Association with the ICSD

As presented in Table 1, of the 39 responses relating to the length of association with the ICSD, nearly half of them had association with the ICSD for more than 11 years and about one-third had less than 5 years. This suggests that the research participants had relatively long association with the ICSD, which adds credibility to their views and opinions, although this does not mean that others’ views and suggestions are less important.

Most of the responses (36) indicated that they first heard of the ICSD through a personal friend or connection, professional colleague or contacts, or as students they were introduced to the ICSD by their research advisers or lecturers. Only a small number of them first heard of the ICSD via conference (6), internet (6), and the SDI journal (2).

As per a wordle (a graphical representation of word sizes suggesting greater the size of the word, greater the frequency and vice versa) depicted in Figure 1, for a question that asked to list three words that they associate with the ICSD, a large number of responses (31) stated International, including international social work, international social welfare, and global; followed by Social Development (28), including community, sustainable development, and development; conference, networking, collaborative, community, friendship, and unity (25); social change, cause, justice, human rights, assets, and anti-poverty (13); SDI journal, research, and academic (9); and social work, social policy, planning, and advocacy (8). Eleven other associated words included engaging, participation, interesting, relevant, accessible, authentic, involvement, diverse, inclusive, pragmatic, and capacity. (Please note that frequency indicated in parentheses do not add up to the total number of research participants because of multiple responses.)

Members’ perceptions about the ICSD

How do research participants perceive the ICSD in relation to meeting their expectations and performing its mission, and as an organization? Data presented in Table 2 show that 83% responded “very well,” “well,” and “acceptable,” indicating that the majority of them were of the view that the ICSD had met their expectations, about three-fourths stated that the way ICSD was performing its mission was acceptable, and 85% of them rated the organization from acceptable to very well. From 15 to 26% of respondents scored all the three rating items poor or very poor. From the point of view of improving the organization, it is critical to focus and reflect on these responses, particularly because over one-fourth of the members think that the ICSD is performing its mission poorly. It appears that some of those who think the ICSD is not performing its mission are, nonetheless, satisfied that it is meeting their expectations.

In the survey of participants’ opinion, the primary function of the ICSD was to hold conferences (R8), provide opportunities for academic collaboration, networking, and exchange (R17), promote social development (R11), conduct research on social development and disseminate (R8), and to lead matters relating to social development and international social work (R2). A sample of responses under these themes is as follows:

“Regret to say, I think the main purpose is for membership to enjoy a trip and gathering every two years.”

“Holding biennial international conferences to discuss social development issues.”

“To provide opportunities for academic colleagues in social development to collaborate.”

“To bring together a group of international scholars with an interest in social development to learn and share and create community.”

“To create a platform for engaging social workers globally and making international central to social work pedagogy in [the] US and Europe.”

“Mostly [the] USA SW faculty increasing their global awareness and increasing their global networking.”

“Provide a venue for practitioners, academics, and students who have an interest in social development.”

“Awareness, education, promotion, and practice of international socio-economic development.”

“Create social change through capacity building internationally.”

“Provide a forum and outlet for research on, and engagement, in the development of social and economic programs.”

“Encourage developmental activities to generate and disseminate knowledge.”

“To further the knowledge in international development.”

“Studies related to the output of efforts at social development—in the US and internationally.”

It is critical to reflect on the following other responses as they offer some clues for improvement and planning.

“To be honest—I really don’t know. I’ve struggled to understand this.”

“It’s unclear; the mission is not even listed on the website in ‘about us’.”

“It appears to be still run by the founding members who are not open to new ideas.”

Further, the survey participants were asked to list three things that the ICSD is doing well according to their opinion and experience. The responses presented in Table 3 suggest that the ICSD is doing well mainly relating to organizing conferences, the SDI journal, research and scholarship, and networking and connections.

A sample of qualitative responses under these categories is as follows:

“Organising conferences and connecting practitioners, educators, and policy makers during such conferences. Involving hosting countries in conferences—promoting social and economic development.”

“Hosting an outstanding conference biennially focused on social development.”

“Publishing the journal (although not readily accessible).”

“Hosting a good journal, outlet for publication on social development.”

“Keeping network of good people together.”

“Creating a platform for people in international social development meet, engaging with CSWE [Council on Social Work Education], mentoring new folks with international social development interests.”

“Having authentic global partnerships regarding the Global South (not being exploitative or professionally imperialistic).”

“Providing leadership to some incompetent people.”

Along with positive responses, one opinion suggested that the ICSD is doing “not so good,” and another remarked about incompetent leadership. The comments may need to be explored further.

Members’ Engagement with the ICSD

Suggestions for planning

The survey attempted to ascertain the research participants’ views in their own words as to what direction would they like to see ICSD focus on in the future. They were also asked to list up to three things that the ICSD should improve or do differently. These responses are comparatively presented in Table 5, which shows consistency in their responses. Further, they were asked to express their opinion (in terms of strongly agree to strongly disagree) about the ICSD’s five future directions relating to social development, knowledge-building, and scholarship; conferences, practice, and projects; educational programs and curriculum content; and international exchanges. The analysis of their responses to these questions is presented in Table 6, which shows consistency in their suggestions stemming from the earlier open-ended questions.

Deliberation in a workshop

The main results were presented in the workshop to discuss with the workshop participants (see Appendix A) and generate ideas and plans for the future of the ICSD. The discussion in the workshop resulted in the following recommendations, which reinforced the results presented above: (1) Integrate qualitative and quantitative survey findings and look into constructive suggestions, which we have done in this article. (2) Resolve membership categories and issues and recruit members to ensure the sustainability of the organization. (3) Update the ICSD website to recruit members and promote the consortium. (4) Develop country chapters under regional branches and cast a net outside North America. (5) Raise the profile of the ICSD by taking positions on social development issues, collaborating with like-mined organizations, seeking the UN consultative status, (re)becoming more interdisciplinary, and developing more scholarly products (SDI’s special issues) and edited books from ICSD conferences.

In order to facilitate the organizational development, a number of recommendations were included: (1) Spending available financial resources to advance the ICSD organizational goals. (2) Hiring a staff to handle the organizational infrastructure. (3) Funding research activities and innovative projects. (4) Reasserting interdisciplinary work. (5) Offering training programs. (6) Providing incentives to members.

Leadership

A few critical comments relating to the leadership, factual or perceptual, in the consortium should be of genuine concern. Has the leadership been concentrated in a few schools and with a few individuals? Here, leadership does not mean name and fame, popularity, charisma, and glamour. It also does not mean one individual and one position. Although head of the organisation is ultimately responsible, it applies to all the elected and appointed positions, the board, the executive council, the SDI management board, and other appointed committees for specific purposes. Acknowledging that this leadership is voluntary, it needs to be underscored that every position has roles and responsibilities, and leaders in the consortium are accountable to those roles and responsibilities, to members, to themselves, and to the ICSD as a whole. While many have performed well and trying to do their best, it has been observed that some roles and functions have not been performed effectively and adequately or have been neglected inadvertently, at least for some time and to some extent. Just assuming positions and not acting for them can cause damage to the organization in the long term. Has this happened to the ICSD? All leaders and members need to critically reflect on this, and the results of this survey offer clues and suggestions to do so. This leadership issue in the consortium needs to be addressed. Members and leaders of the ICSD are capable of doing so, provided they are willing to do it.

Finance

For any organization, for its effective and efficient functioning, for stability and security, and to achieve its mission, vision, and goals, adequate financial and human resources are essential. Leadership in the organization also needs to ensure that they can generate required resources so that they can fund scholarships to participate in conferences and conduct research and projects, and publish scholarly material, including the SDI journal. In the past, the ICSD has done well in achieving these as they recruited members, raised funds during conferences, and sponsored and partnered with the journal and allocated funds as they held leadership positions (e.g., deans/directors) in universities in the United States that commanded some resources. Some leaders have donated their personal money and established special memorial lectures. Most of the current leadership in the ICSD neither reflects such positions nor command such resources, although they may have the capability to generate resources through some other fair means. Consequently, the consortium’s financial resources are gradually dwindling. If effective and adequate measures are not taken now, the current financial resources of the ICSD may not last long. Instead of looking for generosity or mercy of some schools or persons, it is time for the consortium to explore sustaining in a self-reliant way. One way of sustaining the consortium is by strengthening its stable and continuing membership base and professional financial planning.

Membership

The results of this survey are heartening as the great majority of research participants have expressed interest in renewing their membership. The others have stated that regular communication about the ICSD activities, more scholarly and research endeavors, user-friendly membership registration and renewal systems, and outreach and connection with members would motivate them to join the ICSD. In the past, most of the member recruitment has occurred through professional and personal contacts and teacher–student, research adviser, and research scholar relationships.

The ICSD is figuratively referred to as web of a small family of like-minded social development scholars. If the membership grows too big, there are concerns that the ICSD may not be able to maintain its unique character of small membership size and meaningful inter-personal and inter-professional relationships:

“The ICSD leaders have taken the position that the organisation should be as large as it needs to be. There is no interest among the leadership in growth for growths sake…” (Raymond & Cowger, 2012, p. 296).

These positions are understandable, as once its membership size was about 300, and there were 83 organizational members from 31 countries (see Raymond & Cowger, 2012, p. 293). Had the membership continued to grow like this, the consequence would have been the loss of its unique characteristic. Contrary to this anticipation, when the first author assumed the role of president-elect, surprisingly individual membership had dropped to double digits and institutional membership to a single digit. The discussion among some leaders had shifted from fee-paid membership-based consortium to nonmembership-based organization (ICSD Workshop, 2017). How and why did the consortium land at the present position? It calls for some soul-searching. This might not have occurred suddenly. Was it neglected for a long time? Has the global context and relevance of social development changed so radically that it impacted the ICSD membership? Did the leadership consistently perform its roles and functions? What makes or mars the organization is its membership, that is, where its leaders emerge from.

These and similar questions should help not only to reflect critically and learn from the ICSD’s past but also to act to recruit new members and renew memberships from both global north and south (Mazibuko & Gray, 2004) and support their needs (Wang & Ki, 2018). As stated earlier, the survey suggests that members are willing to do so. Size of the membership needs to be determined based on the financial viability of the organization. The total cost of running the organization, including its journal, should be met by its membership fees and other sources of income (conferences and fund-raising events) it earns. This is one of the important options to make the ICSD self-reliant. It also may call for other austerity measures.

Vision, Mission, and Goals

No organization’s vision, mission, and goals are static. They are always evolving according to the changing socioeconomic, political, and ecological and developmental conditions. Members and leaders of the ICSD need to relook and refine its vision, mission, and goals. It is critical to take note of the survey that over one-fourth of members think that the ICSD is poorly performing its mission. Is something wrong with the mission or its performance? Has it been effectively communicated as some people still do not get it? In the past, it was falsely opined and understood, even in the World Bank and other UN bodies, that the social development’s vision, mission, and goals are more relevant to the global south (Pawar, 2014). One ICSD leader suggested to the first author to take the ICSD to developing countries. However, the current global developmental context, including the sustainable development goals, suggests that social development vision and goals are equally relevant to both global north and south (Midgley & Pawar, 2017; Pawar, 2014). Hence, today the vision and mission of social development are ever relevant than before globally. However, members and leaders of the ICSD need to re-examine and reconsolidate their thoughts on current local, national, and global realities and developments in theories, and practice of social development so as to refine, restate, and reassert ICSD’s vision, mission, and goals.

Research and Scholarly Activities, and Professional Networks

The main and general purpose of the ICSD is to build knowledge for social development worldwide (ICSD, 2015). This cannot be achieved without research and scholarly activities. Research participants have repeatedly suggested increasing research and scholarly activities of the ICSD by creating more opportunities. Historically and currently, ICSD provides two solid platforms for promoting research and scholarly activities and professional networks. These are its biennial conferences and the SDI journal, although both are experiencing some challenges to sustain themselves in the future, like they have sustained in the past. The ICSD newsletter has been revived and it does provide another avenue for communication and professional networking. More importantly, it needs to focus on latest theoretical and practice developments in the field of social development from interdisciplinary perspectives. Who and where are these scholars? Can ICSD attract them or not? The ICSD needs to continuously demonstrate leadership in this area. Its leaders and members need to think whether or not it has been doing so and what can they do to ensure it in the future? As part of the scholarship, equally important is development of curriculum in the field of social development and helping schools to incorporate social development perspectives in their curricula. To what extent has the ICSD facilitated this?

Social Development Issues

As part of research and scholarly activity, the SDI journal is ICSD’s flagship product. Currently, it is running into its 43rd volume. Eminent scholars have fed and sustained this journal, and the ICSD has invested its significant resources into it toward realizing its vision and mission. However, the survey results suggest improving journal’s quality in many respects—quality of articles, editorial board, impact factor, and dissemination. In spite of investing significant resources, why has the quality, impact, and academic status of the 43-year-old journal remained the way it is today? Both leaders and members of the ICSD need to critically reflect and take action to re-establish its credibility in the social development scholarly and practice community. A clear strategic action plan is needed without any delay. To enhance research and scholarly activities and professional networks, can the ICSD do any differently and better?

Engage in Practice Projects and Activism, and Increase Visibility

The survey results suggest the ICSD to engage in practice projects, activism, and increase its visibility. Clearly, there is a dire need to connect social development theory in terms of research and scholarly activities to practice projects. As suggested by Borah and Aguiniga (2013), the ICSD should play an important role in this. Social development is a practical endeavor and it must be seen and experienced in communities. How can the ICSD engage in practical practice projects through the works of government and NGO? How can it partner with some of their projects, whether it is implementation and evaluation? There is potential to do this in both global north and south by collaborating and partnering with agencies. The ICSD needs to engage in the field and make an impact, at least to show as an example. On critical issues, whether it is injustice, racism, discrimination or other violation of human rights, or the achievement of development goals, the ICSD needs to take a stand and disseminate it. To achieve this, all the points discussed above are relevant. Practice, activism, and visibility cannot occur in its own. Visibility should not be understood as a marketing trick. Its deeds should speak louder than words. Visibility needs to be achieved through its quality research and scholarly activities and by improving the quality and impact of the journal. The ICSD leadership, its members, branches, and collaborators/partners, all need to work together with due respect to each other to achieve its vision, mission, and goals. It is possible to achieve these.