MAKING DEMOCRACY DELIVER – EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Executive Summary
Democratic Governance
United Nations Development Programme
304 East 45th Street, New York, NY 10017
www.undp.org/governance
June 2007
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MAKING DEMOCRACY DELIVER – EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Executive summary
1. Introduction: How do we make democratic governance deliver? Pippa Norris
FORGING SOCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY
2. Citizen community boards and social audits in Pakistan Patrick Keuleers
3. Civil society and social accountability Bharati Sadasivam and Bjøern Førde
4. Rights to information: experiences from India Elizabeth McCall and Alexandra Wilde
MOBILIZING ACTIVE CITIZENS
5. Mobilizing voter turnout: Nicaragua and Slovakia Aleida Ferreyra, Linda Maguire,
Noha El-Mikawy and Kango Lare-Lantone
6. Conflict-prevention and elections: Mozambique and Guyana Siphosami Malunga and
A.H. Monjurul Kabir
STRENGTHENING STATE CAPACITY TO DELIVER
7. Parliament and poverty reduction: the Tanzanian experience Vibeke Wang, Hilde B.
Selbervik, and K. Scott Hubli
8. E-governance service delivery: India and South Africa Raul Zambrano and Pierre
Dandjinou
9. Ensuring women’s rights to inheritance: Rwanda and Ethiopia Nina Berg, Haley
Horan and Deena Patel
CONCLUSIONS: ENSURING ALL PEOPLE BENEFIT
10. Conclusions: Human development, equality, and public policies Selim Jahan
Notes about Contributors
List of Related Electronic Resources
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Synopsis
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MAKING DEMOCRACY DELIVER – EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Chapter 1:
Introduction: How do we make democratic governance deliver?
Pippa Norris
How can democratic governance deliver more effectively? What are the links between
democratic governance and human development? Will the spread of democracy gradually
contribute towards the welfare of the poor and thus alleviating many of the basic problems
highlighted by the Millennium development Goals?
To address these issues, this study presents a dozen case-studies of practical governance
innovations which have been tried and tested in developing countries. These strategies hold
considerable promise of deepening democracy and strengthening human development,
gender equality, human rights, and civic engagement. Based on case-study evidence, this
study develops a theoretical framework which emphasizes that two essential conditions are
necessary to link democratic regimes with better lives for the poor: namely, there have to be
inclusive channels of political participation by all stakeholders in society, both directly
through local communities as well as indirectly through elections, and there also have to be
capable and responsive states which can manage the delivery of public goods and services.
In terms of inclusive participation, electoral democracies need effective channels to allow the
poor, weak and disadvantaged to participate equally in the public sphere, to articulate their
demands, and to advance their interests within each nation through political parties, civil
society organizations, and social movements that can press for redistributive justice.
Opportunities for participation through free and fair elections with a universal franchise, as
well as the existence of fundamental freedoms and human rights, are fundamental to
representative democracy. Direct channels of social accountability, exemplified by
community boards, social audits, and participatory processes of local decision-making, are
other important institutions helping to facilitate this process, especially in weak states where
the formal institutions of representative democracy are flawed or inadequate. Through these
multiple channels, ordinary people can express their demands on the state, pressure public
officials, and hold elected representatives and governments accountable for their actions.
But raising public demands and expectations cannot work in isolation from other conditions.
In terms of a responsive state, the capacity of institutions and processes of democratic
governance within the state have to be strengthened to allow leaders to respond effectively
to these demands. This is particularly critical in vulnerable states and post-conflict societies.
Parliaments need to have a central role in poverty reduction plans and social welfare policies,
to link voter’s concerns with elected representatives and the delivery of public services. The
public sector, at national, regional and local levels, needs the capacity to respond to social
needs for education, housing and health care, including using new information and
communication technologies to overcome bottlenecks of service delivery. The justice system
also serves an important role in this process, by maintaining the rule of law and property
rights, and ensuring access to justice, especially for marginalized groups and sectors. The
combination of inclusive participation by the poor with the expanded capacity in the
responsive state can be regarded as necessary for promoting democratic governance and
sustainable human development, ultimately helping to achieve the Millennium Development
Goals.
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Chapter 2: Citizen Community Boards and Social Audits in Pakistan
Patrick Keuleers
Governance reforms often stress the need to make the public administration more
transparent, accountable and responsive to the demands of citizens. The latter are now to be
seen in their roles as stakeholders, not just customers. These new approaches seek to
translate citizens’ views and interests into public policy and to involve the public and local
communities more directly in the allocation and management of public resources. This
chapter analyzes these issues by focusing on Pakistan’s reform strategy for devolution, as
well as the role of Citizen Community Boards and social audits in the reform process.
The reform process introduced in Pakistan illustrates the difficulties when moving from a
closed and non-responsive administration towards a more inclusive form of local
governance. Citizen involvement is given a new impetus through the operations of the
Citizen Community Boards and the social audit process aims to incorporate their views more
directly into the service delivery process. By providing tools and venues through which
citizens can monitor and challenge their governments and at the same time take
responsibility for their own initiatives, local communities are gradually becoming more
empowered to contribute to the transparent, accountable and efficient conduct of public
office. This process of reform has allowed community members and local governments to
held meeting on an annual basis to establish priorities for community development. Such
approaches offer opportunities to address the problems of exclusion and social
disintegration in some of the most deprived communities. While the rates of satisfaction
with social services remain very low, there are positive trend in other sectors that indicate
that change is possible and that, with the necessary political will and sufficient resources,
local citizens can be mobilized to change their own lives.
Nonetheless, the chapter warned us that the process of change is not automatic, nor is it
guaranteed. Involvement of all stakeholders is a sine qua non for success. On one hand, the
establishment of the Citizen Community Boards is instrumental in fostering the political
culture shift from one of dependency and patronage to one of partnerships and selfdevelopment; on the other, government effectiveness - the quality of public bureaucracy,
policy making and service delivery - remains an essential condition for success.
The role played by the social audit process remains, at this stage, somewhat uncertain. The
importance of social audits should neither be overrated, nor underestimated. Traditionally,
governments have associated performance monitoring and evaluation with the mandates of
some core public sector agencies. The perspective of the recipients of government services
has usually been absent in these settings. Participatory performance monitoring aims to add
this missing link. But similar to the more traditional forms of inspection and auditing, their
success depends on the extent that the information and insight generated also lead to
remedial action. While politicians are well aware that people’s perceptions of the legitimacy
of the state are shaped by the quality of the social services they receive, the fact that social
services continue to be seen as deficient makes some observers doubt the cost-effectiveness
of the social audit exercise.
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Chapter 3: Civil Society and Social Accountability
Bharati Sadasivam and Bjøern Førde
New mechanisms of citizen engagement with state institutions have evolved in recent years
to demand more accountability and inclusion. Concerns about accountability and legitimacy
are being voiced by a wide spectrum of citizens in countries in both North and South, who
increasingly share the view that there are problems about governance. Such concerns have
catalyzed a new accountability agenda involving an ever-expanding cast of actors – ranging
from intergovernmental bodies and bilateral and multilateral donor institutions to
corporations and large transnational civil society networks.
The new direct forms of participatory governance are primarily concerned with restoring the
right of citizens to participate in decisions that affect their lives. Participation in these new
settings has raised the possibilities for citizen voice, influence and responsiveness. Rebuilding
relationships between citizens and local government means going beyond civil society or
state-based approaches, to focus on their intersection, through new forms of direct
participation, responsiveness and accountability.
Increasingly, new forms of social accountability in which citizens engage with official
accountability processes use a combination of strategies that pursue vertical channels (like
protests, citizen mobilization and advocacy from the outside) and horizontal mechanisms
(like participatory planning and audit exercises, participatory expenditure tracking, public
hearings and alternative community-led approaches to service delivery). These new
accountability mechanisms encompass a host of issues in diverse countries and contexts, and
they cover the spectrum from awareness-raising and information-gathering to setting up
alternative forms of service delivery to creating direct state-citizen accounting mechanisms.
The participatory budgeting and local governance initiatives examined in this chapter
demonstrate the importance of state-civil society synergies in efforts at deepening
democracy. They show civil society in roles that are neither an alternative to nor independent
of the state. These citizen-led initiatives for state accountability and responsiveness resist
casting the state and civil society as irreconcilable opposites, and they do not present civic
action as a superior alternative to the state and the only means of addressing all manner of
problems.
Moreover, they show civil society formations trying to bring about institutional
accountability through a combination of approaches that target vertical accountabilities
between citizens and the state, and horizontal accountabilities across public institutions.
Success has been determined in part by the extent to which there has been consistent
pressure from agencies of vertical accountability on state institutions to perform in
responsive ways to the poor.
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Chapter 4: Rights to information and the poor: experiences from India
Elizabeth McCall and Alexandra Wilde
Over the last twenty years the number of countries passing Right to Information laws has
risen sharply. By mid-2006, at least sixty eight countries worldwide had established freedom
of information laws, in states as diverse as Bulgaria, Germany, Mexico, Portugal, South
Africa, Switzerland and the UK. What has been the impact of this global development? Can
rights to information also have a significant impact upon human development and social
equality, by empowering poor people and marginalized sectors of society to participate in
public life?
To examine this issue, the study outlines some of the reasons for the rise of Right to
Information laws around the globe then compares the experience of right to information in
two states in India: Delhi and Orissa. The authors argue that laws guaranteeing access to
public information function, under certain conditions, as an instrumental means of
combating the social and political exclusion of poor people and marginalized groups, by
enabling them to hold government officials to account and to improve service delivery.
However, the basic conditions of democracy, rule of law, and respect for human rights need
to be established, so that citizens have confidence that they can seek legal redress under
Right to Information laws without fear of retaliation by the state. The comparison of the use
of right to information by poor people in the Indian cases suggests that three key factors
have largely determined their effectiveness, namely: the existence of strong intermediary
groups (including civil society organizations and the media) to facilitate poor people’s
interaction with government bureaucracy; recognition by the poor of a direct and sustained
benefit from exercising their right to information; and the existence of political will on the
part of the government officials to implement rights to information. Without these
conditions being met, Freedom of Information laws are unlikely to prove effective.
The weak institutional and human capacity in many local government offices can act as a
disincentive to provide information to the public. India’s right to information regime
provides for the imposition of penalties on public officials (fines and disciplinary hearings).
If systematically applied, disciplinary hearings can act as an important incentive as such
hearings impact directly on career prospects and can affect long-term plans. Improving and
simplifying public administration records, developing guidelines and establishing training
programmes on right to information for public officials at all levels would help in addressing
the lack of political will.
More research is needed to fully understand the link between a formal right to information,
the empowerment of the poor, and its impact on human development. It is especially critical
to debunk the myth that the right to information needs to wait for countries to reach a
certain level of human or political development before implementation. Exercising the right
to information itself contributes to the legitimate accounting of resources in the process of
development. Effective anti-poverty programming requires accurate information on
problems hindering development to be in the public domain.
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Chapter 5: Mobilizing Voter Turnout: Nicaragua and Slovakia
Aleida Ferreyra, Linda Maguire, Noha El-Mikawy and Kango Lare-Lantone
Popular participation is fundamental to a vibrant democracy. Participation in electoral
processes provides individuals with opportunities to choose representatives and to hold
elected officials accountable. Many programs seeking to mobilize voters have targeted
traditionally disadvantaged groups, such as women, ethnic minorities, the poor, young
people, and those with disabilities. These programmes have aimed at creating a more
representative, legitimate, and accountable governments. It is often believed that once all
electors can choose representatives and parties reflecting their own concerns, this should
generate parliaments and governments which serve the interests of all people, including the
poor. Equal participation is thought to make governments responsive to all sectors of
society.
Institutional, socioeconomic and political factors have now been widely identified as helping
to explain cross-national variations in patterns of electoral participation. It is now wellestablished in a series of studies that certain institutional characteristics are closely associated
with levels of turnout, including types of electoral systems, boundary delimitation and the
closeness of competition, the use of compulsory voting, voter registration processes, and
voting facilities such as access to polling stations and alternative voting procedures. These
factors can provide higher or lower hurdles to getting citizens to the polls. Demographic
characteristics such as age and gender also have a fairly predictable pattern, with younger
voters usually less likely to participate than older citizens. By contrast, socioeconomic
variations show different patterns, with the effects of income stronger in some societies than
others. The competitiveness of the electoral process (at national and district levels) and the
existence of social and political networks are also often associated with levels of turnout.
Moreover, certain reforms have been recognized as ways that electoral bodies, parties, and
civic associations can encourage greater electoral participation. Typically this includes civic
education campaigns, grassroots movements, and educational programmes. The effect of
these interventions needs careful analysis to identify the most effective options.
The chapter also explores the direct impact of greater electoral participation on broader
processes of politics, notable whether mobilization of traditionally disadvantaged groups will
generate greater pressures on governments to deliver on the MDGs. It argues that more
participation in elections should generally have a positive value per se for democracy because
it should lead towards more representative and legitimate governments. Nonetheless, careful
analysis of the issue of electoral participation is needed before conclusions can be drawn
about its consequences. Levels of electoral participation should also be analyzed in the light
of other forms of involvement in public life, as much as in the context of the level of
election (whether a referendum, presidential, parliamentary or sub-national contest). By
maximizing choice and voice, electoral participation has a positive effect on both human
development and the quality of democratic governance because people have the right to
select their leaders. In this sense, elections are necessary for a democratic system and this
should not be forgotten in the rush to qualify the statement with the fact that they are not
sufficient for a democratic system.
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Chapter 6: Conflict Prevention and Elections: Lessons from Guyana and
Mozambique
Siphosami Malunga and A.H. Monjurul Kabir
In many societies afflicted with deep internal conflicts elections have generally been regarded
by the international community as a process that must be accomplished as part of a
transitional timetable towards a peace settlement. In some cases, transitional elections have
indeed laid the foundation for a sustainable peace-settlement and for rebuilding the state. In
many other cases, however, elections have generated a short-term lull in violence, followed
by a recurrence of internal conflict. Any international intervention in managing conflict and
building peace remains highly risky. So what can reduce the risks of failure by the
international community?
There is broad scholarly consensus that the choice of an electoral system, although not the
only factor, has a significant impact on a country’s political inclusiveness and stability. In
particular, many advocate the use of proportional electoral systems as a way to best ensure
peace in vulnerable states and ethnically divided societies. By contrast, majoritarian winnertake-all systems are often seen as more prone to state failure. Although popular, this view
remains controversial, however, as it has come under challenge. In this chapter, authors
consider the role of elections in preventing conflict and consolidating peace by drawing
lessons from two cases, in Guyana and Mozambique, both states recovering from conflict.
The analysis of Mozambique and Guyana confirms that elections play an important role in
creating and sustaining peaceful democratic dispensations in divided and post-conflict
societies. But they do not do this alone and in isolation from other important factors, such as
a national commitment to accommodating ethnic or political diversity in governance
structures and processes and to undertake inclusive democratic governance reforms,
including within political parties.
One of the persistent obstacles to more effective peace-building outcomes is the chronic
inability of international actors to adapt their assistance to the political dynamics of the
divided or war-torn societies they seek to support. The internal-external disconnect
manifests itself at the conceptual, policy, operational and institutional levels. Unless
significant modifications are made to the existing models of collaboration between internal
and external actors by addressing the politics of peacebuilding, international efforts will
continue to fall short of their declared goals of enabling divided or war-torn societies to get
on the path to sustainable peace and development.
For electoral assistance to be most effective, it needs to be delivered in the context of longterm programmes that build domestic capacity to administer sound elections. To contribute
to this goal, the United Nations, its specialised agencies, UNDP in particular – with the
support of member states-must develop the means to ensure a consistent and sustained
follow-up to electoral assistance particularly in the context of effective peace building. When
appropriately tailored, international electoral assistance can make a very critical and positive
contribution to delivering and sustaining peace in divided and post -conflict countries.
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Chapter 7: Parliaments and Poverty Reduction: the Tanzanian Experience
Hilde B. Selbervik, Vibeke Wang and K. Scott Hubli
Strengthening demands by citizens, if the state is unable to respond at national and local
levels, will fail to achieve solutions to the major structural challenges of development. This
chapter examines the role of parliament in poverty reduction by looking at the Tanzanian
experience. In recent years, Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) have become one of
the most important and common approaches used for planning national development and
for attracting international aid. PRSPs are a requirement before countries can receive
concessional assistance from the World Bank or IMF, as well as being the basis for debt
relief. Despite their importance for development in low-income countries, production of
these plans tends to be dominated by technocratic and bureaucratic elites in government,
with some involvement by civil society, while by contrast parliaments usually played a
relatively marginal role on the sidelines in the process. This has broader implications for
other efforts to engage parliaments more actively in achieving poverty reduction and thus
the Millennium Development Goals.
To explore the underlying reasons behind this process, the chapter provides an overview of
parliamentary engagement in the PRSP process and external assistance designed to
strengthen this role. A review of the involvement of the Tanzanian parliament (Bunge) in
this process provides a detailed case study. The chapter considers the implications for
broader efforts by the international community to strengthen the role of parliament in
poverty reduction.
In general, this study concludes that parliament has remained marginalized in the PRSP
process for several reasons: ownership of PRSPs beyond central ministries or some narrow
government-technocratic circles appears rather low; despite improvements in the last few
years, MPs and political parties are generally disengaged from the PRSP process;
participation and consultation are mainly dominated by civil society; PRSP processes are still
to a large extent driven by external actors; and, while the incentives to complete a PRSP are
generally high, the incentives to put it into practice are not correspondingly strong. In this
context, donors have continued calls to improve parliamentary engagement in the PRSP
process.
While there have been some success stories, external support has tended to emphasize
awareness-raising and individual capacity building for parliamentarians, but not addressed
underlying issues of resources and institutional capacity, nor the incentive structure for
political actors to prioritize poverty reduction efforts. The broader lessons from this study
are that effective international support to improve parliamentary engagement in poverty
reduction needs to meet three conditions: it must be politically contextualized and
integrated into the existing political process; must move beyond awareness-raising and
individual capacity building to address structural issues and political incentives that influence
parliamentary behaviour; and it must demonstrate greater willingness to accept policy
outcomes that differ from the preferred option of the international community.
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Chapter 8: E-governance service delivery: India and South Africa
Raul Zambrano and Pierre Dandjinou
Since the mid-1990s, the growth of information and communications technologies (ICT) has
raised debates related to economic, sustainable, and human development. Supported by the
relatively fast expansion of the Internet, and the even faster rise of mobile phone use, many
developing countries see the strategic use of information and communications technologies
as a productive area to engage with the global economy while addressing, at the same time,
some critical development challenges. Indeed, providing access to the new information and
communications technologies through innovative partnerships is one of the specific targets
established by the Millennium Development Goals.
Yet, information and communications technologies are often absent from all the other
development goals where they could be a key catalyst and where they could help to improve
basic service and information delivery on larger scales and at affordable costs. By focusing
on access to the new technologies, which reflects the so-called “digital divide”, the potential
of information and communications technologies as an enabler for public services has
received less attention. The central issue is the potential of technologies to widen public
access to schools, health care, and social services in developing societies and to bring
innovative solutions to accomplish these goals.
To understand the link between e-governance and the poor, we can examine two case
studies, in India and South Africa. The use of ICT in government and governance process
has two different aspects, one related to e-services for the poor and one empowering citizens
to become active in policy and development discussions. While the final impacts of these
efforts are yet to be fully assessed, the evidence demonstrates the potential that the new
information society has for empowering the poor.
Lessons gained from these case studies indicate that local environment is a key factor;
political decentralization favors inception of locally-grown projects that respond to
community needs in information provision and government services. Overall development
policies that facilitate a two way dialogue between the governed and the decision-makers are
most likely to empower the poor and therefore contribute towards governance and
development.
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Chapter 9: Ensuring Women’s Rights to Inheritance
Nina Berg, Haley Horan and Deena Patel
Land rights and inheritance rights for women have long been a policy concern in many
development countries, as well as for legal opinion makers and researchers concerned with
the interplay between societal development, law, and the improvement of women’s legal
situation. This concern has been accentuated by the consequences of the HIV/AIDS
pandemic for millions of women and children, which are deeply intertwined with the legal
field of inheritance. Strengthened engagement and further research into women’s inheritance
rights in different contexts, taking into account the pluralistic legal landscape that frequently
governs this legal regime in a multifaceted manner, is urgent and of paramount significance.
To understand this issue, this chapter compares experiences from Rwanda and Ethiopia. The
cases illustrate the blurred boundaries between formal, semi-formal and informal normative
frameworks of justice and dispute resolution mechanisms in this area, and the conclusion
recommends effective legislative reforms to strengthen women’s inheritance rights and thus
reduce female poverty.
Evidence from both cases indicates that taken together with other means, the law constitutes
a powerful tool to improve and enhance the status of women. When consciously designed
and applied to do so, the law may provide a normative framework to empower women to
make their own choices and avail themselves of the opportunities they are hence afforded.
However, for a national justice system to respond to the internationally recognized rights of
women to which their states have become signatories or parties, several steps must be taken
and certain social and legal processes must be initiated as illustrated by the case studies.
A legislative framework must be put in place to domesticate international obligations. It is
important that the constitution of a given country includes provisions defining the principles
of gender equality and the empowerment of women. The substantive legislation such as
inheritance laws must also be aligned with these principles. In general, the participation of
women in decision making processes on legislative changes is a key ingredient to successful
reform.
As illustrated by the case studies, however, the greatest challenge with regard to legislative
change is to ensure broad consultation with all stakeholders in order to prepare the ground
for the just application of these changes. The institutional response by the judiciary and the
willingness and capability to effectively enforce new legislation representing radical change
depend on measures to ensure capacity development in line with the intentions of the policy
maker and the legislator. The efficacy of judicial activism as a means of promoting the
implementation of women’s human rights is furthermore dependent on factors such as the
dominant legal culture, the independence of the judiciary, and the existence of a civil society
with the human, legal, and economic resources to effectively challenge laws, policies and
practices. Moreover, enforcement by the judiciary and agencies engaged in the enforcement
of legislative reform does not guarantee adherence to their decisions by the parties to the
disputes. For such reforms to have an actual effect in the society, effective information
dissemination and sensitization campaigns, involving enforcement agencies as well as other
relevant actors including civil society and both men and women, must be carried out.
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Chapter 10: Human Development, Inclusive Growth, and Economic Governance
Selim Jahan
This chapter examines broader issues of human development, equality, and development.
This chapter argues that basic objective of development is to create an enabling environment
for people to enjoy a long, healthy and creative life. This may appear to be a simple truth.
But it is often forgotten in the immediate concern with the accumulation of commodities
and financial wealth. Economic growth and the accumulation of wealth are means to
development, they are not the ends. People are the real wealth of a nation and the ultimate
goal of development is thus to enhance human lives and human well-being.
Moreover, development should enhance all human lives and contribute to well-being of
everyone. Thus equality is a major dimension of development. This implies three things:
equality in terms of opportunities, equality in the processes that influence human lives, and
equality in sharing the benefits of development. If development means opportunities for a
few, participation by a handful and benefits for some, it would be lopsided and unbalanced.
Inequitable development is neither acceptable nor sustainable.
In particular, human development policies also look at inequalities and disparities - not only
in terms of income, but also in terms of capabilities and opportunities. Disparities in access
to basic social services as well as productive resources are a major dimension of human
development policies. These policies also address inequalities in terms of gender, regions,
rural-urban divide, ethnicity, and socio-economic groups. The issue of intra-household
disparities is a major concern for human development policies. Gender equality is a critical
dimension of human development. Therefore, all human development policies also have a
gender perspective. Gender issues are mainstreamed within the human development
paradigm.
Human development policies take into account inter-generational issues. In that perspective,
environmental sustainability is a critical dimension of human development policies. But
sustainability in these policies is not limited only to environmental concerns, but it also
encompasses institutional sustainability, social cohesion, and political stability.
In monitoring and evaluation, human development policies are evaluated first on the basis of
their impacts on human development indicators – both composite such as the HDI as well
as other indicators. Then the impacts are evaluated in terms of disaggregated data in order to
get a true picture of diversified situations. Altogether, this is what is known as human
development accounting. Overall the human development approach calls for a wide range of
policy initiatives and reform strategies to achieve these goals. Achieving the Millennium
Development Goals by 2015 will take a coordinated effort among the international
community, following these principles. Whether the world achieves these goals and targets,
as agreed, remains to be determined.
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Notes about Contributors
Nina Berg is the Rule of Law and Justice Policy Adviser in the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in New York.
Pierre Dandjinou is the e-governance Policy Advisor for the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in Dakar.
Noha El-Mikawy is the Poverty Specialist policy advisor for the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in the Oslo.
Aleida Ferreyra is a Research Analyst for the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in New York.
Bjøern Førde is Director of the Oslo Governance Center for the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice.
Haley Horan is a Research Analyst for the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in New York.
Scott Hubli is the Parliamentary Development Policy Adviser in the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice.
Selim Jahan is a Senior Adviser and Cluster Leader for the Poverty Group, in the United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in New York.
Abul Hsanat Monjurul Kabir is the Knowledge Network Facilitator for the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice in New York.
Patrick Keuleers is currently working as policy advisor to the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Regional Centre in Bangkok.
Kango Lare-Lantone is Governance Institution reform Specialist, based in the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) SURF in Dakar.
Siphosami Malunga is the Governance and Conflict Prevention Advisor for the United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice in Oslo.
Elizabeth McCall is a researcher and consultant currently affiliated with Edinburgh University.
Prior to this, she was the Civil Society Policy Advisor for the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice in Oslo.
Linda Maguire is the Policy Adviser on Electoral Systems and Processes in the United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice in New
York.
Pippa Norris is the Director of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
Democratic Governance practice based in New York.
Deena Patel is a consultant for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)’s
HIV/AIDS Group based in New York.
Bharita Sadasivam is a Policy Advisor in the Civil Society Division, Bureau for Resources and
Strategic Partnership, in the United Nations Development Programme in New York.
Hilde B Selbervik is a researcher at the Christian Michelson Institute, Bergen.
Vibeke Wang is a researcher at the Christian Michelson Institute, Bergen.
Alexandra Wilde is currently working for the Community of Democracies. Prior to this, she
was a Governance Specialist for the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) based in the Oslo Governance Center.
Raul Zambrano is the e-governance Policy Advisor for the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) Democratic Governance practice based in New York.
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Related electronic resources
Forging social accountability
Guide to Civil Society Organizations Working on Democratic Governance: http://wwwbeta.undp.org/gov-newest/docs/Policy-Guide-CSO_GOV_Booklet.pdf
Handbook on Working with Political Parties: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/policy-pub-polpartieshandbook.pdf
Practical Guidance Note on Civic Education: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/A2I_Guides_Civic%20education.pdf
Communication for Empowerment: Developing Media Strategies in Support of Vulnerable
Groups: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/A2I_guides_communicationforempowerment.pdf
Practical Guidance Note on the Right to Information: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/A2I_Guides_RighttoInformation.pdf
Guide to Measuring the Impact of Right to Information Programmes: http://wwwbeta.undp.org/gov-newest/docs/A2I_guides_righttoinfoimpact.pdf
Mobilizing electoral engagement
Getting to the CORE: A Global Survey on the Cost of Registration and Elections:
http://www.undp.org/governance/docs/Elections-Pub-Core.pdf
ACE Electoral Knowledge Network http://www.aceproject.org/
International IDEA Voter Turnout Database http://www.idea.int/vt/
Strengthening state capacity
Strengthening Parliamentary Involvement in the Poverty Reduction Strategy Process and the
Millennium Development Goals (Three Tool Kits): http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/parl_other/Parl%20-%20Guides%20-%20parlthandbooks.htm
Parliament, the Budget and Gender: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/ParlGuide_parlbudgen.pdf
Engaging Parliament in the Millennium Development Goals: A Key Part of the National
MDG Strategies: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/parl_pub_MDGSEngaging.pdf
Programming for Justice: Access for All: http://www-beta.undp.org/govnewest/docs/Justice_Guides_ProgrammingForJustice-AccessForAll.pdf
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MAKING DEMOCRACY DELIVER – EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Making Democracy Deliver: Innovative Governance for Human Development
Synopsis
At the UN Millennium Summit the world adopted an ambitious series of goals and targets to
achieve by 2015. Good schools. Clean water. Ending hunger. Empowering women. Cutting
disease. How can democratic governance help confront and overcome these global
challenges?
Many hope that electoral democracy will automatically improve human development. Yet
the impact is not as simple and straightforward. Today many countries hold competitive
elections for political leadership in legislative and executive offices. This is a critical step
towards democracy yet these contests alone, even when free of manipulation and fraud,
cannot automatically solve complex and intractable structural problems. The reason is that a
lengthy and complex chain links the act of expressing preferences through casting a vote at
the ballot box with the eventual outcome for political parties in parliaments and leaders in
governments, the role of public sector officials at national and local levels, and finally the
eventual management and delivery of public goods and services designed to alleviate
pervasive poverty, reduce deep-rooted social inequality, and provide basic health care. This
fragile chain often breaks at multiple stages, especially in vulnerable states.
How can democratic governance be made to deliver more effectively? This study presents a
dozen case-studies of practical governance innovations which have been tried and tested in
developing countries. Cases are selected from places and contexts as diverse as Pakistan and
India, Mozambique and Guyana, South Africa and Slovakia, Tanzania and Nicaragua, and
Rwanda and Ethiopia. Learning from the success – and acknowledging the real limitations of these innovations holds considerable promise of deepening democracy and strengthening
human development, gender equality, human rights, and civic engagement.
Three alternative strategies are illustrated. Direct forms of social accountability empower
communities to hold public officials responsible for failures of local development.
Community boards, social audits, participatory budgeting, and right to information laws
illustrate these processes. Elections remain important but everyone needs to be able to
participate fully. More inclusive forms of participation have mobilized the poor and
traditionally-marginalized sectors of society, while power-sharing elections have reduced
conflict and built peace. Lastly, the state also needs capacity to respond effectively to public
demands. Reforms have strengthened the role of parliaments in poverty reduction strategies,
used e-governance for more efficient service delivery, and reformed access to justice for
women. Chapters illustrate each of these strategies then reflect on the broader set of
initiatives ensuring that all people benefit from the fruits of economic growth and
governance reforms.
Challenging the conventional wisdom, drawing on the unique experience and insights of
practitioners engaged in the international development community, and presenting some of
the latest research on these topics, this report presents fresh insights into how democratic
governance can innovate to meet basic development needs.
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