Comments

As I have travelled through Indonesia over the years I have been impressed with the number and apparent utility of the steel bridges, some of which still carry faded Transfield construction signs. You have stimulated me to get a copy of an old evaluation report on the project that built these to see what lessons were learned all those years ago. An interesting side story: I think it was one of these bridges that collapsed in South Sumatra. But this was a result of a really unintended consequence of bridge building. It seems becak drivers would shelter under the bridge and urinate on a particular support. This eventually corroded away, leading to the collapse. We can't blame the donor for that!!

Tess, In response to your question about the absence of an explicit reference to gender-based violence in the Dili Consensus, I think the short answer is that it reflects a strategic choice to home in on broad goal areas that are completely missing in action at present, rather than areas that are considered to be at least partly reflected in the MDGs. In addition, the heavy emphasis given to peace, justice and human rights is of course relevant in a general sense. That said, gender-based violence is obviously fundamentally different in kind from violence associated with social conflict, largely eludes measurement and law enforcement and cannot be said to be reflected in the MDGs: MDG3 on gender equality and women’s empowerment has just one associated target, relating to gender equality in education, and none of the four associated indicators relates to the prevalence of violence against women. I think these points were well-recognised in the discussions in Dili. At the front end, ESCAP’s Executive Secretary, Noeleen Heyzer, drew a link between security at the societal level and violence against women, saying that the latter was often a barometer of the former. In the course of preliminary discussions among Pacific island countries, on 26 February, there was some debate about the double-edged character of the concept of “culture,” the preservation of which was seen as an important goal for the region but also a potential barrier to the elimination of discrimination and violence against women. In addition, Dame Carol Kidu of PNG emphasised the potentially distorting effects of narrowly-defined MDG targets, which in the health sector may have led to a reduced emphasis on certain health services of particular importance to women, including family planning and adolescent health. And finally, Timor-Leste’s Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao included explicit reference to ending violence against women in his closing address. I should note that a range of other important points were quite prominent in discussions but not explicit in the final, broad consensus document, given the nature of the latter. These included points relating to educational quality, non-communicable diseases, private sector development and access to credit, and women’s political representation.

Perhaps most tellingly, the Dili conference appears to have been a conference "by the fragile, for the fragile", and as such, its outcomes might be understood as being "of the fragile". In this sense, the most encouraging thing in Robin's report is the observation that calls for aid were less notable than calls for ownership. The first baby steps away from fragility may come from acting with robustness, and in this sense the final point - the possibility of "how" goals instead of "what" - may be the logical next step to transcending the objectification inherent in MDGs overall. I will watch that space with interest.

Thanks Robin for this post and commentary which is really useful. I have noted as have others that the Dili consensus makes no reference to addressing the issue of gender based violence. This is a huge problem in the Pacific as we know (& in conflict-affected states pre-existing problems are often exacerbated) so it would be instructive to learn how, if at all, it figured in the discussions in Dili.

The infrastructure and maintenance situation across PNG has been well documented. The Team seem to be reinventing the wheel. The O' Neill government has acknowledged the situation and funded districts to improve social and economic infrastructure, i.e. K10 mil for each of the 89 districts per annum under DSIP. The problem now to be addressed is capacity at the district level to use funds appropriately, i.e. limit corruption and use quality contractors. Moreover a complete revitalisation of the public service is necessary to provide effective service delivery. The recently announced Special Parliamentary Committee on Public Sector Reform and Service Delivery forms part of the Govt's response to this problem. Hon. Bire Kimisopa MP is chairman of the Committee and has the support of the PM to radically overhaul the public service. I consider this a case of research lagging behind Govt intervention.

Thanks for a great article. Acemoglu and Robinson talk about the interactions between economic and political institutions and their vicious/virtuous circles - these institutions can support each other towards becoming either more extractive or more inclusive. In other words, they treat politics as endogenous, which means it's misleading to try to structure their thesis into an independent "x" and a dependent "y". You mention Japan which is actually a good example of this - the Meiji reforms created a virtuous circle, with more inclusive institutions leading to even more inclusive institutions (the Diet) over time, and economic growth occurring with every move toward more inclusiveness. I like the idea of the "innovation frontier", as this seems to provide a concept of how current Chinese growth is probably different from previous Soviet growth. However, commentators on A&R's theory usually assume, as you have, that the prediction is that China's growth is limited. An alternative possibility consistent with the theory is that the increased inclusiveness of the economic institutions leads to pressure on the political institutions to become more inclusive. For example, one can imagine a more educated and wealthy populace demanding unfettered internet access and other political freedoms. On the flipside, China could still turn bad; we have only seen 30 years of economic growth, which is not really that long a period. We must not fall into the "irrational exuberance" trap of extrapolating trends in the same way as 1929 share market participants did before the crash. It is useful to note that the Soviet Union created similar sentiment by growing for a similar period, but then stalled. I commend your desire for a more detailed specification of "inclusive" vs "extractive", and await with interest the next instalment.

Much of this discussion is about the concern that Western NGOs engaging in international development can be coopted by their own governments (or other Western governments). While there may be concerns about this as a distraction from the founding mission of social change organizations, I am curious if the writers could address the issue of local, developing-country, NGOs being overly influenced by their own or outside governments? In the Lao PDR, a nascent civil society struggles to find flexible support without strings attached. They find themselves pulled by international assistance and their dollars asking for clearer financial accountability, transparency, and equity; and pushed by the national and local governments to be accountable only to local officials. There is scarcely room for accountability to original interest groups in the equation. Most NGOs here end up serving an agenda set by international development assistance and/or local governments. I have several specific questions on which I would be very interested to read people's comment: 1) How, as international development assistance organizations, are we to support self-determination in the face of near overwhelming pressure for alignment in one direction or the other? 2) What are we to do when local culture and interests do not coincide with our values of organizations accountable to membership and managed with transparency? 3) There was much discussion about whether iNGOs provide value for money, but I would be interested to see if we can justify organizational capacity development assistance to local NGOs focused on accountability, participation, and transparency with any clear indication that this capacity building leads to greater performance? Thanks. MJ

Marcus P - I have just discovered your entry of Feb 21. There is no feature on this blog to get email notification of a new comment. I didn't propose "simple and neat solutions to the development challenges of PNG." You are attributing something to me which is easy to repudiate since no reasonable person would suggest such a thing. I pointed out a prerequisite for a functional democratic polity. That is all. The idea—the whole idea—is that with a proper structure the locals can develop themselves. I have nothing to say about their development challenges, let alone offer solutions. I am cheered to see you think PR is an obvious reform but you think it won't revolutionise behaviour. I think it would. It has done so everywhere else. But that's a bit off the point. I can't guarantee a new dawn. The point is that without constitutional reform there is no chance of any new dawn. I made no "strong claim that culture ... is irrelevant to political behaviour." Culture IS behaviour. Culture, I said (many times in several thousand words) is irrelevant to political structure. Structure. My claim that culture is irrelevant to political structure is wide open to falsification: just find a (successful, democratic) structure that reflects the culture of the country. Every country's constitution will contain fancy cultural sentiments but the political design will be just a political design similar and dissimilar to other countries but not reflecting local culture. The corollary is that PNG can take any structure that is working somewhere else and it will work for PNG. More than that: PNG MUST take a structure that is working somewhere else. And it must forget about taking any alleged PNG cultural feature into account in that design. Let the elected representatives worry about the culture. They will handle it well if they are operating within a viable structure. Finally, what "most informed observers say about political behaviour in PNG and everywhere else" may be wrong. In particular, pejorative assertions about culture in the context of political behaviour are not only arrogant but ultimately incorrect. It was not religious culture in Northern Ireland that caused the Troubles. It was not New Zealand's dysfunctional culture that caused their problems. In both cases it was dysfunctional political structure. Similarly it was not culture that caused the Bougainville tragedy; it was the structure, namely the uninterested colonial authority and later the unbridled majoritarian PNG assembly.

Stephen, Just found your comment. Glad to take up your three points. Point 1a. Majoritarian unicameral is doomed to fail. First thing is that Botswana is bicameral. See e.g., http://www.bartleby.com/151/fields/59.html Lijphart in "Thirty-six democracies" (highly recommended) rates Botswana with the UK as "between medium-strength and weak bicameralism." He rates India along with Canada, Spain, France and Venezuela as "medium-strength bicameralism." As far as I know no country has made the unicameral majoritarian structure work. Point 1b. The upper house has next to no power. Many people have remarked on this—and yet it curbs. Upper houses like UK, Canada and the former NZ have virtually no formal power and are disgracefully undemocratic. They tend to be sinecures for senior people being "kicked upstairs." It seems, though, that they have enough prestige that the government avoids their criticism. The evidence is that even those appalling upper houses are doing some curbing. If you're interested, the best reference is probably Meg Russell, "Reforming the House of Lords: lessons from overseas." NZ was immediately in trouble when, after a century of complaining about it, they managed to abolish the upper house around 1950. Forty years later they threw their Westminster heritage in the bin and changed to West German PR. Lucky to pull it off, actually. Point 2. PNG pollies won't want reform. So true. I did make the point in a previous post ("Electoral reform is a thankless undertaking..."). Power is seldom relinquished and especially not by professional power-brokers. Power is taken, not granted, and yet all those Australian houses did the switch. The politicians hated it. In most cases it was a huge saga and they had to be dragged backwards into it, kicking and screaming, wailing and gnashing their teeth. In NSW the saga spanned 50 years with many wondrous twists and turns. In WA it took 16 very angry years. Politicians hate reform. In opposition they will give it lip service to embarrass the government and when they win power they'll do anything not to pursue it. Yet it has actually happened six times: Senate, NSW, SA, WA, NZ, Vic. So it can be done. It has to be done. In PNG it is vital that there come a day, as in those other six polities, when, after all the arguments and acres of newsprint and hundreds of pages of Hansard, a majority in the legislature raise their hands and vote for a proper system. It will be an hour of high drama with the losing minority in a state of grief and the winning majority grim-faced, devoid of victory exultation. Crucial to the reforms in Australia and NZ was the presence of two strong parties whereby one of them felt it was missing out. That is not the situation in PNG so reform won't happen unless there is outside pressure. That means Australia. The guts of the message has to be: "Dear PNG Polly, Your structure has never been known to work. You know that in practice it is crooked. Do the right thing for your country." Their patriotism will have to be reinforced with inducements—Australia again. It was Australian negligence before independence that caused the situation. Australia has to fix it. The situation must not be allowed to go on. Were it not for the mineral wealth, PNG could just continue to crumble with Australia mitigating the worst effects. But the resource curse is going to strike and present donors will count for nothing. Without reform, if history is a guide the reasonable prognosis is: coup d'état, Torrens title, genocide in Bougainville, refugee camps in Queensland. Australia will spend decades bleating impotently and cringing in the UN and then in 40 years or so: truth and reconciliation commission, resettlement of refugees, excavation of mass graves—and a PR electoral system. Point 3. Donors shouldn't influence. Who are these donors? I thought it was basically Australia—who else? Why shouldn't donors exercise influence? Don't they want the best for the country?

The Australian Council for International Development has conducted their <a href="http://www.acfid.asn.au/resources/docs_resources/aid-diversion-summary" rel="nofollow">own analysis</a> of the diversion, identifying in each country/region the sectors from which projects will be deferred (drawn from the AusAID website). Unfortunately AusAID still hasn't provided details about what specific projects will be deferred or cancelled.

Tony - great piece, and I strongly recommend that people go and read your full submission at the Review website. One minor point (with both your article and the submission) is that, along with SOPAC, it was SPBEA that was 'absorbed' into SPC, not SPREP. The less-than-satisfactory outcome of the RIF review process captures pretty well the weaknesses inherent in the regional political architecture. Those organisations that were able to secure the support of a strong political champion managed to survive, while a few orphan children were left as a token gesture towards consolidation. The description in your submission of PICTs as "a group of individually insignificant developing countries standing in a circle facing outwards, backs to each other" really touched a chord with me. Thank you.

I think this is a good point. Many years ago (very many if fact) a program of small bridges for rural roads (in many countries as I recall) was seen as a success, and yes good rural roads makes sense (not thought about so often, but school buses become more reliable and parent send their kids, girls in particular, to school), so the bridges were probably a good idea. The issue with schools and clinics is whether they are staffed at the end of the day. AusAID has history of white elephants of unused hospitals and the like since the 1950s I expect. But how do we know there is the capacity to fill them (schools that is) with both teachers and students. If something is offered for nothing then it will be taken (human nature!). The question then is whether the evaluation process is robust enough to see if at the end of the day (or several years down the track) are these things being used.