Danish Red Cross

Localisation

A robust civil society with a strong Red Cross or Red Crescent national society and empowered local branches are key drivers for positive change: promoting local voices, civic action and ultimately better interventions. We are accountable to the people, communities, and partners that we work with and for, and we engage in locally led interventions by promoting and supporting local decision making, local leadership and local capacity.

How we work with localisation

Danish Red Cross contributes actively to strengthening our national society partners by clearly including national society development aspects in our country strategies and annual plans, guided by the priorities of the national society itself – while coordinating closely with other Movement partners to avoid duplication and creation of parallel structures.

We have expertise in supporting branch development, volunteering and youth engagement and apply a counterpart approach to capacity development in other technical areas, which takes place in respectful dialogue.
We cultivate broad local action and empowerment of communities by supporting our Movement partners in leveraging local branches and getting volunteers to engage with community structures, local authorities and other local stakeholders.
We support national societies in enhancing their response capacity in fragile contexts in which they play an important role as first responders.

Local RCRC national society as main implementation partner

Danish Red Cross's point of entry in any given country is the local national society, which is also our main implementation partner. Our aim is to help that national society fulfill its mandate and its auxiliary role to the government. We promote national society ownership and respect the division of labour and responsibilites within Movement partnerships, as agreed in the statutes of the Movement and the Seville Agreement 2.0.

Our partnership approach emphasises alignment with the strategies and priorities of national societies, and harmonisation with their systems and procedures, while also ensuring transparency and accountability. We apply a counterpart approach, which entails that our staff work directly with national society staff. This cooperation creates a basis for continuous dialogue and learning.

To increase the efficiency and impact of our interventions, and to further the localisation agenda, the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movements have engaged in reforming the way we work together. We are committed to supporting the ambition to pursue further alignment with local priorities and harmonisation with local systems and procedures.