Culture and Social Policy in International Development

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Culture and Social Policy in International
Development

• Series Values, ideas and welfare cultures in
  comparative perspective
• Rachel Hinton
• UK DFID, Feb 2009

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Department For International Development

• Formed in 1997
• 5bn GBP budget 2007
• Rise to 9.1bn by 2010/11 (0.56 of GNI)
• 40 major programmes
• Total staff of 3000, of which 1800 are UK staff
• UK SOS Douglas Alexander, MOS Gareth Thomas

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Poverty is falling, but progress is unevenShare
of people living below 1 a day (Source World
Bank)
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Tracking Aid expenditure
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Strategic Overview
White Paper - focus on outcomes
Accountability and Reporting
Millennium Development Goals
promoting international co-ordination
reporting to Parliament and Treasury
Strategy papers
Public Service Agreements (including expenditure
baseline) Output Performance Analysis
Institutional strategy papers
policy papers
Country strategy papers
Departmental report
Policy and Resource plans
to development partners and UK taxpayers
projects and programmes
coordination and influencing
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Priorities for DFID

• The Ministerial team and Permanent Secretary have
  set four key priorities for DFID that will give
  us the best chance of meeting the Millennium
  Development Goals and our service agreement with
  the government (our Public Service Agreement or
  PSA). They are
• Growth and trade
• Climate change
• Reform of the international institutions
• Conflict and fragile states.

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Values

• ambition and determination to eliminate poverty
• diversity and the need to balance work and
  private life
• ability to work effectively with others
• desire to listen, learn and be creative
• professionalism and knowledge.

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Changes in Aid Environment
NEEDS
PROJECTS
RIGHTS
S-SECTOR
DBS
SectorWide
Aid Environment(MACRO)
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Changes in Aid Environment
NEEDS
PROJECTS
RIGHTS
S-SECTOR
DBS
Methodological Environment(MICRO)
Sectorwide
KNOWLEDGEGENERATION
Aid Environment(MACRO)
LOCAL REP-RESENTATIONS
DATA EXTRACTION
FACILITATION
IMPOSED CATEGORIES
EXTERNAL ANALYSIS
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The ideas to deliver better aid

• Harmonised support
• Focused on results
• Allocated where most needed
• Building rather than undermining government
  systems
• More Predictable

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White Paper 2006

Eliminating World Poverty Making Governance
Work for the Poor
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DFID Commitments

• Help build states that work for poor people
• Help people get security, incomes
• Increase access to public services
• Work internationally to tackle climate change
• Create an international system fit for the 21st
  century
• Support UK public involvement

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1. Help to build states that work for poor people

• We will
• Support capability, accountability and
  responsiveness of states
• Base decisions on whether governance is getting
  better or worse
• Promote international standards for responsible
  business behaviour
• Work to fight international corruption in the UK

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2. Help people get security - increase their
incomes

• support private sector development
• get more investment in infrastructure and
  agriculture
• work for trade rules that work for the poor
• promote more productive, sustainable use of
  natural resources
• help manage migration to benefit all countries

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3. Help people access services

• Provide 50 of future aid for basic services
• help provide social protection for the poorest
• make 10 year commitments
• help get children into school and improving
  healthcare
• help providing clean water and sanitation
• fight HIV and AIDS

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Power, Procedures and Relationships
Central Government
Sector and Central Ministries
Donors
Influence
Policy
Budgets,
Reporting
Local
Requirements
Citizen
Regional
Voice
Government
Services
KEY
Political processes
Ideal information flow
Local Community
Existing information flow
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Country examplesCultural difference

• Social Inclusion Strategy
• in Bosnia

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BiH context

• Politics Dayton Peace Agreement 1995
• MIC Two entities the Federation of BiH (FBiH)
  and the Republika Srpska (RS). 10 cantons
  municipalities. Brcko district
• 17.8 below poverty line, 2 million refugees or
  IDP,
• 45 unemployment
• Key priorities EU integration, good governance,
  social inclusion, gender
• Future currently none of the social welfare aid
  through the N budget
• Aid invasion of donors /NGOs
• UK programme modest 4.5m p.a.

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Ljerka Maric Department for Economic Planning
Photo Courtesy WB PRSP Forum Athens June 2007
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TA Programme

• TA to deliver NDS and SIS
• Wanted legacy of PRSP to continue mechanisms
  for civil society engagement with policy
• European standards
• Contracted to consultancy group brought in
  external experts

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BiH Approach

• BiH has experienced chaos to wish list models
  in past (MTDS has been described as wish list)
• significant improvement from MTDS
• priority-driven (six strategic priorities)
• attempt to cost proposals
• structured to meet future EU planning
  requirements
• CDS establishes a mega-strategy approach (CDS,
  European Integration )

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Strategic Complexity in BiH
C
C
C
Country Development Strategy
European Integration Strategic Documents
C
C
C
RS Development Sector Strategies
C
C
BD Development Sector Strategies
C
FBiH Development Sector Strategies
C
C
Canton Development Sector Strategies
C
C
C
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CPoints of Potential Policy Coherence
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Aligning Planning Processes

• the CDS will not be implemented effectively
  unless the core planning processes at the state
  and entity levels are explicitly oriented to
  this goal

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Coordinating the Planning Sector
New Technical Coord. Group
Vertical coordinating mechanisms exist for most
central institution planning functions, but
horizontal mechanisms are less common
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Resistance

• The power dynamic known, reversed
• Rent seeking vested interest in the status quo
• Double accounting
• Agencys agendas
• Played donors off against consultants
• Use resources for top ups
• Active ignoring of programmes ESRF - without
  explicit refusal funnelling expert
  resources

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The consequence of poor TA

• Pressurising local leaders vs painstaking,
  capacity-building work
• Reduces motivation pass the buck re impact
• No need to enter into State level of engagement
  circumvent the difficult task of State Building
• Let them do it for us lack ownership of
  documents and hence no buy-in for implementation
• Exacerbates lack of respect on all sides

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Reflections

• Is the influence and relevance of history,
  tradition and politics on attitudes towards
  outsiders or foreign experts inevitably going
  to undermine the development process?
• Is there always poison in the gift?
• Does it need to undermine self-respect?

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Country examplesPolicy in times of
reconstructionsustainable change?

• Education Policyin Kosovo

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Kosovo context

• Self-governing province in 1974
• 1980s KLA 1998 Serbian response
• Nato bombing 1999, Oct 1st elections
• independence from Serbia Feb. 2008
• International supervision and Kosovos commitment
  to the rights of minority communities
  constitution 15 June 2008
• Broadly on-track to meet most MDGs- main
  exception gender
• High unemployment (40-50)
• DFID focus on aid effectiveness EU
• Education policy unification of parallel system
  DESK rebuilding schools, textbooks, special
  needs, minority education
• Aid flows high 1.2 billion Euros 2009-11
• UK programme modest 5m p.a.

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UNMIK 4 pillars

• Civil administration led by the UN
• Humanitarian led by UNHCR
• Institution building led by OSCE
• Reconstruction led by the EU

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Deepening divides
UNMIK Reform
Foreign experts
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Missed Opportunities

• Capacity resource for confidence building,
  collaboration, information sharing
• National Financing increasing the status and
  credibility of the sector v-a-v other line
  ministries
• Conflict resolution failed to embrace training
  in conflict prevention, mitigation and
  resolution
• RESISTANCE
• Cannot marginalise leadership
• new young blood did not stay at local level
  exodus to INGOs/donors
• No strategy for transition to normal Ministry
  control sustainability lost

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Different approaches for different countries

• Focus on countries with greatest impact on
  development and most poor people

Low-income countries with plans to reduce poverty
Range of funding channels
Low-income countries with Poverty Reduction
Strategies

Middle-income countries

Fragile states
Middle-income countries
Uganda
Vietnam
Fragile states
Tanzania, Mozambique
Yemen Afghanistan
India, China, South Africa
Sudan, DRC,
Brazil, Russia
Maintain links with other Middle Income Countries
through EU assistance
Greater use of UN and civil society
PRBS if governance works, multi-laterals/other
donors where possible
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Why the mismatch?

• Procedures
• Bureaucratic conformity
• Acceptance of diversity
• Negotiated process
• Innovation and flexibility based on
  socio-cultural sensitivity and knowledge
• Organisational Pressures
• Pressure for disbursement
• Balance between pressures for disbursement and
  results
• Pressure for results and impact assessment
• Philosophy of change
• Deterministic closed
• Open system without recognition of complexity
• Non-deterministic, complex, open system

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The logframe
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• Everything should be as simple as possible
• but not simpler.
• Albert Einstein