Or is the appropriate model something more like the Philippines, with its diversity of VOs of differing political ideologies, policy and program commitments, and operating styles? Are there identifiable evolutionary stages in the development of a VO community? What types of support are most important at each stage? These are important questions for donors if they are to avoid creating distortions through well intentioned, but possibly misguided application of their resources.

Since development catalyst organizations commonly define their own performance in terms of the creation and strengthening of strong, self-reliant POs, no study of VO development performance could be complete without serious attention to VO contributions to the development of POs as an important feature of the institutional landscape.

The questions involved are most amenable to analysis on a comparative basis. They are also questions that many VOs and VO coalition bodies need to be asking themselves. Therefore, a participatory type of research process might prove appropriate. For example, the draft study report for an individual country migt. serve as the basis for a national conference of V(s in that country to review the report and its conclusions in a kind of sector self-assessment exercise.

Several country studies might form the basis for a regional conference devoted to a comparative assessment that would help to sharpen the frameworks for comparative analysis. An international conference might then examine patterns of regional differences. The result would be a much refined set of frameworks for assessing VO development in any given country, and a heightened self-awareness within the voluntary sectors of the participating countries of the issues they face as a sector.

# 2. Small Scale Development on a large Scale

Conventional concepts of replication and scaling up reflect a top-down bias in their underlying presumption that the task involves defining a blueprint for project action and then engagig a large development bureaucracy to stamp out replcations of projects based on that blueprint over a large area. Sheldon Annis puts a different twist on the conventional formulation by asking: 'How large can small become?' Or 'Can small-scale development be a large-scale policy?"m His questions puts the problem in proper context. The genius of the VO approach is found in its people-sized units of action and its local problem-solving focus, in contrast to the imposition of an externally defined blueprint. Yet it is true that so long as this is accomplished in only a few communities the consequences will be severely limited. Obviously the proper answer is to do it on a large scale.

The questions posed by Annis are best addressed on a case study basis. The research task is to identify examples of both successful and unsuccessfu efforts to accomplish smal scale, locally controlled development on a large scale. Normally the focus should be on reasonably mature efforts that yield clear and easily documented lessons, rather than on incipient zfforts in which it is only possible to speculate about prospective results. Each effort selected should be documented and aayzed as a case study to yield lessons and insights thar might be translated into other efforts to make sm-Rl-scale development large-scale policy.

Particular attention should be given to questions such as the foliowing Is there a point at which a critical mass of small POs sets loose a new dynamic that supports the spontaneous generation and linkage of such organizations? What are the conditions conducive to rich an outcome? Reports on the Latin American experience suggest that important insights into these questions may be found in that region.

The proposed documentation should be done from a social learning perspective. The most useful lessons are likely to address the question of how to create and manage the learning process by which a functioning set of institutional relationships emerges in support of large scale local development action. Efforts to find blueprints for cookie cutter replication are likely to contribute only to more large-scale, top-down failures.

In many instances the successful examples of large-scale coverage that provide uscful lessons may not be limited to VOs of the type described in this paper. A study of livelihood programs done by Judith Tendler for the Ford Foundation identified six initiatives that had influenced the lives of large numbers of poor." One was sponsored by a public sector enterprise, three by trade unions, one by a bank, and one by a private consulting firm. Tendler's study provides an important caution in such a research undertalkng it should not look only for examples in which the chief sponsor is a VO.

# 3. Medhanisms for VO/PO Funding

The potential dangers of publc donors channeling large blocks of funds to VOs and POs have been examined in this paper. But simply sensitizing donors to the potential dangers of inappropriate action does not provide them with a solution to their problem. We have yet to answer the key question: Are there demonstrated ways to channel such funds that are consistent with enlarging the

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