Comments

Interesting post - in particular I wonder about the factors that led to a decline in community participation over time.

Bill, Thanks for your comment. Our survey, which we completed late last year, had two important aims. One was to look back over the last ten years, where revenues have tripled, and see what impact this has had on service delivery. This sort of benchmarking is critical for every country. Going back to the same schools and health centres which were surveyed 10 years ago is a great opportunity to identify areas of progress and regress. The other aim of the survey was precisely to examine the impact of recent government reforms, such as the central government support in place of school fees. Is that support reaching schools, and how are they using it? It would be a grave mistake to assume that DSIP and other forms of devolved funding will solve the problems of lack of maintenance and understaffing at the front line of service delivery. DSIP and similar funds are invariably spent on projects. This means new roads and new buildings, or perhaps rehabilitated roads and buildings. Even if these are useful investments, there is no guarantee that the roads will be maintained, or the new facilities staffed. Our analysis shows that recurrent funding is being squeezed at the expense of the huge boom in devolved development spending. Finally, even if you think DSIP is the solution to PNG's development problems, then you will be interested in our research, because our analysis of schools and health centres reveals a lot about how DSIP is being used. We found lots of unfinished DSIP projects, and also examples of projects which were completed but are not being utilized due to lack of staff. If you're interested, please check out the <a href="http://devpolicy.anu.edu.au/png-budget-project/budget-fora/" rel="nofollow">project website</a> and especially the presentations made at the February budget forum. We plan to release the results of our analysis in the second half of the year. You can also find a really good video of the budget forum which EMTV has just released <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUR0Oqa6FTQ" rel="nofollow">here</a>.

Dear Robin, Many thanks for the update from Dili. It is a great overview. I'm wondering if you can give a bit more of a sense of how the discussions of ‘fragile states’ were linked (or not) to earlier discussions about the unique development challenges facing small states (particularly small island developing states) and earlier attempts at forging a 'bloc identity' for small and vulnerable states. Putting aside discussions about technical definition of membership for a moment (there has been a long debate about what constitutes a 'small state' or a 'small and vulnerable state') the unique challenges and concerns of small states have long been of concern to multilateral agencies like UNCTAD and the Commonwealth Secretariat. The particular challenges faced by small island states led to a global UN conference in Barbados in 1994, which drew up a ‘Barbados Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States’. A key challenge was to identify exactly what made small states (which were often island states) unique. Key concerns were around exposure to ecological disasters and economic shocks, as well as a number of unavoidable constraints associated with small size. The concept of ‘vulnerability’ emerged as a defining feature of small island developing states (and small states more generally). Subsequent to the Barbados meeting, in 1998, the Commonwealth Secretariat drew up a ‘Commonwealth Vulnerability Index for Developing Countries’, and perhaps unsurprisingly most states on the index were small states or small island states. In the late 1990s a concern also emerged that small states faced economic marginalisation as a result of global trade liberalisation (as many small states in the Pacific, the Caribbean and Africa relied on postcolonial trade preferences for key exports). In this context, it was seen as imperative that specific work programs be developed for small and vulnerable states at a range of multilateral agencies. In 1998 the Commonwealth Secretariat and the World Bank established a ‘Joint Task Force on Small States’ which sought to identify ways that multilateral and regional donor institutions might better meet the needs of small states. A report was produced in 2000 that included ‘development frameworks towards small states’ from: the African Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Commonwealth Secretariat, the Inter-American Development bank, the IMF, the UN (including UNDP and UNCTAD), the World Bank and the World Trade Organisation. Early in the new millennium there was even discussion of a new category of states at the WTO – which would allow for special and differential treatment, and new aid for trade for small and vulnerable economies. At the launch of the Doha Round in 2001 the WTO established a work programme specifically intended frame responses to challenges faced by small vulnerable economies in the international trading system. However this programme has, to date, achieved relatively few outcomes for small states. With regard to ecological challenges, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) at the UN has of course been very important from the early 1990s; advocating for strong multilateral action on climate change. Climate change is, ultimately, an existential threat for some small states in the Pacific and elsewhere. In recent times AOSIS has also led campaigns for ‘Loss and Damage’ measures to be considered as part of the global climate change negotiations. AOSIS is now calling for ‘an international solidarity fund that would compensate countries for economic and non-economic losses stemming from slow-onset climate impacts’. Outside of the climate talks, and here I may well be wrong, it seems momentum for a ‘bloc identity’ for small states in international fora has slowed somewhat in recent years. To return to the Dili Meeting then, is it accurate to suggest that this new alliance of ‘fragile states’ – which seems to link previous groupings of small and vulnerable states with ‘conflict affected’ states – might reinvigorate the search for a ‘bloc identity’ for vulnerable states in international fora, specifically through the attempt to negotiate and frame ‘post-MDG’ goals tailored to their unique needs? I too have tended to avoid ‘the smokestacks of the post-2015 industry’ but if these talks among ‘fragile states’ allow for discussion to move on to the unique policy measures and international partnerships that are needed for encouraging inclusive development in states like those of the Pacific region, perhaps the post-2015 discussion will be very useful after all. Regards Wesley

Great article Kate and Marianne. It clearly points out the advantages of women’s economic empowerment and how it can be enhanced and in turn, enhance development. But we still have a long way to go. While women and girls health and education in developing countries have improved, women continue to trail men in formal labour force participation, access to credit, entrepreneurship0 rates, income levels and inheritance and ownership rights. The World Bank says it’s smart economics to invest in women. Underinvesting in women limits development, slows down poverty reduction and economic growth. The Bank produces papers and facts and figures to support this. But even they say that if they couldn’t show that it enhanced economic development, they wouldn’t be interested. So what about women’s rights and the improvement of women’s lives as an end it itself, as opposed to how useful women in speeding up development. The OECD DAC Paper on Women’s Economic Empowerment mentioned in the blog spells it out. It says women’s economic empowerment is a prerequisite for sustainable development, pro-poor growth and the achievement of all the MDGs. At the same time it is about rights and equitable societies. It also points out that women experience barriers in almost every aspect of work. At the same time women perform the bulk of unpaid care work. This latter never seems to receive much attention and is an area for much greater attention by donors through increased recognition and valuing of the ways in which care work supports thriving economies. Indeed, it also need to be addressed in developed countries. And why is there so much attention to microcredit rather than macrocredit for women. I’ve had women in Timor-Leste ask me why the men always get the big things like cattle and they always get the small things like chickens. The men can make $100a month out of the cattle while the women only make about $10 from the chickens. And little attention seems to be paid to the possible adverse effects of microcredit loans. The DAC paper points out that often the loans are inflexible, have an exorbitantly high interest rate attached to them and repayment starts immediately putting enormous psychological pressure on the workers, affecting productivity and output. It is repeatedly heard that people prefer not to enter into a microcredit loan as they fear that they will lose everything. In Bangladesh, for instance, women do better when they band together in a co-operative structure and both their economic and social standing in the household improve. Women’s social standing, i.e. their status, both in the family and the community is crucial to their welfare and those of their children. In West Africa, when cash cropping was introduced back in the 1960s, all the new technology and money was directed to the men and the women lost their control over family finances through loss of earnings from the excesses from their vegetable gardens that they would normally sell in the markets and use the income for their children’s education and general welfare. Recent World Bank studies in four African countries show that providing women farmers with the same quantity and quality of inputs that men typically receive, and improving their access to agricultural education, could increase national agricultural output and incomes by an estimated 10 to 20 per cent. Why has it taken us so long – over 50 years – to learn this lesson. In fact it hasn’t taken us 50 years to learn this lesson. Most of us working in the world of gender equality have always known it. What has taken so long is for decision makers to listen. Why do women have to fight for equality in everything? Why do so few people in influential positions support them? A few years ago, the DAC pointed out that amongst donors, it was mostly relatively junior level staff who pushed for attention to gender equality and that it be included in project designs, monitoring, etc. It appears that women’s rights and gender equality become less and less visible they higher you go up the donors’ ladders. Why is this? Where is the logic in it, especially if the evidence shows that assisting women leads to development? Why is there still so much actual resistance to women’s equality – from extreme cases like the Taliban shooting a 14 year old girl because she wanted to go to school, to persistent structural and cultural discrimination and endemic, so called domestic, violence against women and girls. Even in the developed Western world, women still do more of the housework and child care than men, not to mention almost all the unpaid care work. How much of the world’s women’s talents and contributions to development have been wasted over the centuries and are still being wasted today. So, a great blog about the ECF and what it’s achieving for women’s economic empowerment but on this International Women’s Day, let’s try and do even more.

Robin, thank you for taking the time to provide such a lengthy and detailed response - it is good to get this sense of what the discussions covered over and above what was captured in the final consensus document

It is too bad that the FSM's delegate to this convention, Senator Peter Christian, had to cancel out because of domestic commitments. We would have liked to participate. In any event Robin's report is excellent and thought provoking. My concern in reading the report is I am not sure what a how goal is and how it can be better than a what goal. I hope it does not become a ready made excuse. Churchill said :"sometimes it's not good enough to do your best, you have to do what it takes." I also am a little ambivalent about this newfound bloc identity. For this bloc, the measure of success for any member is to be able to leave the bloc behind.

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.