The concept of ‘networks’ arguably plays as important a role in social, political and economic life in the early 21st century as that of ‘machines’ did in the early 20th century. Whether in academic research, the popular press, government policies, corporate strategies, blogs or just day-to-day conversation, the term seems unavoidable. Googling the word ‘network’ returns 845 million hits, not much fewer than the 870 million hits for the word ‘country.’ Like machines before them, networks today are used to describe all kinds of activities, or any set of objects or people that are connected to each other. As such, the term can be used in virtually any context, sometimes in very distinctive and practical ways but more often as a metaphor for human organisation. It has strong positive associations connotations – of being modern, technologically savvy, connected, dynamic (crime and terrorist networks notwithstanding). In fact, globalisation scholar Robert Holton argues the concept risks becoming at best a hyped-up, over-used metaphor for any kind of social connection, and at worst a meaningless piece of rhetoric (Holton, 2008). The international development and humanitarian sector has long had a fascination with the idea of the network, one which predates the current internet-driven enthusiasm by several decades: the oldest networks examined here are those that involved agricultural researchers in the 1960s using the creaking global postal system to share papers, letters and ideas. With its global span, multiple actors, many activities and plethora of goals, the aid system lends itself well both to the network metaphor and to the kind of misuse Holton suggests. Networks might bring together groups of like-minded actors in ‘clubs’; they might be professional, technical, knowledge sharing, campaigning, fundraising or operational. Networks can be informal – shaped by friendship, by the fact that foreign development specialists are living in close proximity in countries far from home or by shared experiences working on projects and programmes. There is also growing use of the term in the marketing of aid. One of the most notable examples is in the branding of the UN Development Programme: ‘UNDP is the UN’s global development network, an organization advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life’1 This breadth of use can hinder clear understanding and can lead to fuzziness and imprecision in how the term is used and what it means. This can have knock-on effects on strategies and day-to-day practices. At the extreme, the ubiquity and marketing-focused use of the term could diminish attempts to understand networks in a more empirical manner. Any distinct advantage of the idea and its implications could be lost in a sea of overblown rhetoric. (emphasis added). As Rick Davies notes, ‘the solution to the sloppy use of the term network is to encourage people to think in more discriminating terms about different kinds of network structures, and to test theories about such networks against empirical observations’ (Davies, personal communication, 2011). This think piece is a modest contribution to this process of encouragement. It is intended to support practitioners, researchers, evaluators and policy-makers interested in taking a more reflective and empirically grounded approach to networks. It draws together findings from a light literature review, information from informal discussions and personal reflections obtained from working on and in networks over a number of years.
It first looks at the range of ways networks are currently thought about and dealt with in the development and humanitarian sectors. After highlighting gaps apparent in the understanding of networks, it then explores different approaches that might help address these.