Organizations that pursue reformist goals using authoritarian or personalistic methods are unlikely to instill the trust necessary to build a strong popular base. Conversely, organizations using open and transparent methods to pursue their goals, even if the goals themselves do not reflect democratic ideals, may further democracy in spite of themselves. This program provides no direct assistance to individual organizations, but only to projects that will strengthen the NGO sector as a whole. Such projects include seminars in management and training, efforts to regulate NGOs themselves to ensure accountability and transparency, and conferences and equipment to facilitate communication and networking among existing organizations. Finally, to the extent that US assistance is directed to particular types of NGOs, it should direct less time and money toward advocacy groups focused on abstract issues such as human rights and women's equality, and more toward organizations pursuing practical goals, such as housing cooperatives, battered women's shelters, employee retraining and microlending enterprises.
Advocacy groups are less likely to attract citizen involvement than practical organizations.
They require people to commit their time and effort towards achieving an abstract goal at some point in the distant future, and there is no guarantee they will succeed. With such uncertain incentives, a population struggling with economic hardship is unlikely to become active. Secondly, though advocacy groups may promote values that correspond closely to US democratic ideals, they do not always resonate fully among local communities. Organizations more oriented to practical needs, on the other hand, have an immediate, tangible impact upon their constituents, demonstrating the potential benefits of public action. Moreover, because they seek to respond to the needs of daily life amid a set of specific circumstances, rather than promote abstract, universal ideals, such organizations are more likely to be responsive to local needs and less likely to be perceived as promoting a foreign agenda.