Date: Tuesday, April 21, 2026
My name is Chris Allan, Executive Director of Ajabu Advisors, a group of international strategy and evaluation consultants.
Many years ago, I was traveling around West Africa, looking for leaders of social and environmental movements to join an advisory board making grants to grassroots groups working on environmental issues. I remember clearly my excitement at sitting down with one of the most brilliant civil society leaders there – I asked her who she knew who may be able to direct funding to regional grassroots groups active in environment-focused work.
I’ll never forget how her face immediately clouded over. I could see that she had immediately slotted me into that well-meaning but vaguely colonialist group of Western environmentalists. The ones who think that gorillas and butterflies are more important than people. Needless to say, the discussion didn’t last a whole lot longer, despite my attempts to clarify that we were looking for people who understood that environmental issues are also issues of human rights, poverty, and injustice. Despite the ravages of pollution, extractive industry, corruption, and displacement, I had not connected these issues well with the ones she worked on.
I was keenly aware of the divide between community perception of priorities in the Global South, and the seeming tone deafness of the big Conservation organizations (with a capital “C”) from the Global North. There were many iconic examples: constant flyovers for forest transect mapping in southern Mexico in the middle of a rebellion, eviction of Indigenous Peoples from ancestral homelands now named national parks, a conservation research station burned by neighboring communities, and many more. In supporting grassroots groups in the Global South, we were trying to overcome this divide and get funding into the hands of people who for years had been left out of environmental decision-making.
That was decades ago. Since then, there has been a remarkable shift in thinking and in practice. The big Conservation organizations have revamped their worldviews and their staffs. Social movements that had traditionally stuck to their lanes (e.g., environment, feminism, human rights) are increasingly collaborating. And it is rare to see a theory of change from a member of one movement that doesn’t incorporate the priorities of other movements into its own. In fact, my colleagues in the Global South, especially Latin America, got me to start talking about “socio-environmental” work. Every environmental plan or evaluation now includes consultation across divides of age, gender, ethnicity, and class. Climate change programs now include human rights dimensions. Gender empowerment projects include concern for environment protection. Microfinance initiatives ensure environmental as well as financial sustainability.
Prioritize Linguistic Justice – Just because people speak or write in English doesn’t mean they can express themselves as clearly as they would like in it. Whenever possible, evaluators need to work in languages that participants speak locally, including understanding the cultural background behind the formal language.
Enable Sensemaking – Evaluators are often asked to digest and interpret oceans of material in a short time. While we do the best we can, it is easy to get the facts right but the interpretation wrong, or at least a bit off. Create as many opportunities as you can to engage groups of participants – not just donors – in explaining the evidence you have collected and what it may mean.
The Principles of Environmental Justice (EJ) – developed in 1991 by delegates to the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit.
Bali Principles of Climate Justice – a more internationally oriented set of principles which adapted the 1991 principles in 2002.
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