This is a Guide for Users.

This Guide is built on the experience and learning of the many, many people around the world who use Do No Harm in their daily work. It also reflects the experiences and dilemmas of many would-be users who have, for a variety of reasons, found it difficult to apply Do No Harm as they want to.

Over several years, the Do No Harm Project has visited people around the world who are working with the DNH approaches and tools—or trying to do so. We have listened to them, learned from them, and worked with them. This Guide emerged from this ongoing collaboration. Through these many users and would-be users, the Do No Harm Project has gathered what appears here.

This Guide is Do No Harm focused. It is truly a Users’ Guide in that it both reflects how people find Do No Harm most useful, and it translates it into new approaches, tools and techniques that others can pick up, learn, and use.

From all of these efforts, as our world-wide users tell us, the impacts of interventions are not only predictable, they are traceable and, most important, they can be improved. The users of Do No Harm, who are the real “authors” of this Manual, report on how they have been able to engage with the social dynamics of their environments, in the ongoing processes of their work, to ensure that harm is not unwittingly done. Moreover, they are able to engage the social dynamics so that the outcomes of their work are increasingly supportive of significant, positive, lasting change in their societies.

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