Other Public Sector Study
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Publication
The Evolving Role of the Planning Function: International Experience and Reform Options for India
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-11-01)This note presents the main trends in strategic planning across public sector administrations in seven countries: Australia, Canada, Brazil, Mexico, Malaysia, South Korea, and Colombia. It was prepared in response to the Indian Government's interest in understanding the emerging trends in the evolution of strategic planning in a range of countries and effectively adapting this function across public administration at the national and subnational levels. -
Publication
Chatbots for Third-Party Monitoring: CivicTech Pilot in Madagascar
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-06)Growing evidence confirms that citizen engagement is key to improving the delivery and quality of public services, management of public finances, and to promoting social inclusion, resulting in tangible improvements in people’s lives. The advent and availability of new technologies provide new opportunities to reach citizens, aggregate their ‘voice’ and demand, help governments respond, and partner with citizens to find and implement solutions collectively. With the right approach, CivicTech enables citizens to overcome income, social, and geographical barriers to interact with governments and participate at the local or national level. The CivicTech pilot in Madagascar supported the development of a Facebook ChatBot (bot) to enable third-party monitoring of service delivery operations for the Madagascar Public Sector Performance Project (PAPSP, P150116). A similar approach could be replicated for Community Driven Development (CDD) projects and local government and decentralized service delivery projects to achieve a multi-channel structure for third-party monitoring (offline, mobile, and web). The note documents the CivicTech pilot experience in Madagascar and lessons learned. -
Publication
Citizen Engagement in Operations: A Stock-Take of Citizen Engagement in Development Policy Financing
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-06)Guided by the 2014 Strategic Framework for Mainstreaming Citizen Engagement in World Bank Group Operations, the World Bank supports policies, programs, projects, and advisory services and analytics where citizen engagement (CE) can improve development results. While the corporate commitment to mainstream CE targets investment operations, the World Bank teams continue to explore CE in other instruments. Engaging Citizens for Better Development Results, a report by the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG), assessed the Bank Group’s efforts to mainstream CE. It recommends the World Bank “encourage and support efforts of its regional, country, and Global Practices teams to establish, where appropriate, thick CE that is regular and continuous, uses multiple tools, and is embedded in country systems.” It also suggests this objective could be achieved by more systematically using existing channels of dialogue and stakeholder engagement, including that of Development Policy Financing (DPF), and applying tools at the various levels. Given this context, this Governance Note aims to take stock of existing CE practice in DPF by shedding light on the prior action usage. -
Publication
Freedom of Information Access: Key Challenges, Lessons Learned and Strategies for Effective Implementation
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-06-01)Implementation of the right to information as established in a Freedom of Information Access (FOIA) Law provides a foundation for institutionalization of transparency and support for anti-corruption efforts. Passage of a FOIA law is only a first step toward accessibility of data and documents held by public agencies, however. Effective implementation of a FOIA requires that public agencies take additional steps to put laws into practice and overcome common implementation challenges that can render FOIA laws ineffective. This note, which builds on previous World Bank research on factors determining effective implementation of FOIA laws, reviews cases of introduction of FOIA laws around the world and summarizes the main challenges, lessons learned and key strategies emerging from these experiences. Its primary aim is to inform Italian public agencies charged with implementation of the FOIA law about steps they can take toward effective implementation. As such, it focuses on areas of activity typically within the purview of public agencies, as opposed to those typically in scope of policymakers or central agencies charged with implementation and/or legislative oversight of FOIA. -
Publication
Bangladesh Right To Information Survey 2019
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020)The year 2019 marks the tenth year of the Right to Information (RTI) act enactment in Bangladesh. The Government of Bangladesh (GoB) has made good progress in implementing the RTI Act 2009 in the past decade. The RTI survey was conducted between January and March of 2019. The survey results reveal that the contribution of the RIT Act 2009 has overall been positive in the last decade. Especially, notable progress has taken place in making the supply side prepared in implementing the RTI Act. The survey will enable policymakers and RTI activists to identify and seal the pores and bring about the desired changes in perception, behavior, and actions of various stakeholders, including the citizens. -
Publication
Improving Public Sector Performance: Through Innovation and Inter-Agency Coordination
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-10)This report is an inaugural issue in a new series that aims to offer a fresh look at how developing countries are overcoming persistent problems in public sector management. Significant improvements in public sector performance are being evidenced across the developing world today, as government officials and political leaders find new and innovative ways to tackle long-standing challenges. Part I of this report demonstrates that public sector performance is being pursued diligently and successfully across a variety of country contexts, including in low-income environments. Through surveying its governance specialists from around the globe, the World Bank has assembled a collection of 15 cases that showcase how lessons from global experience are being adapted and applied in practice. The report also explores common success drivers that appear in each of the cases. Part II focuses on a special, cross-cutting topic that is critical to public sector performance -- policy and inter-agency coordination. As the responsibilities of government have grown in volume and complexity, policy and program coordination has become ever more challenging, and the stakes have never been higher. Enhancing coordination will depend not only on the adopted formal institutional mechanisms, but also on their interplay with the broader institutional environment and with other processes that influence coordination. -
Publication
Republic of Azerbaijan: Corporate Governance and Ownership of State Owned Enterprises
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-11)This Technical Note assesses the corporate governance of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Azerbaijan with a view to supporting the government’s efforts to bolster economic development. Mutually reinforcing recommendations are closely linked and aim to increase accountability across the whole ownership structure of SOEs, from their ultimate owners, the citizens, to their employees. The Note outlines international good practice, summarizes current practices in Azerbaijan, and indicates areas for consideration to improve SOE corporate governance in Azerbaijan. The Note was prepared by a World Bank Group team, based on research and consultations during January - October 2017, to (i) analyze current SOE governance frameworks and practices in Azerbaijan and identify main deviations from international good practices; and (ii) develop a series of policy recommendations for further reforms in strengthening SOEs governance and improving their effectiveness. This work may serve as a basis for further collaboration between the World Bank and the Government of Azerbaijan towards SOE reform and related policy considerations. Given the significance of SOEs and a range of important socio-economic and political-economy related factors, improving SOEs governance in Azerbaijan is a significant challenge. Implementation of any of the recommendations contained in this Note should form part of a broader strategy for SOEs linked to economic and sector strategies in Azerbaijan. This Note aims to build on the priorities outlined by the Strategic Roadmaps for the national economy and main economic sectors of Azerbaijan for 2016-2020, signed by the President of Azerbaijan on December 6, 2016. The Roadmaps re-affirm Azerbaijan’s priorities in diversification of its oil-dominant economy, reduce the State’s participation in the existing state-owned enterprises, and enable more private sector led growth. -
Publication
Realizing the Devolution Dividend in Kenya through Cohesive Public Finance Management and Public Participation at County Level: Challenges, Lessons Learned, and Recommendations
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-08)This report covers four areas that had been identified by County officers from both the County Executive and the County Assembly as areas that have brought conflict and disharmony in Counties. These issues and challenges cut across Public Finance Management (PFM), public participation, functions and powers of the County actors and formed the basis for capacity building and training intervention that was provided through the Council of Governors (CoG) and Kenya School of Government (KSG) with the support from the Kenya Accountable Devolution Program (KADP). This brief report highlights the issues and challenges identified in four thematic areas and then provides the identified good practices and lessons learned that can be considered and implemented by County Governments. The first chapter discusses the PFM legal framework with reference to the fundamental processes of planning, budgeting, revenue, expenditure, and financial reporting and relates these to identified areas of conflict that are experienced while executing various PFM processes. The chapter also makes corresponding recommendations for good PFM practices in Counties. The second chapter highlights the challenges that County Governments have experienced in rolling out public participation and provides conceptual clarification and examples of good practices. The third chapter highlights areas that were recurring areas of misunderstanding and misinterpretation with regard to the Constitution and legislative framework on devolution (especially relating to functions and powers of the County Executive and County Assembly). Further, it articulates the Constitutional framework and interpretations of key provisions covering those areas of concern to facilitate common understanding that would help reduce recurring operational disharmony and conflicts. The fourth chapter highlights challenges that the County assemblies experience while executing their responsibilities with regard to fiscal matters and suggests good practices that should address these. This report is intended to be a simple, practical, go-to reference resource for County Executives and County Assemblies on common challenges that they experience while executing their roles and responsibilities and suggests good practices that can help them navigate through the challenges. -
Publication
Practical Approaches for County Governments to Facilitate Public Participation in the Planning and Budget Process
(World Bank Group, Washington, DC, 2015-02)Kenya's new Constitution and supportive legal framework contain multiple provisions requiring both national government and counties to make information publicly available and consult with citizens in planning and budgeting. Citizen participation affords county governments an opportunity to empower citizens on their operations and to deliberate, debate, and influence the allocation of public resources. This working paper presents practical approaches for Kenyan counties to implement public participation in their systems that encourage meaningful public engagement. -
Publication
Responding to the Challenge of Fragility and Security in West Africa: Natural Resources, Extractive Industry Investment, and Social Conflict
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015)The inability to unlock natural resource wealth for the benefit of developing countries’ local populations, a phenomenon popularly known as the ‘resource curse’ or the ‘paradox of plenty’, has spawned extensive debate among researchers and policy makers in recent years. There is now a well-established body of literature exploring the links between natural resources and conflict, with some sources estimating that over the past 60 years, 40 percent of civil wars have been associated with natural resources. Following this introduction, Section two provides an overview of interstate tensions in West Africa in order to improve understanding of the drivers of fragility that trigger conflict between countries around extractive industry investment. Here, the discussion is grounded in examples in which interstate tensions have been apparent, including the case of the Mano River Union, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, a region with a history of conflict, and where the exploitation of commercial deposits of high-value resources may continue to have a potentially destabilizing effect. Section three focuses on the decentralization of natural resource revenues, a process that proponents believe can help manage grievances and defuse intrastate tension in areas directly affected by resource extraction, but one that is also not without challenges. Drawing upon the case of Ghana’s Mineral Development Fund, the section explores the potential for conflict (and conflict triggers) to arise when the redistribution of extractive industry revenues to subnational regions takes place. In doing so, it becomes apparent that the capture and misuse of revenues from the fund is as much a political issue as it is a policy or technical one. This sets the stage for section four, which focuses in greater detail on extractive industry-related conflict within catchment communities, and how contestation is most often a result of unequal power relationships. Section five, the conclusion, summarizes and reflects upon some of the challenges and struggles over resource management associated with West Africa’s recent resource boom, and draws out some of the cross-cutting themes. Here, suitable entry points for future lines of inquiry and engagement are identified.