Here we include links to where our WASH and development allies have talked about failures – please let us know if there’s something we should add!
Case studies of WASH failures
Compilation of common WASH failures, by FLUSH
MAPET manual pit-latrine emptying technology project
The PlayPump: What Went Wrong?
Blogs/Editorials
2018
Want to improve development outcomes? Anticipate the failures. Here’s how
The road to hell is paved with good intentions – and broken toilets
What doesn’t kill you: let’s talk about failure
2017
How to take the right risks in international development
Development Malpractice In Ghana
When it comes to water access we keep doing the same thing. And failing
2013
Can ‘admitting failure’ help the WASH sector learn and improve its work?
Books
2020 Interdisciplinary and Transdisciplinary Failures: Lessons Learned from Cautionary Tales (includes a great introduction to different types of failure and failure terminology)
2013 Aid on the Edge of Chaos (the title is pretty self explanatory…)
1988 Watering White Elephants? Lessons from donor funded planning and implementation of rural water supplies in Tanzania (have we learned nothing since 1988?)
Reports
EWB Canada Failure Reports and Fail Forward initiative
2013 Learning from failure: lessons for the sanitation sector
Videos
2012 Want to help someone? Shut up and listen!
2011 What happens when an NGO admits failure
Journal articles
2022
Achieving development outcomes by building practical authority in WASH participatory collectives in Melanesia (discusses the failure of checklists in development projects and rethinks participation as a political process)
2021
A Qualitative Study of NIMBYism for Waste in Smaller Urban Areas of a Low-Income Country, Mzuzu, Malawi (discusses a lack of community engagement in developing solid waste sites in Malawi)
Acknowledging and Learning from Different Types of Failure (discusses how we can learn from failures in environmental and public health and embed these lessons into our organisations)
Assessment of Decontamination and Reuse of Disposable Filter Funnels Used in Microbiological Water Quality Tests (discusses how plastic waste from water quality testing creates landfill, but there currently is no reliable method for reusing plastic filters without impacting on measurement quality)
Experiences of menstruation in high income countries: a systematic review, qualitative evidence synthesis and comparison to low- and middle-income countries (discusses how society has failed those who menstruate in high income countries)
Failure of the “Gold Standard”: The Role of a Mixed Methods Research Toolkit and Human-Centered Design in Transformative WASH (discusses how randomised controlled trials fail to capture the full complexity of WASH interventions within multi-sectoral systems
Leadership for SDG 6.2: Is Diversity Missing? (discusses the lack of diversity in senior levels of WASH organisations)
Lessons in Failure: Applying an Organizational Learning Framework to Understanding Attitudes Towards Failure in Development (discusses how we can learn from failures in environmental and public health and embed these lessons into our organisations)
Measuring the prevalence of urinary incontinence in children aged five to 12 in an emergency setting: lessons learned in Tukaley, Ethiopia (discusses how an interactive tool was unable to measure urinary incontinence prevalence directly, but how other measures may indicate continence concerns)
Optimized and Non-Optimized Personal Protective Equipment Use during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Thailand: A National Cross-Sectional Survey in a Resource-Limited Setting (discusses the improper use of proper personal protective equipment to prevent COVID spread in Thailand)
Potential Pitfalls in Wastewater Phosphorus Analysis and How to Avoid Them (discusses why better standard procedures are needed for measuring phosphorous in wastewater)
2020
Sustainable sanitation jobs: prospects for enhancing the livelihoods of pit-emptiers in Bangladesh (discusses some of the failures in programmes attempting to improve the lives of pit-emptiers)
2017
Social Science and Medicine: Sanitation marketing: a systematic review and theoretical critique using the capability approach (discusses various failures of the traditional ‘sanitation marketing’ approach)
2013
An untold story of policy failure: the Total Sanitation Campaign in India