Systems change needs politicians

Last week, a friend sent me a well-argued and passionate article on systems change by Anurag Behar, CEO of Azim Premji Foundation.   Most people understand systems change as measures taken—usually by civil society providing expertise or project management services to a specific government department—in order to influence government action. Anurag argues that, in such cases, deploying a few people can only result in surface-level engagement with the system. He adds that by funding such endeavours, donors and grantmakers are moving away from supporting grassroots work.  I believe many funders do this because they think that changing the system from the inside is a higher return on investment than supporting a few grassroots organisations, and that cerebral thinking to change systems is more useful than passionate activism that isn’t sustainable or doesn’t scale. But the system doesn’t change that easily. Why is this the case? My experience within and around government over the past 31 ye