About CDA Collaborative Learning Projects

CDA Collaborative Learning Projects is a non-profit organization, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts (USA). We are committed to improving the effectiveness of international actors who provide humanitarian assistance, engage in peace practice, and are involved in supporting sustainable development.

CDA operates on the premise that experience is a good teacher if we can take the time to learn its lessons. To that end, we organize collaborative learning projects to gather and analyze the experiences of international efforts and, from this, to identify patterns across contexts and project types. Our experience shows that this kind of learning enables us to avoid repeating mistakes of the past and to continually improve the impacts of our work.

Collaborative learning projects have involved colleagues in humanitarian assistance agencies, development agencies, peace practice groups, and corporate enterprises.

CDA is best known for its development of the peace and conflict impact assessment tool known as “Do No Harm” analysis. DNH helps humanitarian and development assistance workers to identify the impacts of their assistance on conflict and to develop options for minimizing harm and enhancing their positive support for peace.

CDA maintains a small group of core staff who have extensive experience in zones of conflict. They have worked in over ninety countries with several hundred international and local organizations, including European and North American governments, United Nations agencies, the World Bank, members of the Red Cross movement, universities and training centers, and many non-governmental organizations. In addition, CDA calls on a broad group of experts when specific regional expertise or language competence is needed.

The organization’s work is funded primarily by governments and international financial institutions which support CDA CLP because it combines rigorous analysis with pragmatic field-level work and delivers practical tools and techniques to field staff and international policy-makers alike.

Many individuals and agencies know of CDA through its Executive Director, Mary B. Anderson and her 1999 book: Do No Harm: How Aid Can Support Peace—Or War.

CDA Collaborative Learning Projects is a direct off-shoot of the Collaborative for Development Action, Inc., a small consulting agency founded in 1985.