Developing Capacity for Innovation in Complex Systems

10 Capacity building

Introduction

Capacity building is a relatively new concept that has started finding its way across organisational life and action. It has roots in a number of disciplines that in the 1970s promoted empowerment in areas such as community development, international aid and development, public health, and education (Crisp et al., 2000). Capacity, in our current understanding of the word, has a number of synonyms such as faculty, power, ability, or capability. For instance, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (2012) defines capacity as “the ability of individuals and organisations or organisational units to perform functions effectively, efficiently and sustainably.”

The use of the phrase “capacity building” is quite ...