Other initiatives

Enriching the aid effectiveness dialogue were events organised by other stakeholders that often brought together partner countries, their aid providers and development experts in a mix of policy-makers and practitioners to exchange views and narrow the gap between them.

 An international conference on ownership and accountability, co-sponsored by Switzerland, Germany and the London School of Economics, considered the practical implications for national development strategies. Country-level experiences in accountability, sovereignty, policy success factors, policy-making and power dynamics were examined. My input was to highlight the following points (Abdel-Malek, 2009c) based on WP experience.

a) It was a mistake to treat ownership and accountability separately – these were two sides of the same coin.

b) CSOs had an important role in enhancing ownership and accountability, but they needed to develop guidelines to govern their behaviour and become more accountable.

c) Interaction among development actors occurred within a power-sharing continuum and showed that stakeholders’ participation thrived where plurality prevailed.

d) The limited progress was due to entrenched practices on both sides and lack of capacity and incentives to deliver results.

e) Achieving more progress depended on political leadership leading behaviour change and building stronger capacities. In citing these

points, I tried to caution against using abstract constructs or fragmented approaches that deal with issues in “silos”.

 A Policy workshop on how to move beyond the Paris Framework, in Berlin (BMZ, 2009),²¹ considered two issues: implementing Paris and Accra commitments, and constructing a “light governance framework”

to give more space to non-DAC, private sector and partner countries.

There was agreement to (a) use simpler language to sustain political engagement and publicise the benefits of improved aid effectiveness;

(b) strengthen partner-country capacities, confirm commitments for greater use of country systems and avoid monopolising the debate in discussions with partner countries; and (c) focus on monitoring credible results of “delivering real things to real people” and strength-ening mutual accountability frameworks. This was also a lively meeting in which one could detect a meeting of minds on some crucial issues.

 A Mexico policy dialogue invited participants from Latin America, Europe, the Middle East and international and regional development agencies to review the region’s experience in managing development assistance and explore how different actors could collaborate to improve aid impact. Challenges of capacity-building and supporting fragile states received much attention. My input underscored the need to strengthen country-led development strategies, use concrete plans to improve institutional capacity, tap middle-income countries’ experi-ences, and refrain from magnifying differences between the Paris and Accra principles and those governing SSC. I argued that we, instead, must seek common good practices in both modalities (Abdel-Malek, 2009b).

 Tidewater meetings: These brought together senior development officials to discuss timely agendas. The 2010 meeting dealt with four issues: how to accelerate progress in achieving the MDGs; capacity for governance and its weaknesses; harmonising development assistance;

and trans-boundary issues (OECD DCD/DAC, 2010b). Both technical and political dimensions were debated, including institutional

21 The workshop was hosted by the BMZ and InWEnt Capacity Building International, in collaboration with The Wolfensohn Center at the Brookings Institution.

accountability. A holistic approach was necessary to examine supply- and demand-sides of governance as a basis for remedial actions.

The agenda of the 2011 meeting was devoted to development cooperation issues: how to put results at the centre of the development agenda and individual partnerships; results as value for money; risk and mutual accountability in situations of fragility; approaches to the development challenges of the Middle East and North Africa region;

policy reform and stronger private-sector engagement; and the future global development agenda.

Widely differing views debated the critical results issue, asking: Whose results? How should value-for-money be defined? Options such as the US

“cash on delivery” modality were reviewed with mixed outcomes.

Participants appealed for a sense of humility when attempting to assess ODA impact; others stressed the need to respect partner countries’

ownership and priorities in assessing results. My view was that it is not sufficient to talk about “value for money” or othernames giving the same meaning from the aid providers’ perspective alone. In fact, this could be counterproductive, as it would give the impression that these providers are driving their own agendas without regard to the interests of recipient countries. There was finally an agreement that any lasting response must be based on an open dialogue with recipient countries and be based on jointly agreed objectives.

For fragility situations, the challenge was how to operate effectively and efficiently, and manage risks. Aid providers were risk-averse, not giving enough attention to state-building and stability before addressing longer-term challenges. Their contributions had to be better coordinated and note the extremely limited institutional capacities of these countries. The recent turbulence in the Middle East and North Africa region called for a “smart”

approach, as reforms required time to show results. Their political and social contexts varied a great deal, requiring tailor-made approaches to restore growth and job creation.

An update on WP progress was given, the meeting endorsed the approach taken and priority issues were set for HLF4, emphasising the importance of having non-DAC providers join any future architecture, and finding sufficient incentives to encourage candid dialogue and learn from one another’s experiences.

 A Wilton Park (UK) meeting discussed UN Development System Reform. The potential UN contribution to the Busan agenda and future development cooperation raised the question of how best to engage with the World Body. Inclusion of the UN as a key partner in the post-Busan aid architecture became more or less mandatory to add legitimacy and use its extensive country-office network facilities. At the same time, the UN development system was due for serious reform to contribute more effectively to development. To address this, the Wilton Park meeting (United Nation Development Programme [UNDP], 2010; Wilton Park, 2010) discussed reform questions, including: Did the 30 agencies and organisations of the UN development system still give value for money? As development challenges evolved – and with the emergence of many alternatives to UN assistance – how should the system that grew up without a blueprint change also? What was still unique about the UN? And how relevant were the traditional UN development roles of norm-setting, global policy-making, research and analysis, and technical assistance?

Why had UN reform been so slow?

As there were alternatives to the system, an urgent process of renewal was necessary to strengthen relevance and improve effectiveness, including strengthening coherence at the country level in Africa and Latin America.

In joining the discussion, I referred to the implications for the UN of the yet-to-be-negotiated Global Partnership and the increasing emphasis on delivery of aid results at the country level, where the UN network was expected to play a key role.

 Development Cooperation Forum initiatives: The DCF had been active in the aid dialogue for many years.²² It sponsored a symposium in Vienna, which discussed mutual accountability and aid transparency issues, seeking agreement to set up standards for all actors on mutual accountability mechanisms and transparency initiatives. The symposium also sought to address how to strengthen national ownership and leadership and ensure active engagement of all development actors; enhance the capacity of institutions responsible

22 I served as a member of the USG Advisory Group of the DCF for seven years, building another link between the DCF and the WP. This was a valuable learning experience.

for mutual accountability; and improve access to information and promote peer learning. There was no “one-size-fits-all” formula; a local culture of accountability (which was virtually absent) was essential, and so was an inclusive approach. It was reassuring to refer to the WP-EFF as “one of the most relevant official mechanisms on accountability” (UN ECOSOC, 2010a).

Another DCF initiative on development finance was held in Helsinki against the backdrop of multiple global crises. It stressed the urgency of policy coherence in the context of fragility; the need for accountable and equal global partnerships in development cooperation; and the impact of development cooperation in reaching the MDGs. Redressing imbalances in the global governance power structure merited urgent actions, and so did the tackling of policy coherence impacting cooperation and development (Honkaniemi, 2010).

Related to this, but organised by the UN body, was a conference on development finance in New York, which called for reforming the global financial system and increasing the volume and quality of development assistance to help cope with the impact of the crisis. Policy coherence was also a principal topic (UN ECOSOC, 2010b). Although the substance of UN resolutions remained the same, meetings continued to remind political leaders of their responsibility to meet their commitments.

The DCF also commissioned a study on mutual accountability and aid transparency at the national and international levels. It examined certain questions such as: What progress was made in following best practices agreed at the DCF Vienna Symposium in November 2009? What factors appeared to determine progress? And what were the next steps to accelerate progress? Its findings (Martin, 2010) on mutual accountability pointed out that:

a) progress was limited except in a few countries that had established foundations for future progress;

b) the WP-EFF should encourage partner countries to develop annual targets for Paris indicators, such as increasing aid predictability and transparency and reducing conditionalities;

c) confusion about what accountability meant and how to measure it had to be addressed;

d) there was a strong need for regular global assessment of progress at national levels;

e) improving non-executive participation in accountability was a top priority; and

f) progress among aid providers required more peer pressure for policy change at national and global levels.

The study served as a principal reference on this issue.

 EU accountability initiative: The EU Council decided to adopt a holistic approach to accountability and transparency, with domestic accountability in partner countries being a key to ensuring good governance. It undertook to disclose information on aid volume and allocation, ensuring that data was internationally comparable by using the OECD/DAC Credit Reporting System. This included the provision of indicative, forward-looking spending plans for three to five years and disaggregated data on all aid flows. A joint framework for monitoring joint commitments on aid effectiveness was to be set up (Council of the European Union, 2011). This measure, when implemented, was likely to streamline EU procedures and alleviate recipient countries’ burden of dealing with a variety of requirements.

 What about civil society actions? Civil society had been aware for some time of the need to undertake in-house reform, prompted by the realisation that discussions of aid effectiveness implied having to “look themselves in the mirror” to identify weaknesses and the means to deal with them. CSOs – both international and local – were facing mounting criticism about certain practices and had clashed with governments in partner countries, which acted by restricting their activities. A CSO meeting in Istanbul addressed these challenges to strengthen their integrity and speak with a stronger voice in advocating aid reform.

The Istanbul Statement (Open Forum for CSO Development Effectiveness, 2010) stressed CSOs “as voluntary, diverse, partisan, autonomous, non-violent development actors”. It formulated principles to guide their work, which included: respect and promote human rights and social justice;

embody gender equality and equity while promoting women and girls’

rights; focus on peoples’ empowerment, democratic ownership and participation; promote environmental sustainability; practice transparency

and accountability; pursue equitable partnerships and solidarity; create and share knowledge; and commit to mutual learning and realising positive, sustainable change. These were laudable principles that, once mainstreamed in CSO practice, would produce a much needed win-win outcome all around.

Although our review refers to a long list of initiatives, it does not do justice to other worthwhile events advancing the same objectives. Our purpose has been to demonstrate in some concrete manner the magnitude and range of events by key stakeholders rather than give a comprehensive account.

What did these initiatives mean? Apart from the sheer magnitude and scope of the dialogue and interactions that occurred, most initiatives adopted a pragmatic style rather than a theoretical approach to the issues addressed. Having been a participant to most of these events, I was also impressed by the wide range of stakeholders invited to these events who were considering different viewpoints and seeking areas of agreement as well as identifying differences. The events served as a “melting pot” of ideas and approaches, which could only produce a better understanding – if not full agreement – of opinions defended by others. In the final analysis, the outcomes of these initiatives had to be tested in terms of:

 how stakeholders’ interactions were likely to help generate a consensus in Busan, and

 to what extent the benefits of the dialogue translated into changes of behaviour that would lead to actual improvements in development cooperation policies and procedures.

Only time would tell.