Evaluation of the contribution of the Shalom Christian Community Corporation, through the Community Transformation for Peace (TCP) project, within the Peacebuilding Framework in the community of Granizal

Background

Granizal, with approximately 20,000 people, is the second largest settlement of displaced people in Colombia. In Granizal, the Shalom Christian Community Corporation (CCC Shalom), funded by Digni, implemented a social project for eight years. As the project name implies; Community Transformation for Peace (TCP), the project tried to intervene in the equation of social vulnerability by working with individuals, families, organizations, and the community based on a new vision for the territory.

Purpose/objective

Document early impacts after two phases of project intervention with emphasis in the second phase (2018-2020)

Methodology

The evaluation was conducted using a participatory approach; the voices of the participants and protagonists of the project were heard and made visible. It was oriented towards early results and impacts, from the perception of beneficiaries and the experience documented by the staff of CCC Shalom and focused on the second phase. Women, youth and leaders participating in the project were consulted, as well as representatives of the education and sports committees, members of the Shalom team and key stakeholders who shared their perception of the results and impact.

Four information gathering techniques were used in the evaluation: eight in-depth interviews (one face-to-face and seven virtual), three focus groups, three tours and a workshop with leaders and document analysis of 121 documents.

Key findings

• According to the data provided by the project, around 400 girls have been part of the different processes during the project period. The systematization, and especially the girls and young people themselves, claim to have transformed their “life project” which now includes studying, self-support, leadership and to be cultivated as a good person.
  When these young women are asked what their lives would be like if they were not in TCP, they affirm that “surely they would be pregnant or drug users”. Participants in the process affirm that they feel capable of influencing the lives of the girls they train and of influencing the development of their community. The transformation is evident in those who have participated in the process the longest.
• TCP involved community leaders from all sectors of the community. They accompanied their initiatives, strengthened their capacities, and generated spaces for interaction with public and private institutions. TCP promoted the education and sports committees, with connections to important local institutions, and they opened the opportunity for the community members to be the protagonists of these committees.
• There is evidence of C.C.C Shalom’s social, institutional and community recognition. Their clarity, transparency, seriousness, academic quality, and commitment is expressed through a permanent and relevant presence in the community. In a country that is going through a crisis of credibility and lack of trust in its institutions, including ecclesial ones, maintaining this high level of reliability for eight years, is a result to highlight.
• There is sufficient evidence in the testimonies, in the photographs and in the reports of how the life of this community has been touched and moved by women’s football. This is a process that has had a lot of impact. Firstly, the fields of the different neighbourhoods in
  Bello and Medellin were generally occupied by men involved in micro-trafficking activities or in the best of cases sports activities. The fact that it is now women and girls who occupy these spaces changes the male understanding of female leadership.
• If the community is organized and if men and women are empowered with knowledge of their rights, the impact that is sought is that those rights are in turn enforced. However, this is not an automatic or obvious path. In conclusion, the advocacy for improved public politics was made possible by the constant and permanent work on strengthening the capacity of leaders by TCP. The achievements in advocacy and impact on management cannot be attributed exclusively to TCP, but it can be affirmed that TCP contributed to the consolidation of the group of social leaders, who in turn contributed and can continue to contribute to the development of the community.
• The theory of developing a territorial approach starts from the idea of understanding the context as a living scenario, consisting of the interactions between the actors who inhabit the context in a specific, historically and culturally determined way, and of the natural conditions of those same scenarios.
  Understanding these relationships is a process that TCP has achieved in a systematic way. In the opinion of this evaluation, one of the main reasons for this achievement is the team of very good academic quality. They were committed to the process and were able to document the different understandings by involving and recognizing the knowledge of the community.

Recommendations

The formulation of the overall objective has, in the eyes of this evaluation, an inconsistency. In the equation of social vulnerability, two variables are involved. The first is social risk and the second is the capacities of social actors to address that risk. The way the overall objective is formulated suggests that by resolving the capacities of local actors and organizations, social risk will be resolved. As initially proposed, these two variables are not dependent. The response capacity of people and organizations does not determine social risk, but rather the ability to face social risk, mitigate and adapt. Therefore, what decreases is not social risk but social vulnerability. This conceptual inconsistency in the formulation of the overall objective has special interest if it is later on decided to carry out an impact assessment, or even for the current execution that continues today.

This understanding is especially recognized by institutions that have supported the TCP process, who argue that this knowledge can help generate processes in other ways or dimensions, to address different aspects of health for example or processes with a greater impact in education. For Shalom it is not possible to assume a commitment of greater scope after project than that developed during the project. However, it could be though that after a very reflective exercise they could identify a focus on which to continue impacting the community of Granizal, taking advantage of all the knowledge, information, and social capital they have gained.
There are other recommendations, but they are not directly to the project but to its derivatives, to the committees and networks. However, these are outside the scope of this evaluation.

Comments from the organisation

Misjonskirken Norge is very pleased by the evaluation. Through an extensive work the evaluator has been able to establish a common narrative of the project and document results and achievements that leads to learning both for local, national, and Norwegian partner. The report might have been better with more statistics.

Digni decided to withdraw South America from the project portfolio in the current strategic period, and it was therefore decided to finalize the project support to this project in 2020. Misjonskirken Norge has a long-term commitment with the local partner and will still support with some economical contributions from 2021. Recommendations from the evaluation report will therefore be important for the continuation of some of the processes from the project