Vietnamese CSOs are now a key player in the development process of the country. Their power relations with other actors depend on how the forms, spaces and level of power are used and developed. As a rubric of power is evolving, the impact and influence of VCSOs on different policy issues quickly shift. Understanding this rubric of power and the change process is important to VCSOs to make their voices better heard and make change happen.
An analysis of power relations of VCSOs on the three dimensions of the rubric is useful for assessing interests and incentives of various actors that can support or block a particular policy. This is an important way of understanding complex change processes. Conducting a power analysis can contribute to answering major questions that VCSOs often face like how does change occur and what can change agents (civil society, donors…) do to support it and identifying behaviors of individuals, organizations and groups, as shaped by incentives, opportunities, and external events which provide short-term opportunities or impediments to change.