors
in the design and implementation of O&G social investment means that working on
discourses can also be operating in a ‘participatory’ and ‘community-centred’ social
investment.
In the next section, I focus on how interviewees discussed engagement with
communities’ expectations. In particular, participants talked about the importance