What roles does NGO’s play in economics and politics?

NGOs/Non-governmental organizations have always played an important role at the grass-root level considering the fact that government agencies fail to a great extent to trickle down their effect at the grass-root levels. They play both collaborative as well as an independent role with respect to the government to bring about changes at the micro-level. The popular NGOs of India are CRY, Smile Foundation, Teach For India, Akanksha Foundation, Pratham Education Foundation, Akshaya Patra Foundation, etc.

Some important parameters with respect to the role of NGOs in economics and politics are −

• CSR Project − The NGOs plays an important role as a part of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) taken by various companies. These CSR projects help in developing the spirit of ethical values in the company and also to contribute to the marginalized sections of the society. Thus, millionaire companies contribute a certain share of their annual turnover to the NGOs that exist in the country for growth and development of these sections.

• Policy Formulation − There is different NGOs that are part of various committees involved in policy formation and they collaborate with the government to contribute their expertise and experience in their respective field. This helps in creating more citizen-friendly policies which are enduring and long-lasting.

• Development of the country − NGOs in India are working with different sectors like education, health, environment, women empowerment. Most of the NGOs focus on creating aware and active citizens who indirectly become the asset in the form of Human Resources for our country. Thus, they are showing the seeds for the long-term effect in terms of a country’s progress in different fields.

• Highlighting Lack of Policy Execution − While there are only a few NGOs that participate and collaborate with the government in policy committees, thousands of other NGOs are actually bringing the fact to the limelight that how the existing policies have been failed to benefit the needy and the ground-level situation needs much more improvement and attention. These NGOs also collaborate with the media to showcase their work and how government machinery has failed to address their grievances.