Civic driven change through self-empowerment : societal transformation and consciousness-based development

In recent years foreign aid has been increasingly criticized for not being very effective. A promising new concept and methodology in the discourse on development is Civic Driven Change (CDC). This form of bottom-up and participatory 'aided change' certainly enriches the debate on development. Nevertheless, some challenging aspects in its operationalization remain to be solved. The biggest problem in CDC might be that the analysis of the multi-dimensional process of development remains too superficial to create significant impact. The role of citizens as agents of development is indisputable and a redesign of states and markets 'from within' is essential. This, however, not only implies that the citizens themselves, as the building blocks of societal institutions, must develop civic agency. They also need to access the deeper, more inner levels of human consciousness. Societal transformation demands above all personal transformation. If you want to change the world, start with yourself.