Institutional and Governance Review
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Publication CPIA Africa, July 2018: Assessing Africa's Policies and Institutions(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-07) World Bank GroupFavorable global economic conditions supported a turnaround in economic activity in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2017, easing pressure on weak policy frameworks. Output growth rebounded to an estimated 2.6 percent after decelerating to 1.5 percent in 2016 amid challenging external and domestic conditions. Notwithstanding the recent upturn in economic activity, growth remained well below its pre–financial crisis average of around 5 percent; moreover, per capita growth was negative for a second consecutive year. Important near and longer term vulnerabilities remain in many of the region's economies: eroded policy buffers constrain the scope for countries to formulate an adequate policy response to adverse shocks; public debt relative to gross domestic product (GDP) is rising, with implications for debt sustainability; employment opportunities severely lag the growing labor force, and livelihoods and economic fortunes are still tied to commodity price shocks and production disruptions, underscoring the limited economic diversification in the region; and poverty is widespread.Publication Indicators of Citizen-Centric Public Service Delivery(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-05) World Bank GroupThis report and the instruments it proposes aim at assisting public administrators in ensuring that their service delivery mechanisms respond to the needs and expectations of citizens. This document summarizes research undertaken under the set of activities dealing with citizen-centric governance indicators, that is, indicators that measure the capacity of public agencies to put the needs of citizens at the center of their service delivery mechanisms. The report is structured into five parts. Part I presents the conceptual framework that forms the backdrop for developing citizen-centric service delivery indicators and summarizes what citizen-centric service delivery entails. Part II introduces two complementary tools designed to assess the performance of public institutions and the quality of public services from the perspective of European Union citizens: a demand-side citizen survey and a supply-side self-assessment checklist for public administrators. These complementary instruments, assist public agencies identify gaps and areas for improvement in their service delivery mechanisms by gathering direct feedback regarding the experiences and perceptions of their users and by critically examining public sector efforts to fulfill the needs and expectations of citizens. The instruments are flexible, inspirational tools that provide an initial grid for administrations willing to move one step closer to their citizens. Part III describes options for customizing the instruments, which can be adapted to a variety of circumstances and service delivery types. Parts IV and V present the citizen survey and administrator checklist.Publication CPIA Africa, July 2017: Assessing Africa's Policies and Institutions(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-07) World Bank GroupSub-Saharan Africa faced another challenging year in 2016. Economic activity continued to weaken, amid less favorable terms of trade, slowdown in global growth, and difficult domestic conditions. Output growth decelerated sharply to 1.3 percent, the slowest pace in over two decades and not as stellar as the average annual growth of around 5 percent in the pre-global financial crisis period of 1995–2008. Regional growth in 2016 was insufficient to raise gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, which contracted by 1.3 percent. At the same time, Sub-Saharan Africa's poverty rate remains high: 41 percent of the region's population—nearly 390 million people—were living in extreme poverty in 2013. Weak economic performance threatens gains in poverty reduction, and the region urgently needs to regain momentum on growth and make it more inclusive.Publication Building Sustainable Public Sector Capacity in a Challenging Context(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-01) World Bank GroupIn a conflict-affected and newly independent country like South Sudan, rebuilding public sector capacity is an important aspect of state building, both in the short and in the medium to long term. If capacity strengthening is not pursued or is ineffective, government functionality remains patchy and dependency on technical assistants (TA) remains high. Capacity strengthening has been considered amorphous and a difficult topic in academic literature. This paper looks at the experience of efforts to strengthen capacity in South Sudan over the decade from 2005 to 2016. The context has proved challenging for capacity-building efforts. On the one hand, some improvements have been seen and some skilled civil servants are in place. On the other hand, wider progress has been difficult and punctuated by crises and setbacks. Renewed conflicts from December 2013 to August 2015, and again since July 2016, have disrupted progress and planning for development support. The report’s recommendations are based on the assumption that minimum stability will eventually return for capacity strengthening to restart; but it cannot be predicted when this will be the case.Publication Building Institutional Capacity for Implementing the National Climate Change Strategy in Romania(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-11) World Bank GroupRomania has already been affected by climate change. The IPCC projections indicate that the climate will warm up over this century at least in line with global projections and precipitation patterns will shift so as to make winters wetter and summers drier. Already, in 2007, Romania experienced the warmest year in two decades (average temperature 11.5° C against a 25 year average of 8.4° C) and the most severe drought in the last 60 years while in 2005 there were historic floods, which caused 76 deaths and significant property damage. The effects of these extreme weather events adversely affected the country through significant economic loss in agriculture, transport, energy supply, and water management. Consequently, mitigation and adaptation to climate change are increasingly important priorities for Romania. After the introduction chapter, the current situation as well as the CC commitments that Romania has undertaken are presented in chapter two. Chapter three provides the possible good practices that could provide inspiration for further reform. A contrast of the commitments with the current capacity and the available good practices has been substantiated in the analyses of capacity gaps that need to be addressed in chapter four. The next chapter provides the avenues for breaching those gaps and sustainably building CC capacity in order to ensure the smooth implementation of the strategy. Project management and financing is treated separately in chapter six since it has been an issue of particular concern and difficulty for the GoR. Finally, chapter seven sets out the basic elements of a public engagement campaign that will be essential for making CC a national issue present in the awareness of the public authorities, civil society and general public alike. A comprehensive list of the proposed measures and their time horizons can be found in annex one.Publication CPIA Africa, June 2015: Assessing Africa's Policies and Institutions(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-06) World Bank GroupThe Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) Africa report describes the progress African countries are making on strengthening the quality of their policies and institutions. Some of the results from this report include: The overall quality of policies and institutions in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa was unchanged in 2014, but there was much variation in performance across countries. More than half the countries in the region saw a change in their policy environment: 10 countries experienced an improvement in their overall CPIA score, and an equal number saw a deterioration. There were divergent trends across policy clusters. Economic management weekend on the back of continuing fiscal policy slippage, as the sharp drop in commodity prices underscored weaknesses in the fiscal framework of several of the regions countries. By contrast, there was some strengthening in the governance cluster, with nine countries showing improvements in scores, more than twice the number of countries with declines. The greatest progress in this cluster was in the quality of budgetary and financial management.Publication CPIA Africa, June 2014: Assessing Africa's Policies and Institutions(Washington, DC, 2014-06) World Bank GroupThis report describes the progress African countries are making on strengthening the quality of policies and institutions that underpin development. It presents Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) scores for the 39 African countries that are eligible for support from the International Development Association (IDA). This year's report expands coverage to include Djibouti and Yemen from the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA). The scores, which are on a scale of 1 to 6 with 6 being the highest, are an indicator of the quality of these countries' policy and institutional framework across 16 dimensions grouped into four clusters: economic management (Cluster A), structural policies (Cluster B), policies for social inclusion and equity (Cluster C), and public sector management and institutions (Cluster D). The overall quality of policies and institutions in Sub-Saharan African countries held steady in 2013, with divergent performance across countries. The average CPIA score for Sub-Saharan Africa held steady at 3.2 in 2013. But beyond the flat regional average, there was considerable divergence in country performance. For the region's IDA borrowers, scores were in a range of 3.9 to 2.0. A broad-based deepening of policy reforms lifted Rwanda's CPIA score in 2013, and the country joined Cabo Verde and Kenya at the top of the score range. Other top performers include Burkina Faso, Senegal, and Tanzania (all with scores of 3.8). South Sudan and Eritrea remained at the low-end of the score range (2.1 and 2,0, respectively), weighed down by deep policy and governance challenges. The quality of policies and institutions in MENA countries lags behind the average for middle income countries in all CPIA categories with scores lower relative to the Sub-Saharan African IDA country average. Since 2005, neither Yemen nor Djibouti has improved its overall rating; indeed, Yemen's overall policy and institutional score actually declined. The average CPIA score for countries in MENA was 3.0 in 2013, unchanged from 2012. Both Djibouti and Yemen had unchanged scores, indicating that despite unsettled conditions in the region and lingering challenges in global economic conditions, these countries generally opted to maintain their existing policy framework. Djibouti's CPIA score (3.1) was slightly higher than the average while Yemen's was on par with the average.