Toward Innovative, Liveable, and Prosperous Asian Megacities Gawad Kalinga: Innovation in the City (and Beyond)

• Main Authors: Habaradas, Raymund B., Aquino, Martin Lorenzo
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2010
• Subjects: Gawad Kalinga, GK, Innovating Communities; Civic and Community Engagement; Community-Based Learning; Community-Based Research
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/res_aki/82; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1075&context=res_aki
• Institution: De La Salle University

Gawad Kalinga (GK) is an innovative approach that could be the key to solving poverty and homelessness in the Philippines. It is potentially an effective, sustainable, and replicable model that could address the problem of urban housing in the developing world. Its most important innovation is a shift in paradigm of what community development ought to be. Instead of looking at members of the poor communities as passive actors (i.e. as mere recipients of donations or as beneficiaries of support programs), GK considers them as active participants in the development process. Through the help of the caretaker team and the support provided by donors and volunteers, residents (or the kapitbahayan) become stewards of their own communities. GK also emphasizes the building of relationships among the different actors involved in what it calls a “nation-building” movement. This is the institutional dimension of innovation. Before programs are introduced to the target community, the caretaker team sets the stage for a continuing relationship with the community members by participating in the community’s social activities, and by familiarizing themselves with the culture of the community. Even corporate partners and individual donors are oriented about Gawad Kalinga by bringing them to a GK site. Through their interaction with the members of the kapitbahayan, these benefactors become more involved in the various programs of GK in their adopted communities, and a more enduring relationship is formed, as a result. Another innovation introduced by Gawad Kalinga is its holistic approach to community development, which involves educational, health, livelihood and environmental programs, among others. This distinctive feature has been successfully replicated throughout the country, and is now being imitated by other countries. Gawad Kalinga has gone a long way since its initial years in Bagong Silang. The generosity, commitment, and heroic sacrifice of its full-time workers, caretaker teams, donors, volunteers, and institutional partners have made a difference in the lives of more than 500,000 people in over 2,000 communities in the Philippines and in several other developing countries. Whether GK can sustain its rapid growth remains to be seen. By remaining true to its innovative character, however, and by nurturing the patriotism of the Filipino people, there is reason to hope that its dream of “Land for the Landless, Home for the Homeless, and Food for the Hungry” will become a reality within our lifetimes.