A quick brief on diffusion of innovations. Among other things, this reports that innovation moves best from person to person, and that often the necessary innovation already exists within a given society – it does not need to be developed by an outside expert. This ties in with the idea of positive deviance. Positive deviance posits that solutions to problems already exist within the societies having those problems – you just have to locate them. For example, even in a desperately poor village, there are always one or two families somehow doing better on the same amount of money. Their kids are less malnourished, they are sick less often. The key is to find out what people are already doing to survive better and share that knowledge.

I love the idea because it means you don’t need expensive experts to solve problems – you can go to the people themselves for solutions. It makes sense – people already living with a problem know a lot more about it than some PhD who has never had to face it in day to day life.