Getting back to basics
After nearly three decades of shaping, applying and advocating for market systems development (MSD), the Springfield Centre reckons that the field needs an honest appraisal of what has happened as systemic approaches have expanded into new sectors and organisations.
At the upcoming Donor Committee for Enterprise Development Global Seminar in Nairobi, we will argue that MSD’s proliferation has brought progress but also dilution and drift. In trying to respond to every adjacent agenda – climate, GEDSI, fragility, employment and beyond – the field has become more diverse but lost discipline. The language of systems has spread rapidly but the core practices needed to achieve systemic change have not kept pace.
MSD discourse has become increasingly inward facing: more frameworks, tools and complexity, but not necessarily more compelling to the policymakers, funders and new aid actors whose support will shape the field’s future.
The proposition is not that MSD should stop evolving. It is that the field may need to consolidate – to get back to basics – before it expands further: more disciplined about its core principles, more rigorous in its claims and more focused on demonstrating leverage, sustainability and lasting change.
🗓️ If you’re attending the Global Seminar, join the debate on Tuesday, June 16, 2026, 2:30 PM to 3:45 PM