International Non-Governmental Organizations in Latin America and Social Capital

International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs) in developingcountries promote interests of the poor, provide social services, and stimulatecommunity engagement. The exponential growth of INGOs during the last four decades wasaccompanied by major financial scandals and corruption charges leading to an increase inresearch on the impact of INGOs on community well-being in developing countries. Due tosparse empirical studies that evaluate the role and functions of INGOs, the question ofthe impact of INGOs on community well-being has remained largely rhetorical. Our studyattempts to provide preliminary evidence on the impact of socio-economic programscarried out by an International Governmental Organization (INGO), Adventist Developmentand Relief Agency (ADRA), in four Latin American countries. Results from thequasi-experimental study suggest that communities with ADRA programs have a higher levelof social capital than communities without them. While the results reported here may notbe generalized to all INGOs, our study is unique in providing a valuable empiricalapproach toward examining the role of INGOs in developing countries