The Iraq Community Action Program (ICAP) aims to foster democratic principles of governance at the grassroots level by working with community action groups and local government councils and representatives to identify and prioritize needs for their communities and collaborate on projects that respond to these needs. Since its inception, ICAP has helped citizens determine, organize, and fund neighborhood priorities, including infrastructure and essential services projects such as building or repairing roads, markets, schools, and water and sanitation networks; developing small businesses; and assisting civilian victims of conflict, including internally displaced persons (IDP). ICAP also helps communities take steps to effectively communicate their needs to the Iraqi government.

ICAP fosters increased citizen participation in local governance by building the skills of community action group members to advocate on behalf of their communities. The project also works with local neighborhood and district councils to strengthen public outreach so they can better understand and respond to citizen expectations. The improved interaction of citizens and councils helps to create informed communities and increases the legitimacy of local government in the eyes of community residents.

ICAP is unique in allowing communities to choose the projects and activities that will most benefit residents while facilitating participation, buy-in, and cost sharing from local governments to ensure project sustainability. ICAP pays special attention to broadening citizen involvement, which it does through a training regimen that focuses on communication, conflict mitigation, and inclusive citizen participation. A major indicator of success is the involvement of IDP in community action group activities. In Baghdad alone, more than half of the groups include IDP representatives.

Working with 115 community action groups throughout Baghdad—where 30 percent of Iraq’s citizens reside—ICAP provides training in areas such as leadership, transparency, advocacy, project design and monitoring, budgeting, and the roles and responsibilities of citizen representatives. The trainings encourage development of more thoughtful and responsive community plans, and they also help the all-volunteer community action groups see the way to a more sustainable future.

With an eye to diversifying their funding sources, the groups have worked with ICAP advisors to fine-tune their governance structures, including bringing in new, more active members, documenting their planning processes, and developing a set of packaged project proposals—all of which are designed to attract support from a broader base of international funding agencies.

These initiatives have paid off. Already, one community action group has registered as a nongovernmental organization, and several others are preparing to submit applications to earn this formal status—a prerequisite for working with many international donors. Proof of their progress came at a recent ICAP-sponsored conference that, for the first time, brought together community action groups and major donors, including bilateral and multilateral agencies.

The Iraq Community Action Program is implemented by IRD with funding from the US Agency for International Development.

Community Governance Briefs

Since 2009, ICAP has worked with community action groups to implement over 700 community infrastructure and supply projects, benefiting more than half-a-million Baghdad residents, all with government buy-in and support. To help document how ICAP has achieved this milestone, the project developed a series of community governance briefs on key project issues. In addition to the project overview, briefs are offered on the topics outlined below. Learn more here.  

Planning
- IRD brought together all the country’s ICAP implementing partners for a first-of-its-kind conference that provided community action groups from all of Iraq’s 18 provinces the opportunity to share lessons from USAID’s longest-running program.

- Community action group members from Baghdad’s Rusafa district worked with government officials at the neighborhood, district, and provincial levels to outline a strategic plan aimed at improving basic services and livelihoods.

Advocacy
- Representatives from more than 20 international donor agencies briefed Baghdad community action groups on their current funding priorities and, for the first time, learned directly from the groups about communities’ needs.

Participation
- Building on earlier ICAP capacity-building efforts, IT specialists from each of Baghdad’s 15 district councils completed a one-week course to help them add interactive features to local government websites.

Engagement
- For internally displaced persons in Baghdad, an understanding their situation and the prospects for their return or integration is key to effective planning and representative governance in the capital.

Outcomes
- Community and local government leaders are working together to secure the implementation of projects outlined in recently agreed to district-wide development strategies.

- ICAP developed a scorecard to gauge the effectiveness of community action groups, measuring indicators like attendance at public meetings and the level of community participation in conceiving, winning support for, and contributing to public service projects.

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