Disaggregating Governance Indicators

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Disaggregating Governance Indicators

• Why Local Governance is important and how it can
  be measured
  
• Shipra Narang
• UN-HABITAT

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The imperative of measuring governance

• Increasing focus on governance issues over the
  last decade
  
• Relationship of governance with poverty
• Good Governance is perhaps the single most
  important factor in eradicating poverty and
  promoting development Kofi Annan
  
• Need to develop objective, measurable indicators
  to assess the quality of governance
  
• Existing governance indicators either
  holistic/aggregate (e.g. HDI), or extremely
  narrow (e.g. CPI)

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Key issues in measuring governance

• Input, output, outcome, performance, perception,
  process and many other indicators?
  
• Governance indicators are more about process
  than anything else
  
• Credible and robust indicators?
• Universality or contextualisation?
• Universality hold the key to comparability,
  while contextualisation captures specific local
  conditions

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Key issues in measuring governance

• Ownership
• Participatory processes must be integral to
  indicator development, collection and analysis,
  in order to ensure ownership
  
• Global, national, regional or local?
• Integer or profile?
• Disaggregation holds the key to meaningful
  utilisation of governance data

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Disaggregation at sub-national and local levels

• Governance data at national level is not, by
  itself, a good enough measure of the quality of
  governance in a country
  
• Issues such as participation, accountability and
  efficiency often reflected more accurately at the
  local level
  
• Local governance indicators can point towards the
  need for reform at the national level
  
• Sub-national and local governance indicators can
  also help in identifying instances of poor
  application of good policies, or issues related
  to capacity constraints

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Disaggregation by issues or principles

• Can such a complex and multi-dimensional issue as
  governance be expressed through a single summary
  measure?
  
• Five UN principles norms or principles of good
  urban governance
  
• Effectiveness
• Equity
• Accountability
• Participation
• Security
• Disaggregation enables the identification of
  precise gaps for policy reform, formulation of
  change plans, or capacity building

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Disaggregation by population

• Governance data must reflect the characteristics
  of different sections of the population
  
• Disaggregation can be based on
• Gender
• Income and social characteristics
• Ethnicity and origin, etc.
• Disaggregation by population can help to direct
  attention and policies towards specific groups
  usually excluded from governance processes

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The Urban Governance Index (UGI) Objectives

• Global level To demonstrate the importance of
  good urban governance in achieving broad
  development goals, facilitate comparison of
  cities
• Local level Catalyse local action to improve the
  quality of local governance
  

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The UGI Selection of indicators

• 66 26 25
• Two expert group meetings
• Two field tests in 24 cities
• Five sub-indices reduced to four
• Criteria for indicator selection
• Consistency with governance principles
• Ease of collection
• Credibility
• Comparability across countries

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What does the UGI reveal?

• Governance processes at the local level
  (complements national indicators as well input,
  output, perception etc. indicators)
  
• Four dimensions of local governance
• Effectiveness
• Equity
• Participation
• Accountability

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UGI Sub-Indices Comparison - Six Sri Lankan
cities
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Universality of the UGI

• Core indicators universally applicable
• Satellite indicators context-specific

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Building ownership

• Participatory methodology
• Focuses on involvement of stakeholders and
  discussion of governance issues
  
• Aims to build broad ownership not only of
  indicators, data and Index results, but also the
  policy reforms and capacity building efforts that
  follow

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Applications of the UGI

• A mechanism for initiating stakeholder
  engagement
  
• A self-assessment tool for cities
• A tool for national comparison
• A tool to establish correlation between poverty
  and governance
  

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Outcomes and impact of UGI in SL and Zimbabwe

• Greater Participation Issues such as amount of
  tax collected against the budgeted amount, what
  the taxes are being used for etc. discussed with
  citizens for the first time. Created an opening
  for the people to learn about and participate in
  the municipal resource management process.
• A commitment to transparency For instance, the
  municipality of Kandy has put up a board with UGI
  data for public view in the City Hall, and
  committed to updating it on a regular basis

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Outcomes and impact of UGI in SL and Zimbabwe
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• Increased awareness Citizens now more conscious
  of the issues of transparency, accountability and
  responsiveness. Debate on pro-poor water
  policies, informal sector, citizens charter etc.
  initiated for the first time in Zimbabwean
  cities.
• Policy change For instance, womens entry into
  the mainstream of local politics is being
  encouraged. On International Women's Day, the Sri
  Lankan President highlighted this issue in her
  address.
• A voice to the poor The demand from the
  underserved for better or the right of access to
  basic services increased with the opportunity
  given for them to participate in city activities.

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Lessons from UGI application

• Global values, Local Appeal Indicators need to
  be made clearer and more contextually relevant to
  politicians, policy-makers and stakeholders
  translation, training, capacity building go a
  long way
• Coordination, not Overlap Local authorities are
  often overburdened with collecting data for
  various indicators and reports (e.g. HDRs, local
  poverty mapping, report cards etc.) these need
  to be coordinated
• An agenda for local government associations LGAs
  can play an important role in scaling up the
  pilot efforts, collating information, building LG
  capacities

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Application of the UGI The Way Forward

• Global Discussions are ongoing with UCLG and
  CLGF to develop a Good Governance Hallmark or
  Award system based on the Index results.
  120-cities database planned in partnership with
  DFID/WB.
• Regional/ national Building partnerships to
  apply the Index in selected regions and
  countries. National application underway in
  Somalia, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, Madagascar etc.
• National/local To be extended to six more
  countries in 2005 in partnership with UNDP.
  Local (individual city) application encouraged as
  a self-assessment measure.

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Please visitwww.unhabitat.org/governancefor
more information on the Urban Governance
IndexThank you!